Frankenstein (2025)

No matter how you feel about Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, this rendition of an all too familiar story is a triumph. Somehow Guillermo del Toro manages to make something that feels almost new, and definitely rich and strange, and yet it is crafted out of a story we all thought we knew well. I haven't read the original in quite some time, but my son who has both a photographic memory and a recent reading was very impressed with the adherence to what Shelley wrote. The 21st-century movie does veer off the 19th-century source however. Mary Shelley’s novel was complete as of 1818, and the movie is set in 1857, which, because the author died relatively young (brain tumor) is several years after the author’s own death. Placing the tale squarely in the Victorian era grounds it in period trappings more sumptuous and therefore consistent with the over-the-top tastes of the director, it also allows its visionary scientist Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) to place electricity more fully at his disposal when animating his creature. This is a half hour too long, but otherwise amazing.