Sci-Fi Bulletin: Exploring the Universes of SF, Fantasy, Horror and Spy-fi!

Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is almost here and this latest trailer gives us a good look at just how much of a ride we’re in for. Here’s what Alasdair Stuart spotted.

0.01 – Lightning

1 second in and we’ve got lightning striking a gothic tower at night. That’s a statement of intent right there!

0.14 – ‘My maker told his tale. And I will tell you mine.’

This is such a beautiful line, because it expresses the central conflict of the story. One of these men created the other, but he created (at least) an equal and is so horrified by that, and the destruction of the natural order and the violence that follows, that this war between them ensues.

0.14 – Cruciform imagery

There’s something unique about the combination of mechanical, scientific and religious in this Frankenstein’s set up. The cruciform position for the Monster is especially unsettling.

0.27 – Oscar Isaac, Everybody!

Oscar Isaac, in silhouette, stalking through the streets in a great hat. God I love how this movie looks.

0.30 – Vesalius and the bodysnatchers

This shot, which seems to show Victor making his way through a morgue to look for ‘suitable candidates’ does some interesting work in setting the movie in historical context. The morgue itself is beautiful, with a vaulted bright ceiling and a weird grandeur to it.

But it’s Victor who’s the most interesting part of this shot. By confirming that he’s making his way through morgues, the movie also puts him solidly at the far end of a tradition of graverobbing that began with outright crime. Andreas Vesalius, considered the father of modern anatomy, got his start stealing corpses from graveyards to dissect and study. He died in 1564 but laws against using the human body to study… well… the human body remained in place up through the 19th Century. William Burke and William Hare were Edinburgh ‘resurrection men’, essentially semi official graverobbers. By this time, Scottish law only allowed medical research on the cadavers of prisoners, suicide victims, foundlings and orphans. Demand, shall we say, outstripped supply and as a result Burke and Hare decided to speed the process. They killed sixteen people before they were arrested.

All of which is to say Victor’s work sits on the line between crime and science and that line is very, very blurry and remained that way for a long time.

0.34 – Gore

That, my friends, is a straight up eyeball being put in what appears to be the monster’s head.

0.35 – Red gown

This is where things get weird and FUN. We get a glimpse of a figure in a red dress with massive folds of cloth blowing around them. Here it looks like they’re just a person in the scene. That will change shortly.

0.39 – Frozen battle

I have no idea which battle this is but those look like British redcoats, with the distinct white cross straps on their chests.

0.56 – The Perfect Guillermo del Toro shot

Every del Toro movie has at least one ‘Yep, Uncle Guillermo did this one alright’ moment. Oscar Isaac with long hair and a Byronic shirt looking worried in front of a Medusa frieze next to an extremely (but perhaps not permanently) dead body feels like that here.

1.05 – Flowpocalypse

I love the immensely flowy gown Mia Goth as Elizabeth Lavenza is in here. I also love how the Monster is shot as an absolute wall of physicality throughout.

1.16 –  Burning the urns

Actually, Oscar Isaac in a flowing coat throwing kerosene on an ornate decayed gothic staircase that may be covered in petrol cans or urns is the most del Toro moment.

1.21 – Who the hell is this?!

Possibly literally?! That’s a red, winged figure with a halo, surrounded by blowing fronds of red. Is the figure we see earlier this one? Is it a recurrent hallucination? Given the fact it takes its own face off, signs point to yes.

1.30 – Christoph Walz!

For a second! He’s playing Heinrich Harlander, Elizabeth’s uncle, an arms manufacturer and Victor’s patron.

1.36 – Walking through fire

I adore how practical this looks. A ship frozen in ice, actual fires, a bunch of terrified men firing muskets and something not fully human walking through them like they’re a minor annoyance, all under the Northern Lights. God this thing looks pretty!

1.38 – Is he saving the ship?

Because that looks a lot like he’s pushing the ship loose of the ice

1.40 – Victor gets beaten up

And looks far more bestial than his Monster doesn’t he?

2.06 – ‘Now. Run.’

The monster is in charge, and this image of him holding a lit stick of dynamite and playing with Victor is as nightmarish as it is, well, kind of deserved.

Frankenstein is in some theatres from 17th October and on Netflix 7th November and I cannot WAIT.