Based on this trailer, del Toro’s “Frankenstein” will be sticking closer to the novel than perhaps any other film before it. (The last faithful-to-Shelley adaptation attempted was Kenneth Branagh’s 1994 “Frankenstein.”)
Shelley’s novel has a framing device that most “Frankenstein” films leave out. The first character we meet in “Frankenstein” is not Victor or the Creature: It’s an explorer, Robert Walton, who wants to sail the Arctic circle. There, he and his crew encounter the half-frozen, half-mad Victor who is hunting his Monster to the ends of the Earth. Victor tells Walton the tale of how he created the Monster and destroyed his life.
The trailer opens with a panning establishing shot of the Arctic, with Walton’s boat lodged in the ice. Then we hear Isaac as Dr. Frankenstein narrates: “I had determined that the memories of my evil … should die with me.”
We see flashes of the familiar story: Frankenstein presenting his theories to scientific colleagues, building a lab, etc. Del Toro is taking a cue from 1931’s “Frankenstein,” directed by James Whale, by having Victor bring the Creature to (un)life with lightning. But rather than a simple slab, the Creature is affixed to a vertical crucifix fixture; Victor is playing God by creating life, so his “son” is birthed in the most famous visage of Jesus Christ. But as the title cards of the trailer warn: “Only monsters play God.”
Though narratively this looks faithful to the novel, there is plenty of del Toro’s style to go around. Victor’s life-giving machine is given a more intricate, Steampunk-like design, for one. The 18th-century Europe setting evokes his 2015 Gothic romance “Crimson Peak,” as do the splashes of the color red in the costume and set design. Most striking is Elizabeth’s green and ghostly veil, foreshadowing her doom.
The ending of the trailer shows the Creature, his face hidden under a hood, attacking Walton’s crew and demanding to speak to his creator. In the novel, Frankenstein is already dead when the Creature finds him on the ship, but we’ll see if that’s true here. I also think this is deceptive; knowing del Toro’s love of monsters, I doubt the Creature is the villain this trailer suggests him to be.
“Frankenstein” is set for release on Netflix in November 2025.
