Del Toro understands Victor.  Even more than other directors that have taken on Mary Shelley’s masterpiece, -that Victor Frankenstein is incompatible to any other human. Del Toro provides a blended reason for it. Victor’s contempt for others and authority, his abusive and rigorous father, and his complete self-centerness. A genius that views people and even his creation-the creature- as not to be measured equal to himself. The film says the reasons are that it is in his psychology, as well as, his environment that molded his chosen and/or predestined isolationism.  Although many try to inject into life, Victor will only welcome them if they can serve him or be an asset to him. In this film, as it is in the book Victor was so consumed by the means to resurrect an assembled human body he never gave a thought to what he would do if it worked. In the book Victor runs away, in this film he does something even worse. Del Toro also understands the creature. A living human forged from of many parts of others that just wants to be compatible with someone and will never be able to. The version of the story Del Toro is showing is that you create the horror that you are most afraid of. To Victor it is companionship. “Frankenstein” is the story that sparked science-fiction and is still cherished after all these decades and centuries and Del Toro’s version will live on for many years.

Set in a lush, saturated environment Del Toro provides the aristocratic world to which Victor emerged from. Del Toro is a master at production design and setting the place of the story. There is no doubt that this film will be Oscar nominated for costume and production design. A world where color pops, and architecture screams. A rich blend of gothic and victorian style. Each scene is full and lavish. It easily sucks you in. It might have long odds to get an academy best picture nomination or a nomination for assembled cast although I will be submitting this film for my association under those categories. 

Where the film gets off its stride is from the script. The script tends to go a little on autopilot for some time, and goes massively heavy-handed at the end. Still, it is a great film and might remain in my top ten at the end of the year. It will certainly be in other film critics’ best of year- it just won’t be unanimous. There will be many more adaptations of this story to come. It’s what keeps this story going.  Del Toro did slip in an homage to 1957 “The Curse of Frankenstein”  in this that all of us film lovers enjoyed. It got a laugh from many in the critic’s row at the screening. It would be interesting to see from many, many years from now in a next adaptation what they would put in their version that is an homage to this one. 8.5/10