Frankenstein, 1994 – ★★★

Overambitious, overstated, overblown, overwrought. What could’ve been a great companion-piece to Coppola’s Dracula takes the theatricality of the earlier film, but little of the craft, invention, or subtext. Examples of the film’s defect are myriad: John Cleese’s RIDICULOUS dentures, the amniotic bath wrestling match, the disappearing equipment from Frankenstein’s lab, Branagh’s perfectly kempt beard on a man wild with ambition, the dance-like camera moves, the speaking subtext aloud, the immediate shift from elation to regret at the monster’s creation, “I will have revenge…Frankenstein!”, and many many more examples. That said, DeNiro is excellent as the monster, especially in his dialogs with the blind man and on the sea of ice, and the bonkers Bride birth sequence is pretty great. Overall, with a Darabont script this could’ve been much better.

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