Back in the middle of the last century Mary Wollstonecroft Shelley wrote this shocker of a scientist who created a synthetic man. The soulless robot quickly got out of hand, went on a blundering, bloody rampage, and had to be killed by the indignant populace. Thus science, for presuming to be God, was put in its place.

For all our blasé new-century viewpoint, there is still a kick in Professor Frankenstein's creation of life in a hulk constructed of stolen corpses — when the Monster first moves on the experimental table, when he goes stumbling, inarticulate, into the warmth of the sun, when he smells the scent of a rose, and when he unknowingly kills a little girl who innocently invited him to play with her.

The Monster — clumsy, hollow hulk of unguided power — is done with a fine nightmare touch, by the aforementioned Boris Karloff. Frankenstein, that silly fellow who monkeys with the sacred problems of life, is well done by Colin Clive, who was the nerve-racked British officer of Journey's End. And Frankenstein is shrewdly directed by James Whale, the man who made Journey's End.

Publication Date: December 26, 1931