Gods and Monsters (1998)

Fittingly, I first learned of this around the same time I was beginning to truly appreciate just what a marvelous director James Whale was. Clips of Gods and Monsters were featured in both of the documentaries, The Frankenstein Files: How Hollywood Made A Monster and She's Alive! Making the Bride of Frankenstein, which I saw for the first time when I bought the Frankenstein Legacy DVD set in the summer of 2004. I also saw a little more of it in the documentary, Now You See Him: The Invisible Man Revealed!, when I bought that set the following year, most significantly the scene in which Whale talks about how Universal butchered The Road Back and when he commits suicide. I can't tell you how intrigued I was to learn there was a film about Whale's life, with recreations of him making his movies and fantasies of him being the subject of a Frankenstein-like creation scene. Its also starring Brendan Fraser, who I'm a pretty big fan of as well, was another incentive to see it. And I didn't have to wait long, either, as I caught it on either IFC or the Sundance Channel, back when I had DirecTV. I didn't see the whole thing in one sitting but I did see good chunks of it in multiple viewings, such as the opening, the first true meeting between Whale and Clay Boone, his reminiscing about his life, and the last act, when things grow very tumultuous for him. I enjoyed what I saw but, after those two or three viewings, I didn't see the movie again for a long time until I bought the DVD at McKay's in Chattanooga some time in the late 2010's. It was nice to catch back up with it and finally see it from beginning to end, and I can say it's a movie I thoroughly enjoy. It's just marvelous, and what makes it interesting is that, rather than a run-of-the-mill biopic, it's a fictionalized account of the last days of Whale's life, which very few, if any, people knew the truth about, especially the impetus for his decision to take his own life. It also paints an interesting picture of a side of Hollywood that, even nowadays, not many wish to acknowledge. But, most importantly, it's a story about an unlikely friendship and how one's past can truly come back to haunt them. Since Whale was such a major figure in Universal Horror in the 30's, I thought it would be fitting to end this year's October Fest by focusing on the real man.

I'm kind of cheating here, though, not because this is a drama rather than an actual horror film but because, much to my surprise, it wasn't produced by Universal. I thought for sure it was, as those documentaries used clips from it and said it was available from "Universal Home Video," and the movie itself uses many clips from Bride of Frankenstein and imagery that's strictly copyrighted by the studio. But instead, the movie was a co-production between Lions Gate, Showtime, Regent Entertainment, and BBC Films, with Lions Gate distributing it in the U.S. I was disappointed to learn that but, since I really wanted to do this movie, I figured it had enough ties to this year's theme that it would count.

In 1950's Hollywood, Clay Boone works as a gardener and lawn-cutter. Unbeknownst to him, one of his clients is James Whale, the long retired filmmaker behind Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein. Whale has recently come home from the hospital following a stroke and is plagued by insomnia, restlessness, the side-effects of his medication, and visions of his past, triggered by various stimuli. While being interviewed by a university student who's also a starstruck fan, he has an episode where he has to lie down in his art studio, suffering from a horrible headache. Upon being examined by a doctor, he's told that his stroke damaged his central nervous system, and though the doctor advises him to continue taking his medication, Whale realizes his condition will continue deteriorating over time. Shortly afterward, he befriends Clay, inviting him into his studio and asking if he would pose for his sketching. Clay agrees, as Whale promises to pay him for it, but during their first session, as they talk about their respective upbringings, Whale becomes despondent after remembering how he was born into a family and community that didn't understand him. Clay, on the other hand, becomes intrigued with Whale's past fame, and when he and some friends watch Bride of Frankenstein when it airs on TV, he finds himself appreciating it, while the others mock it. After watching it himself, Whale reminisces about making the film and has a bizarre dream where Clay, as a Dr. Frankenstein-like figure, removes his damaged brain and replaces it with a healthy one. His health and mental state continue going downhill, and his relationship with Clay becomes strained when, after learning that Whale is homosexual, he becomes disgusted when the director goes into graphic detail about the gay pool parties he used to have at his home. Regardless, it continues when Clay is invited to escort Whale to a party hosted by director George Cukor, but circumstances further exacerbate his fragile health and push him into a mindset where he may ask Clay to do the unthinkable.

Based on a book called Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram, Gods and Monsters was the first major film for Bill Condon who, after contributing to the screenplays for films like Strange Behavior and Strange Invaders, made his directorial debut with 1987's Sister, Sister, starring Eric Stoltz and Jennifer Jason Leigh. He struggled for a while after that, directing TV movies and the second Candyman movie, Farewell to the Flesh, which I personally don't think is that bad of a sequel. Though that movie bombed badly, he bounced back with Gods and Monsters, which he wrote the screenplay for in addition to directing, and which Clive Barker was a producer on. While it wasn't successful commercially either, it netted Condon an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay and his career really took off. Since then, he's written and directed a number of acclaimed films, like Kinsey and Dreamgirls, and he received another Oscar nomination for his screenplay for Chicago. Granted, he's also directed two of the Twilight movies, and the successful but not exactly critically lauded live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast, so I guess you really can't win them all.

Sir Ian McKellen is dead-on fantastic as James Whale, perfectly capturing the different shades and nuances of the man (his performance also received an Oscar nomination). From the outset, he seems to be living a comfortable life in retirement, with a nice house in Pacific Palisades, a loyal, if sometimes disapproving, housemaid, and a nice studio by his swimming pool where he can indulge his passion for painting and sketching. But he's recently had a stroke that's resulted in his mind and body going haywire, causing him to experience vivid visions of his past, particularly his service in World War I, bouts of mania, bizarre smells, and painful headaches. After a particularly bad spell, he learns from a doctor that his condition will only worsen over time and contemplates suicide, even imagining the scenario of Hanna, his housemaid, finding him after he's overdosed on pills. He becomes intrigued with Clay Boone, his recently hired gardener, and introduces himself formally, asking Clay to pose for a sketch. Even before Clay learns of his homosexuality, Whale says he's only interested in sketching his head and nothing else, but, that said, he'd earlier told him that he'd be welcome to use the pool and not worry about a bathing suit. What does happen during their first session is that, while making conversation, Whale, after initially denying it, feels compelled to admit the truth that he came from poverty and that he was seen as an "aberration" within his own home, being artistically inclined amid a working class family. He goes on to tearfully admit, "They took me out of school when I was fourteen and put me in a factory. They meant no harm. They were like a family of farmers who've been given a giraffe and don't know what to do with the creature except to harness him to the plow. Hatred was the only thing that kept my soul alive in that soul-killing place. And amongst the men I hated was my own poor, dear, dumb father... who'd put me into that hell in the first place." Over the course of several more such sessions, Whale laments to Clay about how his career as a film director ended, how his relationship with David Lewis fell apart, and how, during the war, he became very close to a fellow soldier who, as he eventually reveals, suffered a nasty fate that weighed heavily on him for the rest of his time at the front.

