Everybody who knows me can testify that Hammer Horror movies are my personal favorite horror subgenre, besides found footage(yes, I am a sucker for them) and eighties golden era slasher movies. Hammer is British movie company which delivered many legendary horror movies and legends like Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing starred in many of their movies and delivered some of the unforgettable roles like Dracula, Van Helsing or Dr Frankenstein. The latter is main character in this, first of Hammer Frankenstein series movies.
The movie is loosely based on Mary Shelley´s legendary novel, screenplay by Jimmy Sangster is not so based on the novel, the movie starting with imprisoned Victor Frankenstein who recalls and tells his tale to the priest which visits him in his prison cell.
Frankenstein was always interested in medical experiments and had no real morality values, cheating his fiancee Elizabeth(lovely Hammer alumni Hazel Court) with servant maid Justine(Valerie Gaunt) and conducting various animal experiments with his friend Paul Krempe (Robert Urquhart) starting with animals and later evolving into experimenting with corpses of hanged killer and brain of distinguished scientist. They revive an evil creature(Christopher Lee) which wreaks havoc and will change lives of all protagonists forever.
This is one of the top ten Hammer movies I have watched. Everything is done perfect, from character of Victor Frankenstein portrayed by Peter Cushing to evil and chaotic creature portrayed by Christopher Lee, which is so much different than Karloff and the creature which we were used to watch in Frankenstein movies. Maybe movies such as this don´t have much action and carnage, but there is drama, there is good story, great acting and poetic ending which leaves open window for sequels. If you are watching Hammer movies and want to become fan, I recommend this one for a Hammer starter package.
9/10
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