In the same year that ‘Dracula’ terrified audiences, Universal was already winding up the follow up 1-2 punch of the decade in the form of 1931’s adaptation of ‘Frankenstein’ I’ll admit, when it comes to the Universal monsters, I always had much more of a soft spot for Frank than Drac. but I feel its not without good reason.

Dracula is a romance film sold as a horror flick, but ‘Frankenstein’ is a horror flick with a touch of romance and macarbre comedy. Across the board it feels like a step up on ‘Dracula’ maintaining the style established in the Vampiric flick, but leaning much more into the surreal and nightmarish.

The script is a little slow boil by modern sensibilities, but at 70 minutes long, I really cant complain. the first and third acts are all rock solid action horror fun throughout, though the second act, to me, does sag a little as we end up spending elongated time with the Baron Frankenstein and talk of engagements and weddings abound…

The tone is a near perfect blend of horror, action and tragedy, with just a smidge of dark comedy for good measure. I feel they could have leant into the tragedy and dark comedy a bit more for my money…Though I dont think its spoilers really to say they do that more in the sequel.

The characters are all a tad eccentric and manic, a probably intentional choice to show just how grounded ‘The Creature’ is when compared to an actual god born man. my only critique? is they are a little one dimensional. Now, I could argue that years of pop culture oversaturation has made these characters feel one dimensional, when, at the time, they would have in fact felt quite fresh and unique…But then I wasnt born in the 1920’s to have had first hand experience on that front…So what do I know?

The direction once again embraces the german expressionist movement, if anything this film leans into it even more with superb end results. the creature design is iconic and simply excellent (though I feel the subtle refinements in ‘Bride’ really finish the design off) Its a gorgeous looking film with both its studio and location based sequences blowing the socks of anything that was coming out around this time.

The cine is also excellent, with a wide range of shot types, a rich and textured depth of field, some ASTOUNDING sound studio sets (the mansion set where you can actually see the ceiling has to be SEEN to be believed!) I also have to compliment the lighting which uttelry saves this picture, anything less than whats on screen would have failed to truely capture the macarbe in quite the same way.

The performances? Boris Karloff. Nuff said.

and the soundtracks a little stocky, but beautiful and haunting in its own way.

while probably not my ALL TIME favourite universal monster movie, Frankenstein is almost certainly top 5 for me. a powerful work that is still as striking as the day it was comitted to celluloid. and a major feat of the time. Recommended.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/frankenstein-1931/