Number 380 on the top 1000 films of all time is James Whale's Gothic horror film 'Bride of Frankenstein.'
Sequel to Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein portrays a previously un-filmed subplot of Mary Shelley's original novel. Scientist Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) and his mentor Doctor Pretorius (Ernest Thesiger) work to create a "Bride" for the monster (Boris Karloff )they created in the last film.
The original story was the birthchild of Mary Shelley when she, her husband Percy Shelley, Lord Byron are stuck inside on a rainy, miserable day. To stave off the boredom, they challenge themselves to tell the scariest ghost stories ever and, so Frankenstein, was borne. Bride of Frankenstein began by portraying this very incident in a way to establish some continuity (more on this later) between it and its successor, but I don't think this was necessary. I think any viewer could have filled in the gaps quite easily.
A criticism I had for the original film was their unfair portrayal of Frankenstein's monster. In the original novel, he is portrayed as an intelligent and articulate, if hideous being. In Frankenstein, he is little more than a simple-minded beast. This edition helped to rectify that mistake. He's still far from being any type of Renaissance man, but we do see more depth to his character.
He's not just an animal now, but somebody desperately looking for friendship like when he befriends a blind hermit who teaches him how to speak and how to enjoy life. Boris Karloff should also be credited for bringing some humanity to a monster that everybody misunderstands. Rather than being a mindless brute, he's more something to be pitied.
This film also helps to develop Henry Frankenstein. Far from being a mad scientist, he still wants to continue his pursuit to the secret of life and immortality. Again, he has more depth than the first film.
At the start, I talked about continuity. I know this film was only made in the 1930's but there were a whole slieu of continuity errors. One I particularly remember was when the hermit was showing the monster how to smoke. He passes his cigar to him, but in the next cut, both characters have lit cigars.
Bride of Frankenstein was enjoyable enough with well-developed characters, despite its dodgy editing.
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