As this is not a full-on biopic, we only see flashes of Whale's past sprinkled throughout the story but it's done effectively and gets the point across, and is also quite accurate to real life. We see glimpses of him as a young man (Brandon Kleyla) in the factory town of Dudley, where he is, indeed, an outcast in his own family, with his mother telling him to, "Leave the drawing to the artists," and ordering him to go clean out the privy (outhouse). In another flashback, we see him being dragged to

church, his father yelling at him, "Stop lollygagging! And straighten up, son. They'll think you're a Nancy boy." World War I continually haunts him, with memories of actual battles and what became of Leonard Barnett, the soldier he practically fell in love with in the trenches (Barnett is a fictional creation, but Whale did indeed serve in the war, even ending up at a prison camp, and while he didn't speak about it much, it's a given that he saw a number of horrific things). But my 

favorite flashback is when we see him directing Bride of Frankenstein, a bittersweet memory, as he's remembering the long-gone, illustrious career he once had. In the main storyline, we also see that he still has an affectionate, if slightly strained, relationship with his longtime romantic partner, film producer David Lewis, and he remembers the all-male pool parties he would throw following their breakup. Whale's initial denial to Clay about his family not being destitute is itself accurate, as he fought to distance himself from his upbringing

far more than he ever did his homosexuality. Even his describing Boris Karloff as, "The dullest fellow imaginable," to Hanna is rooted in reality, as his and Karloff's relationship fell apart during the making of The Old Dark House and there was much friction between them during Bride of Frankenstein.

That factors into something else about Whale's portrayal: while he is a pitiable figure in the end, he's hardly an angel. He does some pretty low and even disgusting things, such as force Edmund Kay, the college student who interviews him, to play strip poker in exchange for answering his questions; deliberately skeeve out Clay, who's already uncomfortable at the idea of any homosexual advances, by graphically describing the all male pool parties he used to throw; and he

takes him to George Cukor's party for Princess Margaret in order to surreptitiously pass him off as his handsome, young gay lover in order to annoy Cukor. As unflattering as it is, I've read that Whale, as brilliant and witty as he was, could be mean-spirited and downright cruel in the games he would play with people. In fact, while Boris Karloff himself is depicted briefly in the film, I've heard that Clay is meant to be a sort of stand-in for him, with their relationship starting out amicable enough

but becoming more and more strained as the story and Whale's illness progress. We also not only get into the melancholy Whale feels about no longer being a filmmaker but the idea that his horror films are the only ones anyone remembers. Indeed, Whale was always very mixed about his horror films, as he desired to be an A-list director, and even after he retired, he rarely every spoke about them. He's not happy when Kay is obviously truly interested in those films rather than himself, retorting when he says that they're what he'll be

remembered for, "I'm not dead yet, Mr. Kay!" And when Kay says the design of Frankenstein's monster is more significant a cultural image than the Mona Lisa, Whale goes, "Oh, don't be daft! It's just makeup and padding and a big actor. It's hardly the Mona Lisa." Furthermore, when he and Clay first get acquainted, he's reluctant to admit he was the director behind the Frankenstein movies, and when Clay tells him that Bride of Frankenstein is going to be shown on TV, Whale says he prefers The Invisible Man and Showboat. Not that it keeps him from watching it or quoting from it, showing that he does have some affection for his horror films.

In a similar vein, though he's no longer in the film industry, Whale does still have a flair for the dramatic and showmanship. While he tries to act blase about Edmund Kay coming by to interview him, he dresses up and combs his hair for the occasion, and when Hanna shows him in, Whale acts as though he's reading a book, which he later admits he's no longer able to, and had forgotten about the interview. He does something similar when Clay comes back after storming out of their

second sketching session, as he sits on his couch, smoking, and acts surprised when Hanna shows him in. However, Hanna signals Whale about Clay before he walks in, suggesting that was an act as well. And speaking of Hanna, when Whale contemplates killing himself by overdosing on his medication, he imagines what would happen if she found him dead in his bed, a melodramatic vision that's not unlike something you'd see in one of his movies and which appeals to his dark sense of humor, as he laughs at the thought. Clearly, Whale

does miss making movies even before he says it's, "The most wonderful thing in the world," and during the third act, he even tries to manipulate Clay into something he isn't, as a director would. And in the end, rather than let death take him when and how it will, he decides to be a director to the last and orchestrate his own departure from this Earth.

Probably the saddest instance of Whale's melancholy and depression over the past comes at the party, when the well-meaning Kay arranges a photo op with Elsa Lanchester and Boris Karloff. Learning that the only reason why he was even invited to the party in the first place was due to Kay, who's now working for Cukor, Whale, whose drinking has only made his fragile mindset worse, puts on his sunglasses and tries to limp away when he recognizes Elsa. However, he isn't quick

enough, and as he and Elsa talk for the first time in a long while, Kay fetches Karloff. While Whale is civil enough about it, this is obviously uncomfortable for him, and the camera flashbulbs bring on a flurry of images in Whale's mind: his life in Dudley and his wartime experiences become mixed with sounds and images from Bride of Frankenstein, specifically the Bride herself, likely because he's standing next to Elsa. By this time, we've seen how various stimuli can cause Whale to hallucinate and such visions: the smoke billowing

from Clay's lawnmower reminds him of the Dudley factory steam whistles, his paintings in his studio remind him of when he was criticized by his family for his artistic aspirations, any sort of bright lights make him think of the battlefield, and mentioning how his father and grandfather were both part of the church makes him remember when he was once yelled at for lagging behind on the way to Sunday services. But now, even well-meaning, friendly faces from his past set off images and sounds that overwhelm him, and he's begun to see certain major figures from his past, like his father and Leonard Barnett, standing right across from him, staring at him sympathetically.

