This magnificent, intense, shattering production will leave you reeling, stunned and breathless.
This is a repeat screening of the brilliant 2011-2 production at the National Theatre in London, directed by Danny Boyle,and starring Benedict Cumberbatch as the Creature and Jonny Lee Miller as Victor Frankenstein. There are actually two versions of this film, with the two leads swapping roles in the other version.
The production is based on the novel by Mary Shelley about scientist Victor Frankenstein who creates a man from combined dead bodies and then goes on to abandon him. Shelley’s classic works raises so many big questions,-Why are we here? What is the meaning of life?…
We see how the poor Creature, abandoned at birth , is penniless and homeless. In Cumberbatch’s extraordinary performance we see how the scarred Creature, emerges from the apparatus he has been suspended from, works out how to move and walk, and then discerns the rhythm of the weather and seasons.
The creature soon cruelly discovers how society will only reject him and drive him away.Eventually he forms a friendship with a blind old man de Lacey, beautifully played by Karl Johnson, who teaches him the ways of civilisation.
Things take a turn for the worse when he is driven away by the old man’s son and daughter in law .The Creature’s heart, originally with massive potential for good, begins slowly to turn pernicious and he goes down the path of bitter revenge.
The Creature is lonely and separate and wants a companion and in his view Victor broke his word when he destroyed the Creature’s potential ‘wife’ he had almost finished completing .
Cumberbatch as the Creature is amazing , a sensational bravura performance. At first he is all slippery and slithery as he tries to learn to stand up and walk , he then becomes twisted and clingy but grows to become powerfully eloquent. Yes, thus Creature has even read John Milton’s Paraidise Lost.
Victor Frankenstein as played by Jonny Lee Miller is shown as driven, elegant and handsome .He is a scientist in search of the spark of life and succeeds but it all goes wrong.Shocked, he abandons the scarred Creature and flees.
At the end we see how the positions of creature and creator are reversed. – we see how Victor becomes more and more like the Creature was at the very beginning.
Elizabeth, as portrayed by Naomie Harris, is depicted as questioning, innocent, beautiful…She thinks she knows her fiancé Victor but does she really?!
The camerawork is excellent and it almost feels like we are there on stage. There is a great use of close-ups at times and also dizzying, effective use of the high shots of the huge revolve, and the amazing chandelier/galaxy of lights, that are used to great effect. There are some magical special effects.
The huge Olivier Theatre stage is stretched to its limits.There is exciting use of the revolves and I enjoyed the delicate, almost Japanese style of de Lacey’s house. Victor’s house and Elizabeth’s room were elegantly decked in black and white.
A huge noisy train catapaults ominously forward belching steam to represent early 19th-century industrialisation.
This was a chilling, thrilling, challenging production that well deserved the rapturous, standing ovation that it received.
NT LIVE FRANKENSTEIN is screening at selected cinemas now. The film opens with a short documentary about the rehearsal process before ‘live action’ begins.
Running time 2 hours 15 minutes without interval.