Frankenstein

Frankenstein (1931)

[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021884/]

The Gist:

I wonder if a gist is really necessary, since the elements of the Frankenstein movie are so pervasive that you know most of the film coming into it. I will say the German Expressionist stylistic flourishes are a welcome sight and that the film succeeds a great deal in its simplicity. It doesn't try to hone in too heavily on the themes of Shelley's book, but allows those themes to come to the surface naturally and concisely. The film only lasts an hour and ten minutes and really should have ended with the shot of the mill burning down. That was the poetic ending. The next scene where Dr. Frankenstein is being nursed back to health by his fiancée while his father rattles on in a way that I suppose was intended to be charming, that was the forced Hollywood ending that hurts my soul. Also, I don't know why Boris Karloff was so good at making "NGGH!!!" sounds and waving around his arms frenetically but he totally was. Good on you dead Russian guy whose name didn't even get into the original credits.