That brings us back around to Whale's relationship with Clay. His interest in his new gardener does initially seem to be one of sexual attraction, despite what he tells Clay later on, as he's intrigued by him the minute he sees him and, again, offers him free use of the swimming pool. He also takes an interest in Clay's time in the Marines, occasionally asking him about his time in the Korean War and how many lives he had to take. And Clay is someone that Whale can pour his heart out to while

sketching him, if sometimes in more detail than Clay would care for. In fact, during the third session, the memories become so vivid and painful that Whale gets angry at Clay, as if he somehow brings them on deliberately. But most significantly, Whale, after having bizarre dreams involving Clay, has an urge to make him into his own personal Frankenstein monster. Following the party, the two of them return to Whale's home after getting soaked in a downpour, and while eating dinner,

Whale asks Clay if he believes in mercy killing and if he ever came across any poor souls he could've put out of their misery in Korea. This leads to Clay admitting that he never made it to Korea, but Whale is undeterred by this, telling Clay that his having to explain it to his father is a good war story in and of itself. Later, as Whale does some more sketching, he tells Clay of Barnett's horrific fate during the war: "He caught his one night coming back from reconnaissance... And they were nearly home when a maxim gun opened fire. Barnett's

body landed on this wire that was as thick as briers. It was hanging there the next morning. It was only a hundred yards from the line, but too far... for anyone to fetch it. So we saw him every morning stand-to and every evening stand-to. 'Good morning, Barnett,' we used to say to him. 'How's old Barnett looking today? He seemed a little peaked. Looks a little plumper.' And he hung there... well, at least until we were relieved. We introduced him to the new unit before marching out, speaking highly of his companionship... But I

tell you, for each man who died, I thought, 'Better you than me, poor sod.' You know, a whole generation was wiped out by that war." And when Clay says there's no reason to dig these memories up, Whale sadly tells him, "It's digging itself up. There is nothing in the here and now to take my mind off it. The parties... Reading, I can't... I can't concentrate. There's no work, of course, and, uh, love, and, uh, painting and, uh... drawing, I mean." Whale then shows Clay his sketches, which are nothing but random scribbles; he's lost the ability to even indulge in art. He sadly says, "It's all gone for me now. All gone."

When Clay then decides to indulge Whale by posing nude, Whale comes up with something else, commenting, "It's going to happen after all." Instead of sketching him as he is, Whale fetches a World War I gas mask and makes Clay wear it, saying he wants to create a dichotomy between his body and the inhuman mask. Then, out of nowhere, Whale makes sexual advances on him, touching and caressing him, kissing his neck, and even goes for his crotch. This leads to a struggle where an

enraged Clay pins Whale to the floor, yelling at him that he's not gay, but Whale mocks him, even when he punches him, threatening to tell his friends about it and that he'll never live it down. Clay angrily asks what he wants and Whale says, "I want you to kill me... I'm losing my mind. Every day, a new piece of it goes and soon, there'll be none of it left. But if you kill me, death will be bearable. You could be my second monster." He continues begging for Clay to end his suffering, putting his hands around his own neck, but Clay

refuses to do it and is badly traumatized by it. Seeing him cry, Whale calls him a "bloody pussycat," and, realizing what he's done, apologizes but figures it's unforgivable. He has Clay put to him to bed, but before he lays down, he asks him, "Do you believe people come into our lives for a purpose?" When he falls asleep, he has a dream where Clay, looking like Frankenstein's monster, takes him to a mass grave on the battlefield and motions for him to join his comrades, including Barnett, in death." The next morning, Clay and Hanna discover that Whale has drowned himself in the pool, leaving behind his original sketch of the Monster for Clay, signed, "To Clayton. Friend?"

I'm glad that Brendan Fraser seems to be on the cusp of a comeback now, as Gods and Monsters alone proves he's capable of more than just silly comedy and high adventure. As Clay Boone, he's a fairly free-spirited guy, happy to just be getting by, as he lives in a trailer by the ocean. At first, doing James Whale's gardening is just another job for him, as Hanna hired him while Whale was in the hospital, recovering from a stroke. He doesn't even know who Whale is until their second meeting, when he invites Clay into his art studio and learns of his past as a director of Universal horror films. Though a little uncomfortable about some of his paintings, which include a fully nude portrait of a man, and not understanding what he sees in him, when Whale offers him money to let him sketch his face, Clay takes him up on it. After going to the library and learning that Whale is who he says he is, Clay has his first sketching session. Much to his surprise, Whale suddenly opens up to him about his poor upbringing. At a local bar that he frequents, Clay finds everyone busting his chops about his relationship with Whale, especially the barmaid, Betty, who happens to be an old flame of his. She goes as far as to suggest that Whale is just pretending to be famous so he can come onto Clay, much to his aggravation. He's vindicated when Bride of Frankenstein starts playing on the TV and Whale's credit appears onscreen; moreover, while everyone else mocks the movie for being corny, Clay gets into it and even appreciates it. Once it's over, Clay talks with Betty about how he's interested in Whale because he feels that he's done something with his life, unlike himself (we later learn just how deep that feeling of disappointment goes). Betty, after again accusing Whale of being a gay old man who's only interested in Clay for his looks, talks about how they broke up and how she's decided he's just a, "Big, fun, irresponsible kid," who has no future. And Clay's response to this? "So I guess this means you don't wanna fuck." With that, Betty peels away from him in her car, as he unsuccessfully tries to patch things up.

