Frankenstein

Curiosity was a major component in the film, Frankenstein. When Frankenstein asks the doctor if he has ever wanted to do anything dangerous, he explains how if no one was curious or brave enough to look beyond what we already know, we wouldn't know anything and wouldn't learn anything new. I think this is a general theme throughout the movie, especially with Frankenstein and his monster. Frankenstein uses his knowledge and creates something that was never attempted or accomplished before, while his monster also explores things and wants to learn what is new and what this life is.

Besides curiosity, which is a big element of human nature, there are so many other themes that were played throughout the film, such as human emotional experience, which can be felt throughout with the characters in the film and also how the audience feels while watching it.

Although the idea of Frankenstein is fictional, the characters feelings, emotions, the environment, etc., all live in our real world, but were vividly expressed in this film while adding a fictional character: the monster. Henry's curiosity led him to create a monster who was unable to cope with normal society. Unable to grasp the concept of anything around him, the monster was lost and confused, which led him to hurt and kill people. Still not understanding, the monster escaped to eventually hurt more people and get killed by the one thing he was truly scared of: Fire. Realistically, the audience would understand that they would have also acted the same as the rest of the townspeople if there was some undead monster running around hurting people, which would seem realistic in that sense of the movie.

The characters in the movie were the most important part of the film, because they all expressed emotion and their thoughts throughout the movie. Frankenstein, who was the monster's creator, was intelligent and mostly curious to see if he could create something like never before. He was the whole reason the plot even existed. Sadly, he is also the reason so many people got hurt and killed since his creation was out of his hands. His wife was someone who seemed pure and innocent, just like the little girl by the lake. The wife showed the sane side of things and also understood that what was going on was wrong and that bad things were going to happen if continued. The little girl by the lake was, like mentioned earlier, this idea of hope, purity and happiness. The monster tries to express those feelings with this little girl, and the audience hopes that she is slowly helping the monster change into this pure innocent creature. But of course, the monster doesn’t understand that he is doing wrong when he throws the little girl in the water and kills her. The monster is this sad, confused character that people are terrified of. He is put into this world which he is unable to understand and is harassed at the very beginning with fire and torture. It's sad to say that some of the other characters could have approached this situation differently and helped the poor creature possibly turn out better than he really did.

Like the themes, there were many symbols throughout the film, such as: Fire, dark/light, religion, the tower, power, etc. Fire was something that scared the monster and eventually killed it. It was the light and he was the dark, even though light is what awakened him (lightning) and light is what put him down (fire). The daisies in the film, along with the wife and her dress, represented purity and happiness which neither the monster nor Frankenstein grasped.

This film is definitely a sci-fi film, because we have this plot of a man who creates a man out of other men! It's unreal for someone to bring a human back to life and teach it how to live, breathe, eat, talk, sleep, live like a normal human. This scary monster is what children are afraid of and what we know as science fiction.  Personally, I enjoyed this film because it was so beautifully shot from beginning to end and great use of resources especially during that time. The graveyard scene, which was my favorite part, at the beginning of the movie really sets the mood for the entire movie. I also enjoyed this more than Metropolis mainly because of its use of silhouettes and having the technology that allows voice!