CHAPTER ELEVEN
FRANKENSTEIN
Year of Release: 1931
Director: James Whale
Writer: Francis Edward Faragoh, Garrett Fort
Starring: Boris Karloff, Colin Clive
Budget: $262,000
Box Office: $12 million
“It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn; and whether it was the outward substance of things or the inner spirit of nature and the mysterious soul of man that occupied me, still my inquiries were directed to the metaphysical, or in its highest sense, the physical secrets of the world.”1 This quote from Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein (1818) encapsulates our shared pursuit of knowledge. The creature, not unlike his creator, desires to understand this complicated and mysterious planet we all live on. Frankenstein is a novel about science, about its magnificence, but more, about its danger to our society and to our souls. If Mary Shelley lived today, we would have to assume Frankenstein would be a treatise on technology. The creature, borne of our collective pride and stubbornness, would perhaps come in the form of an iPhone.
But in 1818, the nineteen-year-old Shelley, often credited as one of the first horror storytellers, focused instead on the tenuous science of medicine. Her Dr. Frankenstein actively rejects domesticity and convention in order to pursue scientific glory. And, once he achieves his goal, he rejects the creature he has created. Frankenstein is a cautionary tale. It is horror at its finest, exposing the ethical dilemma memorably summed up by Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) in the sci-fi horror film Jurassic Park (1993) when faced with scientifically engineered dinosaurs: “your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.” In the Industrial Age, when resurrectionists were digging up the recently deceased for medical dissection, Mary Shelley was the first to ask in literature if ethics and science could coexist. Her novel, rife with meaning, is also terrifying in its vivid accuracy of the runaway train that is modern science and technology.
Popular in its time, Frankenstein was adapted for the stage by Richard Brinsley Peake. Presumption; or, the Fate of Frankenstein (1823) was attended by Shelley herself at the English Opera House (now known as the Lyceum Theatre) on the West Side of London. Yet another play, The Man and the Monster!; Or, the Fate of Frankenstein played at the Royal Coburg Theatre in London in 1826, and sixty years later the creature was revived for a musical burlesque entitled Frankenstein, or the Vampire’s Victim (1887). In 1910, the legend of Dr. Frankenstein and his ill-begotten creation came to the screen for the first time. The twelve-minute movie, produced by Thomas Edison’s Edison Studios, was shot in a few days by prolific director J. Searle Dawley. The film downplayed many of the macabre elements of Shelley’s masterpiece:
In making the film the Edison Co. has carefully tried to eliminate all actual repulsive situations and to concentrate its endeavors upon the mystic and psychological problems that are to be found in this weird tale. Whenever, therefore, the film differs from the original story it is purely with the idea of elimination of what would be repulsive to a moving picture audience.2
Imagine if these constraints were still put on horror films! After the Italian silent adaptation, The Monster of Frankenstein (1920), Americans at Universal Studios once again brought the creature back from the dead for the most iconic depiction to date. Frankenstein (1931) is a classic horror picture, one so certain of its scares, it included a warning to audiences that “it will thrill you. It may shock you. It might even horrify you.” Bela Lugosi, who had recently donned Dracula’s cloak to much avail, famously quit Frankenstein when he was underwhelmed by the test makeup. This choice to leave, and to allow Boris Karloff to take his place as the creature, has long been considered Lugosi’s biggest career downfall. The fallout of this lofty mistake is portrayed in the Tim Burton film Ed Wood (1994).
The 1931 Frankenstein has been the touchstone for later adaptations of how the creature looks, moves, and acts. Unlike the thoughtful, empathetic creature of Shelley’s creation, the film’s monster appears as slow-witted, and as more the villain than Dr. Frankenstein. Universal Studios also brought back Igor, the doctor’s assistant, who had not been in the novel, but had first been portrayed in Peake’s 1823 play adaptation. While Universal’s version of Frankenstein may seem tame by our modern standards, there were controversial scenes that unnerved many. The most contentious is when the creature throws little Maria (Marilyn Harris) into the water, accidentally drowning her. State censorship boards in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and New York all cut this scene before allowing moviegoers to experience Frankenstein. Despite some grumblings about decency, Frankenstein went on to be both a financial and critical success. In 1991 it was added to the National Film Registry, and was also eighty-seventh on AFI’s 100 years...100 movies. Frankenstein endures. It is, perhaps, the best example of when horror and science intersect.
In Frankenstein, Dr. Frankenstein is able to piece together a body made of several different bodies’ parts. Is this scientifically possible? Although reanimating a pieced-together corpse may not be realistic, limb transplants are no longer science fiction. Hands and arms have successfully been transplanted and the first leg transplantation may not be far behind. How does the process work? Organ donation is only possible if the organ in question has blood and oxygen flowing through it until the time of harvesting. A living donor can give a whole kidney, a portion of their liver, lung, intestine, or pancreas.3 For a hand transplant the donated hand usually comes from a brain-dead donor. The procedure to connect the new hand can take anywhere from eight to twelve hours. The recipient then needs to take immunosuppressive drugs in order to prevent rejection of the hand and take part in physical therapy to gain function and mobility. The first hand transplant took place in 1964, and in 2016 the first double arm transplant took place. The recipient, a veteran who was a quadruple amputee, has been able to gain the use of both arms and even threw out the first pitch at a baseball game in 2018.
Every day thousands of people are the recipients of donated organs. In the United States in 2017 more than 34,000 people received organs such as corneas, kidneys, and hearts. Although that number is impressive, there are more than 114,000 people on waiting lists for organs, and twenty or more die each day by not receiving one in time. This need has led to an increase in the black market for organs. Illegally harvesting organs is a dark reality that several horror movies have focused on, including Turistas (2006) in which a group of friends on vacation in Brazil get caught in an organ harvesting trap. How can organs possibly be harvested? Some “organ brokers” may have connections with funeral homes in order to get organs before a body is embalmed or cremated. Some people are willing to part with their own organs for financial compensation while others may have organs taken from them against their will. According to the World Health Organization, approximately seven thousand kidneys are illegally harvested annually by traffickers worldwide with the average buyer paying $150,000. Several cases over the past decade prove how the black market for organs is alive and well. In China, a missing six-year-old boy was found alone in a field. Both of his eyes had been removed, presumably for the corneas. In 2012, a young African girl was kidnapped and brought to the UK for the sole purpose of harvesting her organs. She was rescued before any procedure was performed. Kendrick Johnson, a Georgia teen, died at school in January of 2013 under mysterious circumstances. After his parents obtained a court order to have the body exhumed for an independent autopsy, the pathologist found the corpse stuffed with newspaper and the brain, heart, lungs, and liver missing, leading some to believe he was murdered and his organs sold on the black market.