When he's invited to join Whale for lunch the next time he's there, Clay learns from Hanna that Whale is, indeed, homosexual. He then begins to wonder if Whale's interest in him is more than just for artistic inspiration. When Whale, again, asks him to come into his studio for another session of sketching, Clay lies and says he can't. While having an after lunch cigar with him, he confirms to Clay that he is gay, that he never thought Clay himself was, and assures him he has no sexual

interests in him. This prompts Clay to sit for him once more and, again, the two of them talk frankly with each other. When he tells him that he doesn't have a steady lover at the moment and that he feels a man has to make his own way in the world alone, Whale warns him that too much freedom can be a bad thing. This leads him to explain how his own need for freedom led him to retire from filmmaking and, by extension, why his relationship with David Lewis ended. But then, he gets too graphic when

talking about the male pool parties he threw once Lewis had left the house, causing Clay to yell, "Just cut it out, okay?! Isn't it bad enough that you've told me you're a fuckin' fairy?! And you're gonna rub in my face in it?!... Fuck this! I can't do this anymore! From now on, I'm just the guy that cuts your lawn! Got it?" He storms out and, that night, goes back to the bar. When he finds Betty isn't there, he has a passionate one night stand with a woman he picks up there, as if to reinforce his manhood to himself. He does go back to Whale,

offering to sit for him again, as long as he stops with the "locker room talk." He can't explain why he returned other than to say he likes his stories, although he's still put off by how frank Whale is about homosexuality. This leads to Whale reminiscing about his relationship with Leonard Barnett, which gets him angry with Clay, blaming him for bringing up these memories. Despite his frustration over his moodiness, and surprise when Whale decides not to sketch him anymore, Clay does agree to drive him to George Cukor's party.

But, neither of them have a particularly good time there, especially Clay, who feels very out of place. When a sudden downpour gives them an excuse to leave, they take it and head back to Whale's home. There, after he has a shower, Whale can only offer Clay a sweater, forcing him to keep a towel around his waist.

All throughout the movie, whenever Whale presses him about his time in the Navy and the Korean War, Clay either ignores or dodges the question. When it comes up again while they're having dinner following the party, Clay confesses that he never made it through boot camp. He says his father was a Marine, one who lied about his age in order to see some action in World War I, but, "By the time he was ready to ship out, all the fighting was over. So, he felt like he'd missed out... To him,

it was like his life never really got started. Nothin' else seemed to matter. Certainly not his family." Admitting that he enlisted so his father could live vicariously through him, Clay says he did indeed love it, saying, "It was a chance to be a part of something important. Something that's, that's bigger than yourself... I didn't have the guts for it... literally. My appendix burst. They gave me a medical discharge. And the only thing I can think is, 'How the hell am I gonna tell my father?' And you know what happened when I finally did tell him? He laughed at me. Well, them's the breaks, huh? No war stories for this pup." Whale, however, disagrees, saying, "That's where you're wrong, Clayton. You just told me one. A very good story indeed." This reinforces an earlier scene, where Clay calls his old home in Missouri and tries to speak with his family. However, he hears that his sister isn't there and his father is in a drunken sleep. He truly had little to nothing in his life before he met Whale.

By this point, Whale has had a bizarre dream where he sees Clay as a mad scientist like Dr. Frankenstein, operating on him as though he were the Monster: opening his skull, removing his defunct brain, replacing it with a new one, sewing it up in his cranium, and then charging him up with electricity. Hinting at how he's seeing Clay as an instrument of his salvation, when the third act comes around, Whale attempts to make him into his own Frankenstein monster by having him put

him out of his misery. Clay, already shaken by Whale's aggressive sexual advances, tells him, "I am not your monster." He lets go of his neck and scurries away from him, crying hysterically from what he's been put through. Despite Whale now thinking he's damaged their relationship beyond repair, Clay does help him unbutton his shirt when he goes to bed. Whale then has another dream, this one with Clay, wearing the Frankenstein monster's costume, taking him to a mass grave and motioning

for him to join his war buddies, particularly Barnett. Whale apparently takes this as a sign that he must end his own suffering, as the next morning, Clay and Hanna find his lifeless body in the swimming pool. Clay dives in, pulls him out, and gives him mouth-to-mouth, but both he and Hanna realize he's already gone. After showing Clay the suicide note, Hanna tells him to get out so he doesn't become a murder suspect, or for there to be a scandal about his relationship with Whale. The movie's final scene is set years later, when

Clay is now married with a young son. The two of them watch Bride of Frankenstein on TV, and during the scene with the hermit, Clay clearly thinks of his friendship with Whale. When the movie's over, his son admits he liked it, and Clay shows him the memento Whale left him: his original sketch of the Monster, with the message, "To Clayton. Friend?", on the back.

Whale's seeing Clay as his own Frankenstein monster is, I believe, intentionally foreshadowed from almost the beginning, as Brendan Fraser's haircut has a squarish shape to it that, when combined with the contours of his face, looks a bit like the Monster's iconic image. A more overt bit of foreshadowing is at the party, when Boris Karloff is speaking with Whale and Elsa Lanchester and Whale sees Clay standing behind

Karloff, the camera juxtaposing the two of them. Then, during the dream sequence near the end where he is the Monster, his silhouette before you see him in full costume is almost exact, right down to the shape and even his walk. And the movie ends on a shot of Clay, after taking the garbage out, walking down the street in the rain, imitating the Monster's walk full on.

Hanna (Lynn Redgrave), James Whale's longtime housemaid, has worked for "Mr. Jimmy," as she calls him, for fifteen years and, as much as she fusses over him and doesn't approve of his homosexuality, it's obvious she loves him dearly. When the movie opens, you hear her tell David Lewis that she got rid of a live-in nurse because neither she nor Whale cared for her, and she wishes Lewis would move back in with Whale. She's disgusted with how Whale sexually teases Edmund Kay during their interview, and when he becomes interested in Clay Boone, she assumes it's for sexual satisfaction as well. It's only when they talk about Whale privately that Clay even learns that Whale is homosexual, as she tells him how his "sins of the flesh" will ensure he burns in hell. She's quite relieved when she learns that Clay isn't gay and then, encourages his relationship with Whale. As you can guess just from that, Hanna has very strict, old-fashioned views: she considers an unmarried man to be trouble and, even though her own husband is dead, insists that she's still married. She's also not amused by Clay's sense of humor, rolling her eyes when, after she says he needs a woman, he jokes that she's too old for him. In fact, she takes it seriously until he starts laughing and she retorts, "Oh, men! Always pulling legs. Everything is comedy. Oh, how very amusing. How marvelously droll." And when she watches Bride of Frankenstein with Whale, Hanna confesses it's not her "teacup," as she finds the Frankenstein monster to be so hideous that she thinks that's how Boris Karloff actually looks. The day when Clay takes Whale to the party, Hanna is out visiting her daughter and son-in-law, who keep her out all night. By the time she returns the next morning, Whale has already taken his own life, as she and Clay discover. After Clay has pulled his body out of the swimming pool, Hanna shows him the suicide note. Crying over Whale's body, she then tells Clay to leave so he won't be suspected of murder, and also so a scandal won't erupt. To keep up appearances, the two of them put his body back in the pool.

David Lewis (David Dukes), Whale's former lover and friend, appears twice in the movie: first in the opening and at the party. Even though they're no longer together, Lewis still cares for Whale, becoming concerned during the opening when he tells him about his insomnia and his reluctance to take the medication because of its side-effects. He also apologizes for not visiting Whale when he was hospitalized due to the problems he's having with his latest film production, and before he leaves, he kisses and embraces Whale. During one of his sessions with Clay, Whale explains that his quitting the film business while Lewis was still in it contributed to their romantic relationship ending. During the party, Lewis comes upon Whale, questioning him about his drinking and not liking when he admits to "flaunting" Clay in front of George Cukor, alluding to the damage his behavior could cause those who know him. Lewis promises to stop by his house for breakfast the next day but, of course, this ends up being the last time he sees Whale alive.

Though Whale is sure that Lewis is the one who got him invited to the party, it turns out to have actually been Edmund Kay's (Jack Plotnick) doing. Kay is a super fan of Whale's work, especially his horror movies, and completely and utterly gushes like a schoolgirl when he first meets him. He makes no secret that Bride of Frankenstein is his favorite, reciting a quote from it, and is surprised that his house is rather low-key, saying, "I thought you'd live in a great big villa or a mansion." When he interviews Whale down by the swimming pool, he says he wants to know everything, but his anxiousness to get to the horror movies annoys Whale, prompting him to force him to remove an article of clothing for each question. This makes Kay believe the rumors that Whale's directing career ended because of a sex scandal are true but, while that isn't so, he does get a lesson in Hollywood's hidden gay scene, which leaves him rather uncomfortable. By the time he finally gets Whale to talk about the original Frankenstein, the poor guy is down to his underwear, and he doesn't get far in his questioning before Whale suffers one of his painful episodes. He's so intent on helping Whale to his studio that he's forgotten he's practically naked until Whale points it out. Though he says he was going to go swimming to help him save face, Hanna isn't fooled at all. Despite this very awkward scene, Kay is more than happy to arrange for Whale to be invited to George Cukor's party, revealing that he interviewed Cukor shortly after he first met Whale and now works for him. When Whale commends him for going after a "poof" who can do something for him, Kay decides to arrange the impromptu reunion between him, Elsa Lanchester, and Boris Karloff, whose presence at the party is also likely his doing. Though he means well, the photo op he forces the three of them into causes Whale's fragile mindset to worsen.

In Clay's personal life, which mostly consists of people who hang out at the bar he frequents, the barmaid, Betty (Lolita Davidovich), is an old flame of his who, before they start watching Bride of Frankenstein, is really hammering down on his friendship with Whale. She questions why Whale would be interested in sketching him, suggesting that he's gay and just wants to fuck him. Rather than just ribbing, there is some serious tension between her and Clay, as Betty alludes to how they

used to be an item and later calls him out for hitting on another woman in front of her. She also says he's not "marriage material," or even "boyfriend material," that he's a big kid whose life is going nowhere. When he retaliates by giving her crap for not putting out, she angrily drives off, telling him, "From now on, you're just another loser on the other side of the bar!" And sure enough, when Clay goes back to the bar, he learns that Betty is out with someone else. Also, when they're watching Bride, Betty, in particular, makes fun of it, saying, "These old movies are such a hoot. They thought they were being scary but they're just funny." The place's owner, Harry (Kevin J. O'Connor), is just put off by the implications of necrophilia, with Clay responding that the Monster simply wants a friend.

Again, one of my favorite parts is when Whale remembers shooting Bride of Frankenstein, as they manage to capture not only the look and feel of it, as we'll get into, but also the spirit of the actors. Ernest Thesiger (Arthur Dignam) is so awesome here in his one appearance, coming off as eccentric and quirky as the real man is said to have been. When Whale leads Elsa Lanchester (Rosalind Ayres) to the set in her full Bride makeup and costume, Thesiger is amazed at the sight of her, commenting, "My God! Is the audience to presume that Colin and I have done her hair? I thought we were mad scientists, not hairdressers." Elsa retorts, "Only a mad scientist could've done this to a woman," but Thesiger insists, "Oh, no, my dear, you look absolutely amazing. There's no way I can compete with you. The scene is yours." Elsa, with an attitude that seems to herald the obsession Hollywood now has with gender and racial representation, comments, "In the sequel, James,two lady scientists should make a monster, and our monster would be Gary Cooper." Thesiger says, "I'd have thought Mr. Leslie Howard would be more your line," leading to this exchange: "More your line, I think." "My line, nowadays, runs to Rin Tin Tin." 

