Frankenstein (1931)

Film: Frankenstein (1931)
Stars: Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles, Boris Karloff, Edward van Sloan
Director: James Whale
Oscar History: No nominations, but it was one of the American Film Institute's Top 100 Movies, so general film history has been pretty kind
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

We all have huge gaps in our respective film-watching careers.  For some of us, it's that one nagging classic that you somehow haven't gotten around to for some reason that we can't 100% explain.  For others, it's a particular subset of films (people who have never seen a John Ford western, for example).  And on occasion, it's both.

This was the case for myself with Frankenstein, a legendary film that also happens to be a part of film history that I have largely missed-this is the first of the classic Universal Monster films that I've seen.  During the 1920's and 1930's, Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, and the Lon Chaney's (Sr. and Jr.) created some of the most indelible images in horror movie history.  The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Phantom of the Opera, the Wolf-Man, Dracula, the Mummy, and the Invisible Man (Claude Rains, but let's not quibble) are a pretty stupendous lineup of great horror film characters, and over eighty years later we're still borrowing heavily from these films.

While I've officially added all of these films to my Netflix queue (I love that there exists a Netflix where you can add any movie from any year to your upcoming viewing list), it's a little odd to see Frankenstein for the first time.  Like other classic movies that you've never seen but are clearly familiar with, every scene is exactly how you'd expect it to be, and there are parts of it that, I have to say it, "come alive" as you're watching.

The entire sequence with the monster becoming part of life is thrilling-Colin Clive's electric call of "it's alive, it's alive" has the same impact whether you're seeing it for the first time or the thirtieth.  It just sparkles with that sort of movie magic that you can't duplicate or deplete, no matter how many times you see it or that it is mimicked.  This is the case with most every moment with the lumbering, terrifying Karloff.  Karloff's performance is excellent, with him resisting persistent talking, and still using his lumbering frame and heavy makeup to impose all of our fears onto the creature.  The movie manages to best use him when you can see his humanity, like the scene with the little girl, where he accidentally kills her and sets the city off on a terrible rampage.

The film is shorter than you'd expect from a classic (I'm always floored when a movie that is so revered clocks in at little over an hour), and despite the length, still has some dull moments.  Mae Clarke, for example, is a bit too damsel in distress for my taking, and any moment of the film that doesn't focus on the creature is very staged.  But the movie jolts and crackles when Karloff is guiding it (which is a good chunk of the film), and has made me excited to investigate the rest of the Universal catalog.

What about you-what films have you been putting off that you should have tackled years ago?  Do you have a favorite of the Universal monsters?  Share in the comments!