Moving Monsters: The First Frankenstein Film, 1910 (Anniversary Series #8)

Having explored some of the many fascinating and spooky contexts surrounding Mary Shelley’s novel, this final post for my 200th Anniversary Series looks at the novel’s entry into the glamorous world of film. Frankenstein has entered popular culture in a massive way, largely influenced by the famous 1931 film starring Boris Karloff with his neck bolts and lumbering frame, but did you know that this isn’t the earliest film adaptation of Frankenstein? Over twenty years earlier, in 1910, Edison Studios released a 15-minute feature that has become one of the most interesting films of the silent era. Designed to be accompanied by music, it loosely adapts Mary Shelley’s plot to represent the first time the monster was seen on screen.

The Edison Kinetogram and promotional stills of Frankenstein, 1910

While the 1931 film has much to answer for in its secular representation of science (that overlooks Shelley’s ambiguous supernaturalism), the 1910 film swings the other way, emphasising much more the supernatural and psychological elements of Mary Shelley’s novel. This was a deliberate move by the production company to avoid what they saw as the original horrors of the novel. The March 15 1910 edition of The Edison Kinetogram – the catalog sent out by the studio to promote its films – noted:

“To those familiar with Mrs. Shelly’s story it will be evident that we have carefully omitted anything which might by any possibility shock any portion of the audience. In making the film the Edison Co. has carefully tried to eliminate all actual repulsive situations and to concentrate its endeavors upon the mystic and psychological problems that are to be found in this weird tale. Wherever, therefore, the film differs from the original story it is purely with the idea of eliminating what would be repulsive to a moving picture audience.”

The success of their endeavour in terms of not provoking fear is questionable: their monster is perhaps one of the creepiest looking incarnations I’ve seen. His bedraggled winding sheets and skeletal hands carry much more of a sense of the ghostly, reanimated dead than some of its later representations.

The Monster of 1931 (left) vs the Monster of 1910 (right)

Likewise, the scene of the monster’s creation is surprisingly grotesque, drawing more heavily on Mary Shelley’s suggestions of alchemy, necromancy and the occult than her references to the more modern studies of chemistry and medical anatomy. The Edison Kinetogram described this scene as:

“The formation of the hideous monster from the blazing chemicals of a huge cauldron in Frankenstein’s laboratory is probably the most weird, mystifying and fascinating scene ever shown on a film. To Frankenstein’s horror, instead of creating a marvel of physical beauty and grace, there is unfolded before his eyes and before the audience an awful, ghastly, abhorrent monster.”

I don’t disagree. Look at the awesome creepiness of this still from the monster’s creation scene:

The scene of the monster’s creation in Frankenstein, 1910

Where the film becomes particularly interesting is in its deviation from Mary Shelley’s plot that actually, in some ways, returns us to the text’s central concerns with the psychological and supernatural. In this film, the monster’s corporeality is questionable, to the point where, unsuccessful in his attempts to be united with Frankenstein, he fades away, leaving only his reflection in the mirror. Entering the room, Frankenstein finds that it is not he who is reflected in the mirror, but the monster – a lovely representation of the doubling between monster and maker as two halves of one connected being that Mary Shelley emphasises throughout her novel. Mary Shelley questions ‘Who is the real monster?’ and this film follows suit. However, unlike Mary Shelley’s tragic finale, where both Frankenstein and the creature return to death, the film emphasises the morally restorative powers of love that repair the “evil and unnatural thoughts” that had allowed Frankenstein to create the monster in the first place. As The Edison Kinetogram describes:

As he stands directly before the mirror we are amazed to see the image of the monster reflected instead of Frankenstein’s own. Gradually, however, under the effect of love and his better nature, the monster’s image fades and Frankenstein sees himself in his young manhood in the mirror. His bride joins him, and the film ends with their embrace, Frankenstein’s mind now being relieved of the awful horror and weight it has been laboring under for so long.”

Watch the film in full:

What do you think of this film and its treatment of Shelley’s novel? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!