She's alive!

Golems, doppelgangers, doubles, replicants, cyborgs, monsters:


I just reread Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (complete text available online here) because I bought Peter Ackroyd's fascinating novel The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein.

The first film version of the Frankenstein/Monster story was a silent feature made in 3 days in 1910. I've seen the famous 1931 James Whale film, with Boris Karloff as The Monster.

I have never seen the 1994 version called "Mary Shelley's Frankestein," directed by Kenneth Branagh in which he played Victor Frankenstein, casting Robert de Niro as the creature, and Helena Bonham Carter as Elizabeth. But I just watched Ken Russell's famously over-the-top movie Gothic, (with Gabriel Byrne! and Natasha Richardson!!)

In the comic art world, Bernie Wrightson's illustrations are prized by fans. The drawings were collected and published by Marvel, but have been rescanned and printed in a higher-quality, full-sized version by Dark Horse.

Mexican director Guillermo del Toro has confirmed that he is planning his own version of Mary Shelley's novel, which makes sense, but it is still a few years away.

Now I'm watching Gods and Monsters, an amazing movie made of only $3 million, but absolutely gorgeous. With Ian McKellan, Lynn Redgrave, and Brendan Frasier in his best role ever. The shooting script for this Oscar-winning film about the director of the most famous film version of Frankenstein can be downloaded here.) The collector's edition DVD I got from Netflix has a special feature called "The Making of Gods and Monsters" which so makes me appreciate the actors, the director Bill Condon.The biography of Whale has been rewritten by James Curtis (and published by the U of MN press, how about that!).

On my wish list: Christopher Bram's novel The Father of Frankenstein (on which Gods and Monsters is based).