FANTASIA OBSCURA: Frankenstein Plays God (But What Else is New?)
There are some fantasy, science fiction, and horror films that not every fan has caught. Not every film ever made has been seen by the audience that lives for such fare. Some of these deserve another look, because sometimes not every film should remain obscure.
Sometimes, love is stronger than anything the universe can throw at it, especially if it’s spats and a guillotine…
Frankenstein Created Woman (1967)
(Dist.: Twentieth Century Fox; Dir.: Terence Fisher)
After 10 years of producing films in their signature style, Hammer Films was still a presence at the theaters. Times were great for the studio, with audiences willing to watch a Victorian/Gothic standard pic directed by Terence Fisher and Peter Cushing ready to bring about ruin as Doctor Frankenstein.
And for this, the fourth time Cushing played Baron Victor Frankenstein, the doctor got very metaphysical.
We start with a cold open where a condemned prisoner is led to the guillotine. We see a man with zero effs to give (Duncan Lamont) who’s so lit up from drink he’d have shown up fully charged for his appointment with death had the electric chair been invented.
The only thing that breaks his mood is seeing his son Hans at his beheading. Despite his pleas to the priest, the boy watches his dad’s demise before the credit roll years instantly pass.
Hans (Robert Morris) is grown up, working for Doctor Hertz (Thorley Walters) who himself is collaborating with Baron Frankenstein on a cryogenic experiment, with the Baron serving as subject when he puts himself on ice for an hour.
How Frankenstein and Hertz came to collaborate is never made clear, but hey, funding for STEM projects being what it always has been, well…
After successfully defrosting, Frankenstein explains to his colleague what he’s doing for, judging by the baron’s tone, the umpteenth time: He hopes to determine if a soul leaves the body right away or if it can be captured, and if so, whether it can be instilled in another body. Why? Because it amuses him, and if you try and harsh his shtick, he will let you have it, as he does brilliantly a few times in this film.
To celebrate the doctor coming off ice, Hans is sent to town to fetch some bubbly. There, he spends some time wooing the innkeeper’s daughter, Christina (Susan Denberg), a poor unfortunate whose deformities scar her, affect her motor skills, and make her self-conscious.
But Hans doesn’t let that get in the way of loving her. He appreciates her, unlike the town rowdies Anton (Peter Blythe), Karl (Barry Warren), and Johan (Derek Fowlds). Like bullies in most small towns, they dress better than everyone else (in this case, top hats and spats) and treat everyone like dirt.
The “Spats Squad” pretty well drives the film thanks to their need to be nasty. They stiff the innkeeper, egg on Hans to the point of rage, and abuse Christina whenever they can. They even sing an insulting ditty about her under her window while she and Hans make love.
To top off their evening, they go back and break into the inn, kill the innkeeper who catches them drinking, and allow poor Hans to take the fall for it. And because Hans won’t ruin his lover’s reputation, he can’t provide an alibi for the time of the murder.
For the crime, Hans ends up on the same guillotine as his dad; Christina, who was out of town during the whole mess and is unable to save her lover, drowns herself in the river.
For the town as a whole, it’s a sad story that people will try not to talk about for years. For Baron Frankenstein, however, it’s a golden opportunity to accelerate his research.
With a little bluster and subterfuge, they manage to get Han’s body in time to extract his soul then place it inside Christina.
Tempting as it is to turn this into a dirty joke, it does have a number of interesting thematic implications about lovers joining together in harmony and what such unions produce.
The theme of two lovers entwined in death acting from beyond gets danced around but never solidly approached in the film. Between a script that had been sitting on the shelf for 10 years before production (hence the title, which was a play on the title of a then-current film …And God Created Woman) and the casting of Christina, a role that needed a more subtle approach, with an actress for whom this would be her first lead, the richer implications of the story were not going to be developed.
Instead, as the film progresses, the scales are righted by the consequences of Frankenstein’s actions — inevitable considering the Doctor’s attitude; consequences, schmansequences, he probably thought as he threw the switch.
Truth be told, Frankenstein doesn’t so much create woman as he repackages her. While giving Christina Hans’ soul, he corrects her deformities and, for some reason, ends up making her blonde as well.
This allows her to go after the Spats Squad more easily, but it leaves the viewer with mixed feelings about Frankenstein’ approach to Christina. Does she do what she does against the Spats Squad because she wanted to get back at them, or is she given no choice because she’s had all agency removed from her?
It’s a question with ironic real-life parallels. Denberg, as a result of this role, was a Playboy centerfold in the August 1966 issue and portrayed one of Harry Mudd’s women on Star Trek. With the process and the results forming a repetitive cycle, it’s no wonder that after Frankenstein Created Woman that she gave up on acting and moved back to Klagenfurt, Austria.
Probably just in time. Unbeknownst to all, the studio had just passed its apogee point, with Night of the Living Dead just around the corner giving viewers an alternative to the Hammer formula.
Guillotines and spats may be one thing, but the taste of the audience? That’s something a lot harder for love to tackle.
NEXT TIME: Speaking of playing with bodies that get out of control…
