frankenstein must be destroyed (cinema history class)

Session: Monsters of Hammer, week 3
Movie: Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed

Plot:
Baron Frankenstein is experimenting with brain transplants. With the reluctant help of a young doctor and the young doctor's fiance, he works his magic using the brain of his former colleague. Hilarity ensues.

Class Reaction:
This may have been, overall, the best general reaction to a movie that the class has had. We all thought that this was a great movie.

My Thoughts:
Given the screaming title and sensationalized trailer, I was expecting a much trashier movie. And I was expecting to see the classic Frankenstein's Monster with green skin and bolts coming out of the neck. In fact, FMBD is actually a quite intelligent film. In the after-film discussion, I compared it to some of the movies based on Michael Crichton novels. I believe the ones I cited were The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Crichton had a habit of writing science fiction that centered on something that seemed plausible but slightly beyond the reach of current science. Invariably the plot involved something going awry. Jurassic Park is another good example. In FMBD, Frankenstein is working on brain transplants -- something which, in principle, is plausible.

That's not to say that this was an overly-cerebral movie. While the central premise and plot were intelligent, there was a dose of trashiness, which made this feel more like something from the early 1960s than 1969 (which was the actual release year). Director Terence Fisher did a great job of building suspense early, and keeping it going. There really wasn't a dull point in the film. And the ending, bleak though it was, was perfect.

Peter Cushing turned in another great performance. Manic. Brooding. Clever. Almost sympathetic. Sometimes I wonder if he was capable of a bad performance.

The only thing I didn't like about the film was the rape scene. Apparently it was filmed over the objections of Peter Cushing, Veronica Carlson and Terence Fisher (respectively, the actors involved in the scene and the director). All because a Hammer executive thought it was necessary to keep the American audience happy. But because of the way it came about, the scene was out of place and out of character. And the rape is never mentioned or alluded to afterwards. Worst of all, if not for that scene, Frankenstein would be an almost sympathetic villain.

The class all agreed that the rape was out of place. IN fact, if I recall correctly, Joe said that it lowered his rating of the movie from a 9.9 to a 9.5.

In this session, I have been consistently surprised at the quality of the movies Keith has been showing us. I may have to rethink my impression that Hammer was a trash-producer.