Frankenstein 1931 talk

[Mikey]

Just watched Frankie '31 on TCM last night and was wondering...

Did the producers intentionally make Frankie a sympathetic character, or did audiences eventually interpret the Monster differently as times and public opinions changed ?

[cjefferys]

I think the monster was always a sympathetic character, even in the original Shelley novel I felt the same thing.

[Hector]

He's a sympathetic character...in a way, he's a victim himself...

[Gorn Captain]

From what I remember, the creature in the book is more intelligent, making his own decisions as he realizes he'll never be accepted.
Karloff's creature, with his damaged brain, makes him somewhat more "endearing", as he's not all that aware of everything. More like someone acting on instinct, and yes, maybe a bit more "animal like", like a smart pet that gets rejected by its owner.
A large part of what made the movie creature sympathetic, is Karloff's gentle touches, which few actor after him succeeded in replicating.

[PNGwynne]

I recall reading somewhere that Karloff's Monster can be seen as showing a progression for child to adolescent to adult in his three movies; I think that's apt.

The Monster does have pathos and elicits sympathy. I think that is due to Karloff and director Whale--you certainly don't see that in later Universal programmers.

[enyawd72]

Karloff and Whale deliberately set out to make the monster a sympathetic character. This was definitely a risky move for the times, especially within the context of the story. (namely the accidental drowning of little Maria) Karloff actually objected to that particular scene, but Whale insisted it was necessary to show the tragedy of the monster.
I have little doubt that Whale projected his own persecutions onto the monster. It's obvious the monster is not evil, despite the plot device of the "criminal brain". He lashes out only at those who mistreat him. His kindness towards Maria and again towards the blind hermit in Bride show he is truly good at heart, but is driven to commit evil acts by constant cruelty and persecution. He is the beaten, starved dog who turns on it's master and becomes wary and vicious towards other people as a result of abuse.

[madmarva]

Other than Maria, the monster killing the old couple at the beginning of the Bride is his toughest act to excuse, but it's not inconsistent. The creature lashes out from pain and fear, but later shows tenderness when he's treated well by the blind man. Whale had so much going on in both films.

And Karloff should have been nominated for an Oscar. His work is just as strong 80 years later.

[Gorn Captain]

Whale's movies treat the Creature as a true character, while later he became a caricature, restricted to a couple of stereotypical moves ("stretch out your arms and groan").

[MIB41]

The monster is absolutely a sympathetic character, but as a child I was terrified of him. Especially back in the late 60's and early 70's when those films were enjoying a new audience. With everything kids see today I can believe children are more sympathetic to the character as originally intended. But back when I was a kid (long before the Exorcist, Jaws, or Halloween) the Frankenstein monster by Karloff or Strange were heavy hitters for scariness amongst my age group. The idea you could put the brain of a criminal inside a freakish looking monster and then watch him kill people, even kids, certainly didn't command a sympathetic reaction from me. Frankenstein today is fully restored with the monster reacting to the girl's drowning in the pond. Back in my day, you only saw him reach for her, then it broke off to an edit of the father carrying her limp body. That only gave it a more sinister overtone and supported this notion that his desire to kill came from the criminal brain. I was a kid. How could I or any kid possibly see past that and catch the symbolism and allegory in play with those ideas? Clearly as I became older I began to see the messaging and read between the surface imagery. But as a kid, it mortified me seeing a monster composed of dead people, breaking out and killing other people, including kids.

[Earth 2 Chris]

Agree that yes, he was meant to be a sympathetic character. What is hard to imagine now, is how horrifying his look was to audiences of the time. Making a character that hideous one to pity and care about was a risky move at the time.

And Karloff was right. He vacated the role because he saw in Son of Frankenstein that the monster would soon become a prop...and he did. As much as I love Glenn Strange's look as the monster, he didn't get to do much in either House films. At least A&C Meets Frankenstein offered him a bit more to work with.