When Colin Clive (Matt McKenzie) is called to the set, we get a hint of the real man's tortured character. Thesiger tells Whale that he's "stiff as a board" and Clive himself tells Whale, "I'm not quite myself today, Jimmy. A touch of the flu, you know." Not only does Thesiger's comment allude to Clive's alcoholism but Clive's comment about having the flu is likely meant as a nod to how he would die from a combination of tuberculosis and pneumonia, worsened by his drinking, just two

years later. Despite how ill he feels, Whale assures Clive that he can do the scene in his sleep, prompting him to go on. In the main story, Whale meets Elsa at George Cukor's party. Delighted to see him again, Elsa tells him that she recently saw Una O'Connor, one of Whale's personal favorite actors. Elsa is also very annoyed by Edmund Kay's energy and enthusiasm, especially when he arranges the photo op with the two of them and Boris Karloff (Jack Betts). Though his appearance is brief, Betts, thanks to some nice makeup, does

manage to look the way Karloff did in the late 50's, and he captures his well-known gentlemanly character in his acting as well. And though Karloff is perfectly fine with the op, when the first picture is taken, Elsa sarcastically asks Whale, "Don't you just love being famous?"

Although it was a low budget film of just $10 million, Gods and Monsters is very visually polished, benefiting greatly from the  cinematography of Stephen M. Katz, who worked with Bill Condon on his first film, and also shot both The Kentucky Fried Movie and The Blues Brothers with John Landis. For much of the movie, it has a warm, lush look to it, thanks to the beauty of James Whale's home in Pacific Palisades and the constant bright, California sunshine, which often gives the scenes set inside his art studio an almost

golden glow. By contrast, his flashbacks to his early years in Dudley and his wartime experiences are very desaturated, with a color palette of dull grays and low blues in the former, and browns and smoke in the latter. The flashback to the set of Bride of Frankenstein, while in color, is rather muted, likely alluding to the movie itself being in monochrome. And speaking of monochrome, Whale's dream about Clay replacing his brain is shot in glorious black-and-white, with all the

German Expressionism-inspired deep blacks and shadows seen in those classic Universal movies. Expressionism is also the best way to describe the silhouetted images, first of Whale himself alone and then of both him and Clay as the Monster, he sees wandering a desolate landscape in his dreams. Similarly shadowy are the scenes of him tossing and turning in his sleep as he has these dreams, and the scenes between him and Clay inside his house as the storm rages outside.

While there are a fair amount of surreal images and sequences, Bill Condon's camerawork and direction, for the most part, never really call attention to themselves. There are some certain flourishes, such as how, during the first sketching session, the camera slowly tracks around from a side-view of Whale to a full-on close-up of his face as he decides to be honest with Clay about how poor his family really was. And then, in a really nice touch, the final camera angle here is revealed to be the POV of an image of Whale's father,

whom he just admitted he hated for forcing him to work in a factory and who, in the reverse shot, looks at him solemnly, with a sad smile on his face. Significantly, this is the first time one of Whale's memories bleeds into reality, a sign that his condition is worsening. We see more as the film goes on, with Whale seeing Leonard Barnett at the party, talking with him as he's reflected in a mirror when Whale and Clay return home afterward, and even a vision of Frankenstein's monster (a shot 

that's black-and-white) standing in his kitchen, illuminated by the lightning, before he comes at Clay with the gas mask. Going back to Barnett's reflection in the mirror, other significant reflections pop up here and there in the cinematography, with Clay looking at his image in some water before splashing it in his face (another possible connection between him and the Monster, as the latter sees his own reflection in water in Bride of Frankenstein) and Whale's own reflection is seen 

when he looks out the window upon confessing to Clay that he can't even draw anymore, as is Clay's as he undresses for him. There are some claustrophobic, tense POV shots from inside the gas mask to convey Clay's discomfort and mounting panic when he's forced to wear it, and some well-done underwater shots when he dives into the swimming pool at the end, cutting back and forth between a front shot of him and his POV

as he swims towards Whale's lifeless body. Probably the most striking and downright Hitchcockian shot is one positioned at the bottom of the winding staircase in Whale's house, looking straight up and turning as Clay comes down it. Similarly, the shot of Whale's body floating in the swimming pool after Clay and Hanna put him back in is an unforgettable image, shot in a manner to make it look striking and almost operatic.

Editing is also used in some instances to show just how sudden and explosive Whale's visions and memories can be. Following his episode during the interview, he's resting in his studio, with Hanna sitting across from him, when we suddenly get a montage of the sights and sounds of guns firing, soldiers taking shelter behind a blockade, and a smoke-filled battlefield. This imagery becomes interspersed with him as a young man and our first look at Leonard Barnett, as well as the sounds of someone yelling, "Quiet on the set!", Whale's

father yelling, "You're a disgrace!", and his mother telling him to clean the privy. In the mist of this, we hear the voice of the doctor examining Whale, followed by a tight close-up of his eyes looking at the overhead light in the room, a shot of his face reflected in the doctor's head mirror, and other close-ups of Whale's head and face as he's examined. Whale's fantasizing about his committing suicide afterward is done so unexpectedly, cutting from his POV looking at the

pills in his hand to Hanna finding him dead and crossing herself, that it could initially fool you into thinking he actually did it. Another furious sequence of sounds and images occurs at the photo op Edmund Kay puts together at the party, which the camera's flashbulbs set off. We get explosions, Dr. Pretorius saying, "To a new world of gods and monsters!", more images of combat and the battlefield, a brief glimpse of what Whale later reveals is Barnett's body on the barbwire, scenes of the Bride's eyes being uncovered and her screaming face, and soldiers being shot down.

The film's setting in and around Hollywood is a very appealing one, especially the main one of James Whale's lovely home in Pacific Palisades. While it's nothing too extravagant, it is very pleasing to look at, with the lovely flowers planted in the center of the circular driveway, and the big swimming pool and studio in the back, where Whale does his painting and drawing (they not only visited Whale's actual former home but also managed to gain access to some of Whale's actual paintings and place them inside the studio). The

house's interiors are similarly lovely, with a foyer housing the base of a curving staircase; a big, elegant sitting room with a black, grand piano; a nicely old-fashioned-looking kitchen; a surprisingly modest dining room with a rather small table; a comfortable TV room and library; a room with a very beautiful, marble bar with small statues standing around some long, thin flower vases; an elegant, downstairs dressing room; a large bedroom upstairs; and a storage room where, 

among other things, Whale keeps his World War I gas mask. George Cukor's house is much bigger and flashier, though we only see the exteriors, with a large lawn where people are seen playing polo in one spot and seated underneath tent-like awnings elsewhere, another big swimming pool and an open corridor up the steps across from it, and even a man-made pond with swans swimming around.

