Frankenstein 1970 (1958)

When it was briefly talked about in The History of Sci-Fi and Horror VHS documentary, Butch Patrick referred to Frankenstein 1970 as being "vaguely futuristic," which is a big understatement. It may have been impossible for them to know how the year 1970 would be but it would have been much better if they'd stuck with one of the original titles, which was Frankenstein 1960 (which they, ironically, discarded because it didn't sound futuristic enough), as only once does this film mention that it's taking place at any point in the future and, even then, it's still very clearly a product of the 50's. In any case, like so many other movies, that documentary was where I first learned of this film and it was clear from what little was said that, despite the presence of Boris Karloff, it was hardly among the greatest Frankenstein movies ever. I can remember looking up information for it on IMDB in the early 2000's and everything I read seemed to bare out the notion that this was not a good movie by any means. I never saw anything of it until 2010, when James Rolfe featured it in his fourth installment of CineMassacre's Monster Madness, which he called Camp Cult, which is rather similar to what I'm doing this October. His feelings were that the movie itself is nothing special and that Karloff is the only reason to watch it. When I finally did see it myself, as it was part of a Karloff/Lugosi DVD set from Warner Bros. that I got for Christmas one year, I found myself agreeing with him. Karloff, as he always was, is really good here and it's interesting to see him actually playing an actual Frankenstein character rather than as a monster (this wasn't the first time he appeared in a Frankenstein movie outside of the monster role but it does mark the first time he played a scientist from the infamous family); however, aside from him and some of the movie's more notable technical and narrative aspects, everything else is very "meh." None of the other characters are particularly memorable, the monster itself leaves something to be desired, and, despite being only 82 minutes long, the movie can be quite dull and mainly consists of little more than the uninteresting conflicts between the other characters and Baron Frankenstein meandering around in his laboratory, working on his experiments.

It's the 230th anniversary of the beginning of the legend of Frankenstein, when the original doctor created his monster, and a film crew is shooting a TV documentary based on it. They've managed to score a major coup in that Baron Victor von Frankenstein, the last of the family line, is allowing them to use his castle and grounds in Germany for the filming. However, the Baron's motivation for this is the money, as he needs it in order to purchase an atomic reactor to use in his own experiments, which concerns his friend, Gottfried, who's also handling his finances. Despite his obvious contempt for the film crew and their exploitation of his family name and history, the Baron goes along with their plans, even taking part in the filming himself. Gottfried becomes even more concerned about what his old friend may be up to when he hears that the Baron has lately been working with the director of the city morgue and he's disturbed by his menacing demeanor when he inquires about it. It turns out that Gottfried has every right to be concerned as, down in a laboratory hidden below the family crypt, the Baron has been constructing a monster of his own, which he plans to bring to life using the atomic reactor. Feeling he must restore his family name with this experiment, the completely mad Baron will stop at nothing to bring his creature to life and uses the body parts of those around him to create it, including the heart and brain of his loyal butler, Schutter, when he accidentally discovers the lab.

Frankenstein 1970 is one of only a handful of films directed by Howard W. Koch, who mainly worked as a producer in both film and television (he would notably go on to be the producer on a few of the Academy Awards shows in the 70's and 80's and was also the Academy's president from 1977 to 1979). