60 Nights of Horror #15: Bride of Frankenstein

The #60NightsofHorror2022 theme of Women Being Molded into What Weird Men Want Them to Be continues this week with a return to the subject material of Gothic!

Mary Shelley, after being called a perfect angel by Lord Byron, gives a sly smile and says "You think that."

"Bride of Frankenstein" is less about the Bride herself and more about the circumstances that led the Creature to WANT a bride, namely the old blind hermit telling him "alone = bad," and "friend = good." But the old blind hermit also told him that Fire = Good and we all know how that worked out.

A theme that really stands out to me is the nonconsent involved in bringing life to dead materials. It's not like we're putting a disembodied soul back in, which would have its own problems. We're creating a life and putting it into an adult form it doesn't understand, expecting it to behave and to learn and not react with absolute horror at its own existence. Love dead, hate life indeed. The creature didn't consent to be here and his entire life has been misery. And lonely as he is, he doesn't understand the violation inherent in his wanting someone like him, someone with whom to suffer. Not until it's too late.

Of course there ain't nothing I've said here ain't already been said, and there are a thousand think pieces on this that have been jizzed out by brainier brains than mine over the past 87 years.

But gosh is it pretty to look at.

It's important to remember this was 1935. 19-fucking-35 they had these special effects! They were pioneers, improvising and implementing the methods that would lay the groundwork for how to use a camera to tell a story. Nearly every shot is a painting. The sets are sumptuous.

The script spells a lot out for people who may or may not have understood the moral of the story, but not everyone in 1935 was a scholar and shit ain't that different now, but I'll allow it.

Watch this if you want to know where everything you love comes from. And then go watch Gods and Monsters. And listen to Alice Cooper's "Ballad of Dwight Fry."