We also see the poorer side of Hollywood along with the glitz and glamour, as Clay lives in a seaside trailer park, his own trailer cluttered with cigarettes and beer bottles on the inside, likely bought from this downtown bar he tends to frequent, where they serve beer and have a small TV set up in the corner. Since he has no phone of his own, he has to use a phone booth on a cliff overlooking the ocean (the views of it rather beautiful). By the end of the movie, when he's married with a son, they're living in a comfortable,

middle-class home, definitely the opposite of where Whale and his family are shown living in his flashbacks. The little we see of it, Dudley is depicted as a very poor, oppressive place, with everything made of brick and having a depressing feeling due to the muted, gray color palette. We get one look inside Whale's family home and it does look very small and confining, with a privy (which we, thankfully, never actually see). Whale later describes how their living situation were "four to a

bed" and that they often had to eat, "Dripping. The fats from roast and such, kept congealed in a jar, and then used like butter on bread and toast." And we do also get glimpses of the trenches Whale often called home during the war, although one of the few times we actually see it, the soldiers look surprisingly content, especially Whale, as he describes his relationship with Barnett.

What really makes Gods and Monsters such an enjoyable movie is, like Tim Burton's Ed Wood, you can tell that the person behind it has enormous affection and love for both his subject and the movies he himself made. Nowhere is that clearer than in the tributes to James Whale's work, which include not only the many scenes from Bride of Frankenstein but also the fabulous recreation of its production. From the set itself and the costumes the actors are wearing, particularly the recreation of the Bride makeup and wardrobe, to how the

actors look and feel very much like the real people they're portraying (Matt McKenzie may not be a dead ringer for Colin Clive but, like I said, I think he manages to capture the man's tortured soul in just a few seconds of screentime) and the acting out of the scene when Whale calls action, with Rosalind Ayres mimicking Elsa Lanchester's bird-like movements and Arthur Dignam saying Ernest Thesiger's declaration, "The Bride of Frankenstein!", it is done with so much love that I can't be anything but enthusiastic. But then, just

minutes later, Bill Condon outdoes himself when Whale has his dream. It starts with that dark, Expressionistic shot of him wandering a desolate countryside, as audio clips from Bride play, most significantly the dialogue between the Monster and the hermit. Then Clay, wearing a surgeon's smock, carries Whale into the laboratory within the very watchtower from the movie. This scene is even more of a love letter to Universal Horror, with the black-and-white, the sets being recreated virtually

stone for stone, the Expressionistic lighting, and all the electrical equipment based on what Kenneth Strickfaden made for the original Frankenstein movies (right down to the machine that measured the Bride's heart-rate), not to mention the action of the scene itself. You have Clay opening Whale's skull, removing his brain, putting in a new one, sewing his skull back up, and juicing him up with electricity from the machines, with plenty of sparks and flashing lights. Let's also not forget the vision

of the Monster Whale sees in his kitchen late in the film, complete with Jack Pierce's legendary makeup design. And not only does the last scene transition to black and white, making it look like a scene from one of the old movies, but, at the start of the ending credits, you see the line, "A good cast is worth repeating," used to close out many of the classics from the 30's.

There's some commentary here on Whale's sometimes misunderstood approach to making horror films. Though Betty argues with Clay that, "Scary is scary. Funny is funny. You don't mix them," the first thing that Whale asks when he talks about it with Clay is, "Did anyone laugh?" He goes on to say, "A picture about death. I had to make it interesting for myself, you see. So, a comedy about death. The trick is not to spoil it for anyone who's not in on the joke." Also, while it never goes into whether or not Whale somehow identified with the

Monster in regards to their both being outsiders, what is clear is he has nothing but affection for the character. He tells Clay, "The Monster never receives any of my jibes. He's noble. Noble and misunderstood," and his one memento from his time as a director is his original sketch of the Monster. Though he tries to make Clay into his own personal monster by having him put him out of his misery, in his dream, Clay assumes the role of the noble monster he spoke of by bringing him

to where he can reunite with Barnett and his other war comrades in death. There's definitely a parallel between Whale and Clay and the hermit and the Monster, not just in their unlikely friendship and but also in how Whale is a virtual recluse into whose life Clay stumbles and how, in his memento to him, Whale simply asks, "Friend?", as the Monster himself sometimes mumbled. The whole thing comes full circle with the last shot, which is Clay walking down the street in the rain, imitating

the Monster's movements. And finally, you see how different people of different generations view Whale's work and how each one of them brings their own attitudes and sensibilities to it. Whale himself watches it for nostalgia and to admire his own work, Hanna is just repulsed by it, finding both the Monster and the Bride hideous, and Clay's friends find it to be more funny rather than scary, but Clay himself gets something out of it and passes that on to his son, Michael. After watching Bride of Frankenstein with his dad, Michael calls it, "Pretty cool. Better than most monster movies."

As much as Whale's own homosexuality is a part of the story, the film also goes into the hidden, gay side of Hollywood's Golden Age. The misconception that a sexual scandal ended Whale's career is brought up early on, but Whale himself insists it never happened. He goes on to tell Edmund Kay, "If you were a star, nobody cared a tinker's cuss who you slept with, so long as you kept it out of the papers. As for us directors, well, outside Hollywood, who even knows who George Cukor is, much less what he gets up to with those

boys from the malt shops?... George is famous for his Saturday dinner parties. Great writers, artists, society folk, all rubbing elbows with Hollywood royalty. But how many of those 'oh, so proper' people know about the Sunday brunches that follow? Armies of trade, eating up the leftovers, followed by some strenuous fun and frolic in the pool." Of course, Whale later admits to Clay that, after he and David Lewis' longtime romance ended, he got up to some serious hedonism with his own pool parties: "Oh, there was a time when this 

house was full of young men... This studio was full of bare buttocks and pricks. Mmm. Hard, arrogant pricks." After Clay storms out in disgust, we get a flashback to one of those parties, as a man outside the studio door says, "Watch me dive," and jumps into the pool. We then see that the pool has a number of young men in it, many of whom are completely naked (one guy gets out of the pool and we see everything). Going back to Lewis, while the film makes it out like Whale ended the relationship

because he himself was no longer in the film business, and possibly so as not to get Lewis caught up in a scandal, the truth is that Lewis left because Whale became interested in a 25-year old man when he was in his early 60's (that, as well as his forcing Kay to undress, sadly speaks to how Hollywood has, especially in recent years, been revealed to be a sleazy place that tends to cater to predators). Still, the movie does accurately depict their continued friendship afterward, with the two of them even sharing a full-on kiss in their first scene.

