Rewatched Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed and viewed Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell since my initial post. Unfortunately my DVD of The Horror of Frankenstein skips horribly or refuses to boot up at all, so I'm going to have to buy it again or find somewhere to rent it before I can watch it. It's a shame the rights situation of these movies is so mucked up, because I'd love to see a Blu-ray box set of the entire series of Hammer Frankensteins.
1. The Revenge of Frankenstein - What makes this one for me is that Frankenstein is somewhat trying to redeem himself after his actions in the first, the uniformly compelling characters, Frankenstein's great refusal to admit his identity to the board, the great trick opening... just everything, really. My favorite of the whole series.
2a. The Curse of Frankenstein - The original and it still holds up wonderfully. Love Frankenstein's willingness to get his hands dirty in the first of the series.
2b. Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed - Rewatched this one and I've decided it's second only to The Revenge of Frankenstein in my esteem. The rape scene remains troubling (as does the reason for its existence, especially), but other than that I love the particularly dark, ruthless take on the doctor that Cushing gives here and the final act is absolutely awesome. In many ways this movie belongs more to the class of horror films ushered in by Night of the Living Dead and continued with The Texas Chain Saw Massacre -- it's modern and seems to reflect the state of society and era in which it was released. Were it not for that repugnant rape scene and a few lapses in logic this would rate as one of the all time great horror films, IMO. As it is, it's very, very good and one of the top tier Hammer horror movies.
3. Frankenstein Created Woman - Okay, so some of the stuff here is confusing as hell (how is Hans' soul in Christina's body but also instructing her to get revenge as a severed head?), but the whole business about the soul is also very interesting, it's extremely enjoyable watching the villains get their just desserts, the gore is good, Cushing gives one of his best turns as the good doctor... definitely one of the best in the series despite the confusing script.
4. The Evil of Frankenstein - Has quite a bit going for it, including good production design and an especially good performance from Cushing IMO, but the whole angle with the hypnotist becomes a little tedious for me. Certainly nowhere near as bad as it's often said to be.
5. Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell - My god, that wig... Well, this isn't a bad movie by any means, my ranking it as the least of this great series shouldn't be viewed as thinking it was anything less than good. However, it suffers from its obviously low budget, a terrible looking monster, and odd shifts in tone as well as an unoriginal storyline. I do think that it's interesting to see the good doctor doing his experiments behind bars and the film shows us the disturbing reality of Frankenstein's obsession: Even locked away in an asylum and even after his latest catastrophe with another experiment going awry, he's never going to stop. Cushing's performance is very good. Shane Briant is good as his protege. But I simply can't help but feel it just doesn't bring much new to the table. However, it's six (or seven, depending on your point of view) films into the series, so its lack of freshness isn't unusual for such a lengthy series. Still a decent movie by any standard.
reply
share