Extravagant Gothic Sci-fi Melodrama is Alive in Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein
Hearing the words “Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein” is one of those cinematic prospects that almost just makes too much sense — a truly sublime synthesis of creator and creation. The resident conductor of projects swirling all around a general sense of delicately handcrafted dark fantasy, the prospect of del Toro taking on Mary Shelley’s ever-enduring Gothic science-fiction tragedy is one that not only, in theory, fits like a glove, but at this point feels like a legendary “what if?” of cinematic speculation, seeing as del Toro has been talking about adapting the story for somewhere in the realm of two decades. As far as the union between director and eminent story that has informed so much of their work, the materialization of the project recalls arthouse horror favorite Robert Eggers finally getting his shot to adapt Nosferatu in 2024 (both even feature Ralph Ineson!).
But where Eggers struggled to justify why his visually stunning brand of period horror warranted another revival of a frequently retold story, del Toro finds a distinct point of view through his signature ghostly and poignant reverie. Frankenstein is indebted to the text’s central tenets without being a straight recreation. It invents characters, twists the plot, expands the story into new locations, and ultimately divides the narrative in half in a casually bravura feat, transforming more directly into one of del Toro’s spectral fairy tales rather than a traditional retelling.
Of course, Frankenstein is still ludicrously lavish and ornately made and designed. Getting dropped into the film’s prelude, which acts as the story’s central anchor as Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) recounts his tragic and horrible tale of an abominable creation to a crew of arctic explorers who have rescued him from the freezing tundra, we’re immediately treated to the cinematic eye of del Toro’s regular cinematographer Dan Laustsen, capturing the frozen plains with a panoramic richness, creating wonderful portraits of the landscapes, as well as the scale and intricacies of a massive ship stuck in the ice. Moving into Victor’s tale, it’s all sumptuous photography of marvelous costume and production design from Kate Hawley and Tamara Deverell, respectively, tracing a story that tracks how Frankenstein’s grief as a child has followed him into adulthood, and ends up hollowing him out so deeply that he can’t hope for rescue, only salvation.
In that way, del Toro has fashioned Frankenstein into a melodrama that’s more directly about the sins of the father being passed down to the son — Frankenstein is a man cultivated so thoroughly from a childhood of desperately pining for the love of his father and mourning the loss of his mother that he creates new life to spite the world, only to cyclically reanimate the conditions that led to his madman-like ambition and emotional remove. When he’s ostracized out of revulsion aimed at his initial prototype of his eventual creature, wealthy benefactor Henrich Harlander (Christoph Waltz) steps in to help subsidize what he sees as the next big scientific breakthrough. Little does he realize that the project is an exhumation of the depths of Victor’s soul, destined for tragedy.
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