Victor, did you ever ask yourself, of all the parts that make that man, which one holds the soul?
FRANKENSTEIN│2025
something i don't see folks mention (which is understandable given how MUCH is in this film) is this line from victor... i think considering the time period, it made me assume that the frankenstein family in this adaptation probably owned or at least had financial stakes in american slave plantations and i think that adds a whole other messy layer to victor as a person
he only mentions it in passing because he was still a child at that time and wasn't aware that his family fortune came from human exploitation and evil, but also it ties into his laboratory and making of the creature being entirely funded by an immoral war profiteer. he and heinrich exploit other humans by either callously judging men about to die at the gallows or clinically picking apart what's left on a battlefield, surrounded by bodies who met their end from heinrich's own weapons
the entire frankenstein name is built upon cruelty, privilege, and grandiose ideas of self importance and it's only when the creature—someone who has nothing, thinks of himself as being nothing, and was created from this cruelty—does the cycle stop and what the frankenstein name meant and represented can finally fade away
To add to your excellent points, I saw Claire being French and the timing of when Victor mentions it happening as pointing to her plantations being in Haiti or other French Caribbean colonies. The bulk of the Frankenstein money coming from the brutal, dehumanizing trade in sugar fits right in with the critiques Elizabeth leveled at the men (all of them- Victor and Harlander obviously, but also at William, who has turned what was left of this family fortune into a career in finance) during the dinner meeting.
kinda an insane reading of the movie but how do we feel abt a trans reading of victor. or like essentially, how victor's rejection of the "feminine" leads to his failure to be a proper creator. in the first part of the movie, he notes that there's a dichotomy between him and his mother vs his father and william (he and his mother are moody, melancholic, emotional while his father and william supposedly calm and stoic, very classic old school feminine vs masculine characteristics). i feel this is further supported when we look at the characters' color themes especially at the preamble. victor and his mother are red while his father and brother are black and blue respectively (again, very classic calm, stoic colors). red is passion, violence, and blood. blood is also the life force of the human body. hence we can argue that victor and his mother are associated with life. the only other person we see in red is elizabeth whose color theme, while are in jewel tones to resemble insects, isn't just life but nature itself. (as an aside, we can maybe view elizabeth's connection to adam as nature recognizing life despite rejection from its creator?)
anyway, i digress. as victor ages, we see red become his secondary color and he is largely seen in black. as i've said before, black is his father's color. despite victor's contempt for his father, his desire to be like him and surpass him has led him to emulate his father and reject his connection with his mother.
this reading is totally not fleshed out and insane, feel free to tell me i am pulling shit out of my ass but my friend hasn't watched the movie yet and i need to tell this to someone askeisllsjk thanks for reading <33
KEEP COOKING ANON KEEP COOKING UNTIL THE ENTIRE RESTAURANT BURNS DOWN
but seriously i agree with all of this like the most obvious connection between victor and transness is of course "birthing" the creature coupled with (in the context of the 2025 film) an honestly very raw and uncomfortable to witness period of postpartum depression but i love your analysis of colours and how they correlate not only with victor's relationships to other characters (masculine and feminine) but himself
also in terms of the novel, i really recommend reading susan stryker's works and how she relates to the text as a trans woman~
Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein pages
something i don't see folks mention (which is understandable given how MUCH is in this film) is this line from victor... i think considering the time period, it made me assume that the frankenstein family in this adaptation probably owned or at least had financial stakes in american slave plantations and i think that adds a whole other messy layer to victor as a person
he only mentions it in passing because he was still a child at that time and wasn't aware that his family fortune came from human exploitation and evil, but also it ties into his laboratory and making of the creature being entirely funded by an immoral war profiteer. he and heinrich exploit other humans by either callously judging men about to die at the gallows or clinically picking apart what's left on a battlefield, surrounded by bodies who met their end from heinrich's own weapons
the entire frankenstein name is built upon cruelty, privilege, and grandiose ideas of self importance and it's only when the creature—someone who has nothing, thinks of himself as being nothing, and was created from this cruelty—does the cycle stop and what the frankenstein name meant and represented can finally fade away
I just watched Frankenstein last night and it was so fucking GOOD. But I'd really like to read the book. Where's a good place to start?
short answer: start with the book itself! there's two versions, one which is the original text written in 1818 when mary shelley was still only a teenager and then the revised 1931 edition. both are excellent in their own rights and the 1931 version is more widely known even by non-readers but i personally prefer the 1818 text. it feels more representative of who mary was at the time she wrote it whereas the 1831 revision feels more cynical and conservative (which makes sense when considering mary's life up to that point). however the 1818 text still feels VERY raw and deeply personal which is probably why it's the version i've come to prefer
in terms of which physical edition to look for, my top recommendation is the one with bernie wrightson's illustrations. i can't think of another artist who managed to depict the novel's events so viscerally and in such a haunting but beautiful manner. a lot of the 2025 film's visuals also took heavy inspiration from wrightson's art and he's even mentioned in the credits!
a few other editions i recommend seeking out if you're able to are the new annotated frankenstein which includes a wonderful introduction by gdt himself and frankenstein but with annotations from scientists and engineers if you want a more scientific viewpoint on the text itself
also if you're like me and you enjoy video essays, this recent one is amazing at how it dissects the themes of gender, sexuality, and family dynamics from the 1818 text. i'd recommend watching it either before or after you read the novel
sorry for going a bit overboard anon shsgfdghds but i'm so happy you enjoyed the movie and want to give the book a chance!!