A One Mann’s Movies review of “Frankenstein” (From the 2025 London Film Festival). (2025, 4*, 15).
Another LFF film that is on limited release, in selected cinemas, from today in the UK. Guillermo del Toro’s passion project, “Frankenstein”, is a Netflix production that will start streaming on November 7th. But this really is an impressive, big-screen spectacular which – if you can – you should try to see at the cinema.
One Mann’s Movies Rating:
Plot:
A Danish ship is stuck in the ice in an effort to reach the North Pole. An explosion on the ice draws the crew’s attention to a badly wounded one-legged man called Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) that they rescue from the ice. Victor is being pursued by a terrifying creature that puts the whole crew in danger. While onboard, Frankenstein recounts his story.
Certification:
UK: 15; US: R. (From the BBFC web site: “Strong violence, injury detail”.)
Talent:
Starring: Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi, Chirstophe Waltz, Mia Goth, Charles Dance, Felix Kammerer, David Bradley, Lars Mikkelsen, Christian Convery, Rafe Harwood.
Directed by: Guillermo del Toro.
Written by: Guillermo del Toro. (Based on the novel by Mary Shelley.)
Running Time: 2h 29m.
Summary:
Positives:
- A genuinely handsome production, with rich sets and costumes and drenched in colour.
- We take the side of the creature in his melancholia, and feel his pain.
- Great ensemble acting from Isaac, Elordi, Goth and Waltz.
Negatives:
- The creature immediately after creation is still more comic than scary.
- Why is the creature invincible?
- Quite gory in places which might not be to everyone’s tastes.
Full Review of “Frankenstein”:
A genuinely impressive opening.
It’s 1857 near the North Pole and the opening scenes of the film made me go “Wow”! Netflix have clearly spent a lot of money on making this one look good. We see the ship’s captain (Lars Mikkelsen) put his ship in danger to help this strange and damaged man, so it is only right that he should recount what put him there. “Some of what I tell you is fact. Some is not. But it is all true” intones Victor (Oscar Isaac), mysteriously.
We then zap back to Victor’s childhood where his father (a riveting Charles Dance) rules him with a rod of iron, physically punishing him for homework he can’t learn properly. As such, Victor is close to his mother Claire (who, I never realised, was also played by Mia Goth in a dual role). This makes his life pretty shit but then Claire dies in childbirth. Life becomes shittier still for Victor when that son, William (Rafe Harwood), becomes the apple of his father’s eye.
All of this section of the film is delivered with an opulence of location (Lincolnshire’s Burghley House by the way), costume (Kate Hawley), hair & makeup and production design and it is filmed (by Dan Laustsen) in a gorgeous saturated colour. Totally lush.
Genuinely spooky cadavers.
As the action moves to Edinburgh for Victor’s research, he presents half of an animated corpse to professors and staff at the university: a truly obscene creation that is sufficiently lifelike to creep me out! Once again, the production design and special effects team really came up trumps.
This session introduces us to Victor’s new benefactor, Harlander (Christophe Waltz): an arms dealer responsible for mangling many thousands of men on Europe’s battlefields and seemingly wanting to give something back. But is that his only motive? Harlander funds the enterprise but with a warning for Victor to tread carefully: “Can you restrain your fire Prometheus? Or will you burn your hands before delivering it?”
Enter Elizabeth.
As it turns out, Harlander is the father of Elizabeth (Mia Goth, again) who is set to marry Victor’s brother William (now Felix Kammerer, from “All Quiet on the Western Front“). But the obvious attraction between Victor and Elizabeth tells us that this is not going to be an easy triangle to square.
Elizabeth has a combative relationship with her father, as she is clearly a pacifist. Mia Goth is again mesmerising on the screen: strange, ethereal and empathic. It’s a terrific performance.
The mood crashes.
Of course, Mary Shelley’s story is not sweetness and light and as we descend into the realms of gothic horror, the sets become more extreme – a huge deserted water plant on the moors, wonderfully gothic – and the colour palette becomes blue/grey reflecting the more sombre mood. Christoph Waltz delivers some wonderful acting in these scenes with Oscar Isaac and the script is really crisp and interesting. As he urinates into a toilet bowl he declares “French porcelain chimes to a man’s stream” before – putting Victor properly in his place – he demands that he empty it for him!
Desplat scores again.
The score is once again by Alexandre Desplat, with some risky and unusual choices. A scene where Victor is assembling his creature from the different body parts of dead soldiers is accompanied by, on first sight, the most inappropriately jaunty tune. But it really works well.
Creating “Merciless Life”.
Of course, the process of creation involves a lot of electricity (about 2.21 Gigawatts, I would guess) and an approaching storm is set to deliver the goods. The dumb old lump of meat that is produced (now Jacob Elordi) still manages to be more comic to me than sad or scary, despite del Toro’s best efforts. It’s about this time that “Young Frankenstein” would have got him doing a performance of “Putting on the Ritz”, but sadly that is missing from this film.
Instead, we switch (via on-screen chapters… never my favourite thing) from “Victor’s story” to “The Creature’s Story” and the film gets much more interesting as we see the creature develop. He does this partly through a relationship with a blind man (David Bradley) and he desperately tries to make sense of his life and why his creator has betrayed him. It leads to some genuinely moving moments: “I am obscene to you but to me I am but myself” he bemoans.
Frankenstein is like Captain Scarlett.
One aspect of the film that struck me as a bit daft is why or how the creature is so invincible. He gets shot and blown up but still comes back for more, his body self-healing itself. It seems like a super-power he has that was never given to him. At one point, he seems to disobey basic physics, dropping like a stone to the bottom of the Arctic Sea and then, inexplicably, rising to the surface again and smashing his way through the ice.
A gore-fest.
Also a word of warning to those who don’t like gore: some of the scenes of the animated cadavers and of the bodies being chopped up for reuse are on the gory side, so some eye-shielding might be required.
Summary Thoughts:
There is a certain irony about the fact that Guillermo del Toro has been working towards “Frankenstein” for much of his working life, just as Victor Frankenstein has done with his creation! Whereas Victor drops his result like a stone, with a “seen that; done that” attitude, I hope that at least del Toro gets more satisfaction from seeing his new work appreciated. For I think it’s a majestic motion picture and I personally enjoyed the ride very much.
As I said in the intro, it is out in cinemas on selected release now and will be on Netflix from November 7th 2025.
Where to watch?
Trailer:
A trailer for the film is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aulMPhE12g.
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