The pathos of the monster was lost when Ygor's brain was placed into his skull at the end of Ghost of Frankenstein. Hard to sympathize with a convicted graverobber who plots world domination. It's easy to forget, if you follow the continuity, the monster from the end of that movie forward is not really the original character, but Ygor's brain in the body.

Chris

[MIB41]

Agree that yes, he was meant to be a sympathetic character. What is hard to imagine now, is how horrifying his look was to audiences of the time. Making a character that hideous one to pity and care about was a risky move at the time.

And Karloff was right. He vacated the role because he saw in Son of Frankenstein that the monster would soon become a prop...and he did. As much as I love Glenn Strange's look as the monster, he didn't get to do much in either House films. At least A&C Meets Frankenstein offered him a bit more to work with.

The pathos of the monster was lost when Ygor's brain was placed into his skull at the end of Ghost of Frankenstein. Hard to sympathize with a convicted graverobber who plots world domination. It's easy to forget, if you follow the continuity, the monster from the end of that movie forward is not really the original character, but Ygor's brain in the body.

Chris

Good points Chris. It's worth noting too that Frankenstein came out only a few short years after the advent of sound to film. If you watch the opening sequence of Frankenstein, you'll note a very high degree of audio attention to things you would never hear quite the same way again. Like the shovel hitting the dirt. Or the dirt landing on the coffin. Those were graphic horrors for audiences of that day because it really put you in the moment with them digging up a grave. You were not only seeing it, you were hearing it with graphic detail. When you consider the United States was composed of a ultra conservative Christian population, this was a very risky and horrific image placed upon society. The idea of telling a story about people not only desecrating graves, but removing bodies from their resting place to be chopped up to make a monster was a vivid and incredibly risky move. It not only horrified the public, it challenged their value and belief system in a way the Exorcist would do much later. Originally Universal was very uneasy about releasing it at all. They thought Whale had overdone it with the graphic violence and messaging in the film. Note the restored reaction by Colin Clive when he said, " Now I know what it feels like to be God!" That didn't exist on any copies I saw on television as a child. That was removed after the initial release of the film in theaters and was not present on rereleases until the movies became available on VHS in the early 90's. So it's always worth applying context to these films when watching them. Heck my dad took my mom on a date to see this in the 40's and they said audiences were still screaming. So it was a very heady film for it's day. And it took decades for them to run as censored versions before they finally reached restored status as we all know them to be today.

[Earth 2 Chris]

^Too true Tom. My grandfather told of seeing this film when he was a teenager, probably in it's first run. The movie had quite an impact on him. He was walking the railroad tracks home, alone, in the dark. A man stepped out of the shadows and asked "Hey buddy, got a light?". My grandfather couldn't answer him, because he was already home by the time the guy finished his question!

Chris

[Gorn Captain]

I remember my Mom talking about the first time they went to see Chris Lee as Dracula, in the 50s.
She said she was absolutely terrified. You had to be 18 to get in. And that was 20 years after Frankenstein, so they were used to more things.

The impact of the Creature's look in 1931 most have been even more shocking, and the concept of a revived corpse even more.
I wonder: did people back then see him as sypathetic, or do we, as later generations, have more compassion for him?
Any member here see it in '31?

[PNGwynne]

Chris, my grandfather had a similar story. He had grown up an Ohio farmer and would've been almost 20 when he saw the film with some friends. According to him, one of the guys wouldn't go back to his home by himself after the show.

I think these films, very novel in the '30s, were truly terrifying to contemporary audiences. But heck, we were watching them as children on SuperHost.

[Hedji]

The general image of the monster definitely still has the power to scare the little ones. Ever been to the House of Frankenstein in Lake George NY? (The Niagara Falls one is crap now, sadly) They have a guy working the pavement dressed up, and he is pretty intimidating. When I was a kid, it would scare the bejeezes out of me, and my feet would turn to lead, such that my parents couldn't drag me within a 30 foot radius of him. Here is a pic of my and my daughter from a few years back.