The only moment where Whale comes off as overt and unapologetic in his homosexuality is in the flashback to the filming of Bride of Frankenstein. After the very flamboyant Ernest Thesiger comments about the Bride's look, "I gather we not only did her hair, but dressed her. What a couple of queens we are, Colin," Whale says, "Yes, that's right, a couple of flaming queens. Pretorius is a little bit in love with Dr. Frankenstein, you know." Colin Clive looks horribly uncomfortable at the insinuation, and as I said in a previous review,

there were unconfirmed rumors that he may have been secretly gay or bi-sexual (many, including David Lewis, denied this, though). Given how especially homophobic Hollywood was back then, you realize this was something you wouldn't see very often, especially on sets, which likely led to many in the business not being crazy about Whale. And we do see hints of that general sense of homophobia, with how creeped out Clay is by Whale's "locker room talk" and his barely contained disdain for it, Hanna being sure that Whale will go to hell for his "sins of the flesh," and Betty teasing Clay by saying Whale's interest in him can only be a sexual one.

There is also some commentary about how Hollywood is full of ass-kissers, easily-bruised egos, and phoniness. When Whale receives his invitation to Cukor's party for Princess Margaret, one of many sent out to various people in the industry, he growls, "The pushy, little... Horning in on the Queen's little sister and then offering to share her with the whole damn raj?" Though Whale says he no longer has anything to do with this side of the business, he does go to the party with Clay, merely to annoy Cukor. When they meet Princess

Margaret, she's portrayed as a total dingbat, mistaking Whale for someone else until he removes his sunglasses, and when she sees his face, she says, "I am such a goose. I mistook you for Cecil Beaton," a famous British photographer. She adds, "It's the hat. You're wearing one of Cecil's hats, you know?" (Actually, to be fair, Beaton did look like Whale.) When Whale introduces himself to Cukor as David Lewis' friend, and tells Margaret that he used to be a director, Cukor, in a patronizing tone and cheesy

smile, comments, "One can't throw a rock in this town without hitting one of us old movie directors." That's when Whale introduces them to Clay, saying he's his gardener. While Margaret comments, "I adore gardens," Cukor is quite frazzled and angry when Whale insinuates that Clay is his lover. Whale also spots Lewis at the party, talking with Elizabeth Taylor, whose last movie he produced, and comments how he thought he was in New York. When Whale tells Lewis what

he did to Cukor, and tells him his opinion of Princess Margaret, saying she likely views them all as commoners, Lewis admonishes him, reminding him that there are others who know him that still work in the film business, which Whale is dismissive of. That's when Whale learns that Lewis wasn't even the one who got him invited. Rather, it was Edmund Kay, who now works for Cukor (his being hired by Cukor right after interviewing him make me suspicious of the director's intentions), and I have a feeling that, without him, Elsa Lanchester and Boris Karloff wouldn't have been there either.

Carter Burwell, the Coen Brothers' frequent composer, did the music score for Gods and Monsters, and his work for it can be best described as low-key, reflective, and, as expected, melancholic, with James Whale's recollections and visions, as well as the episodes of his failing health, often scored with a sad mixture of string and piano. Sometimes, however, it does have a lovely bit of whimsy to it, like in the flashback to the filming of Bride of Frankenstein, and Whale's memory of his pool parties is scored in a glorious kind of fashion, as if reflecting his feeling of, "Those were the days," as well as remembering how good-looking those young men were to him. There is a bit of the quirkiness you tend to get with Burwell's scores, as he comes up with an offbeat, rolling leitmotif for Whale himself that's repeated many times throughout the score. Where Burwell gets to be both unusual and kind of epic is in Whale's dream with Clay as Dr. Frankenstein, as that scene is scored with a pounding kettle drum and a melody that manages to come off as both triumphant and just plain strange. The scene between them in Whale's home during the storm goes from sad and melancholic to somewhat strong when Clay strips down for him and finally to tense and alarming when Whale makes his sexual charge towards Clay, resulting in their scuffle. It goes back to sad and even tragic when Whale asks Clay to kill him and he tearfully refuses. Fittingly, there's a feeling of finality to the music when Clay and Hanna realize that Whale has drowned himself, leading into a melodramatic violin piece that, when the scene transitions to Clay and his son watching Bride of Frankenstein, is used to replace the hermit's violin playing. There's a very poignant theme that plays when Clay shows Michael Whale's original sketch of the Monster, with the offer of friendship written on the back, transitioning into a heartfelt piece for the ending scene of Clay walking as the Monster out in the rain. It keeps with that feeling for the first part of the credits, then goes into a child-like string bit, before going back into the melancholia for the remainder of the credits, making use of Whale's leitmotif.

Gods and Monsters may not have been the movie you expected me to end October Fest with but I hope you get why I did. Besides its being a portrait of a very important figure in Universal Horror, it's also just a great movie. It's very well-acted, with Ian McKellen and Brendan Fraser both giving amazing performances, it perfectly captures how James Whale was a fascinating but troubled person and how difficult his final days were, Bill Condon's direction is dead-on, the tributes and allusions to old Hollywood, especially the classic Frankenstein movies, are absolutely delightful for fans and done with obvious love and affection, it peels back the curtain for a look at a side of Hollywood they typically wish not to acknowledge, the music score is subtle and fits with the movie's offbeat, melancholic tone, and in the end, it effectively tells a very human and touching story. If you're at all interested in Whale or his work, this is mandatory viewing, and if you're just being introduced to him, hopefully it'll inspire you to look up more info on him and seek out his other films.