Hi again!
First, my sincere apologies for again being late with this one, but I had good reason.
Yesterday evening, while helping with the youth service at my church, I took a rather nasty spill. I'm still aching a bit, and probably will for another couple days, but I'm better than I was last night. My hands took part of the fall, so they were too sore last night for me to write much of anything, but I'm able to write now, so I'll do this one, and try to do the next one tonight if I'm able.
This one's 1933's 'The Bride of Frankenstein.'
A direct sequel to the original, with James Whale returning as the director, and Colin Clive and Boris Karloff (The latter referred to in the credits simply by his last name; I guess they figured he was recognizable enough that including his first name was unnecessary) returning as Dr. Henry Franenstein and the monster, respectively. The role of Elizabeth has been recast for this one, now played by Valerie Hobson, taking over the role from Mae Clarke.
We open with the author Mary Shelley (Elsa Lanchester) sitting in during a storm with her husband Percy and their friend Lord Byron. They give a brief summation of what happened in the previous Frankenstein movie, then Mary points out that the story actually didn't end there, and proceeds to tell what happened next...
We see immediately after the windmill climax of the first film, that the monster apparently survived the windmill fire by going down to a lower level. He kills two people, the parents of the little girl he had accidentally drowned in the first film, when they come down to see if they can find its body.
While this is happening, Dr. Frankenstein is brought back to his house and nursed back to health by his fiancee Elizabeth. He is abruptly approached by a fellow scientist named Dr. Pretorious (Ernest Thesiger). Pretorius informs Frankenstein that he was very excited to hear about the monster's creation, and says that he desires the two of them work together to see if they can make a female monster to act as a mate/ bride for the original creature. In an amusing scene that follows, we see that Pretorius is himself something of an expert in creating new life, as he has created several 3- inch- tall people of various kinds. Still, Frankenstein has no desire to make the same mistakes he mae before, and turns Pretorius down.
When the villagers discover the monster's still alive, they do what they do best: Form an angry mob and capture the monster. They put him in prison, but he quickly breaks out and flees into the woods. There is a heartwarming segment in which, while fleeing, he wanders into the house of an old blind man desperate for a little company. The two start to become friends, and the blind man teaches the monster a bit on how to talk (As well as giving the monster a fondness for wine and cigars), before a pair of hunters come along and ruin everything, forcing the monster to flee again.
As the monster approaches a cemetery, he eludes the villagers by hiding in a crypt. There, he sees Dr. Pretorius and a couple henchmen taking a young woman's body from the crypt, clearly still interested in creating a bride. Pretorius is completely calm to discover the monster, whom he then gets to become his accomplice through the promise of a bride/ friend to help the creature deal with his own loneliness.
Pretorius repeats his offer to Dr. Frankenstein (Who had apparently married Elizabeth since we last saw him), and as added incentive, has the monster kidnap Elizabeth and promises to only release her if Frankenstein agrees to help him. Frankenstein agrees, and so they go back to Frankenstein's old lab and ultimately create the Bride, a strange creature played by Elsa Lanchester in the second of her two roles in this film, who twitches her head around a lot like a bird. The monster tries to be friendly to her twice, but each time she screams, clearly as horrified by his appearance as everyone else who sees him. Knowing that he belongs dead and so does the Bride, the monster has Dr. Frankenstein and Elizabeth flee the lab, then pulls some kind of self- destruct lever which blows up the lab, killing himself, the Bride, and Pretorius all at once, and so the movie ends.
As usual, I'll get what I dislike about the movie out of the way right off. First, it's weird that they call the movie 'The Bride of Frankenstein,' yet the Bride only appears for the last 3 minutes or so of the movie. Second, Una O'Connor (Who I mentioned played the obnoxious, shrieking landlady in 'The Invisible Man') returns as the Frankensteins' obnoxious, shrieking servant, Minnie. Fortunately, she's only in a few scenes. Third, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for the lab to have a self- destruct lever, especially one as big and bulky as the one that the lab has, that's like an accident waiting to happen. Even if the monster hadn't deliberately pulled it, it would probably only be a couple days or so before some idiot would trip or something and accidentally hit the lever.
Now, for what I liked. First off, the opening with Mary Shelley was very cool, though it's odd that Elsa Lanchester is credited for playing her but not for playing the Bride. Second, the special effects in it are amazing for the time, especially the little people Dr. Pretorius created. Third, Karloff does an even better acting job playing the monster in this than in the previous one. He talks, and expresses a lot more emotions this time around, in particular you really pity him when he tries to reach out to the Bride and she spurns him. Fourth (But tying in a bit with the last point), I consider the scene with the monster and the old blind man to be easily one of the most poignant moments in any Universal monster film. O.P. Heggie does a wonderful job as the blind man, you can sense the amazing joy he feels over having finally found a friend, and the monster, too, appears to be very happy to for once be around someone who not only doesn't fear or hate him, but actually likes and cares for him. It's one movie moment which will stay with me for the rest of my days.
So, that's 'The Bride of Frankenstein.' If you haven't seen it, do so ASAP, it's on Youtube.
I'll try to get another installment up later tonight if I can (If I do, it'll be the last of the classic monster movies before I move onto my next theme for this month). See you later!
