Boris Karloff Returns to His Monster in Frankenstein 1970

The Frankenstein legend has made another movie screen appearance, and of the latest incarnation of Frankenstein adaptation, Victor Frankenstein, reviews have been mixed to say the least, and the box office, rather a disappointment, though perhaps one might agree that it is if not the best, at least the most imaginative reimagining of the Frankenstein story since Frankenstein 1970.

Despite the date in the title, the film was shot in 1958 in Cinemascope Black and White. The 1970 was intended to give the low budget film a futuristic sense, though the only futuristic science fiction was its place in the 1950’s atomic bomb energy craze in horror films. The most stand-out feature was that it starred Boris Karloff (again as the monster, sort of, and that’s the final twist.

The storyline has a modern day Baron von Frankenstein who was tortured and physically mangled at the hands of the Nazis in post WWII Germany, because he refused to use his science skills for the Nazi war effort. The Baron is continuing his work as a scientist, but needing money to continue his experiments, he agrees to rent out his castle as a film location to a movie crew to film a television movie about his famous family, and his grandfather, the old Baron von Frankenstein of monster reputation. Little do they know the current Baron is following in his ancestor’s footsteps. The money allows Frankenstein to obtain a nuclear reactor to power his creation, rather than the old standby lightning bolts. But when he runs out of body parts he starts killing off the members of the film crew. This is done through his partially completed monster, a lumbering figure with his head completely bandaged, serving both a story function in the later reveal, and a budget saving device of not having to create a monster make-up. His creature has no eyes at first and kills the wrong girl, until he can get the right ones. When the end finally comes in a climactic burst of atomic reactor steam, and the bandages are removed, inside them is revealed the face of Karloff/Victor Frankenstein as he was before he was tortured, with a recoding played explaining that the Baron was trying to create a lasting version of himself for perpetuation of the family name.

On an entertainment level it was very low budget and a bit of a cheat, with the monster. a mummy-like creature, a guy stumbling around in a bandage helmet ranking somewhere between Phil Tucker’s Robot Monster (a gorilla suit with a space helmet) and Project Metalbeast (with Kane Hodder – Friday 13^th’s Jason, in a rented werewolf suit) but certainly an imaginative take on the legend and the lore of extending the Frankenstein world. I don’t know what poor Boris Karloff felt about it, but I can imagine. His career had reached a nadir in the late fifties. Abbot and Costello had come and gone, and Hammer horror was taking over the classic stories with new stars like Christopher Lee. The aging great horror star would see a bit of a resurgence in the early 1960’s, with some modestly decent horror projects, but perhaps a more reverent casting in television, where he would appear in episodes of shows like I Spy as a kindly but eccentric old gentleman in a Don Quixote quest, and even lend his name to a series of spooky comic books from Gold Key.

Frankenstein 1970 was shot on a left over set from an Errol Flynn film at Warner Brothers and directed by Howard W. Koch, who would go on to a rather illustrious career, ultimately as President of Production at Paramount Studios and producer of the Academy Awards shows. The film also starred Don “Red” Barry, who for actors like Karloff, who felt they were type cast, carried the actual name of his most famous character (Red Ryder)  in his professional name – imagine Sean “Bond” Connery or George “Spanky” McFarland. After Victor Frankenstein, maybe it’ll have to stay Daniel “Potter” Radcliff, because I doubt “Igor” is how he’ll be fondly remembered.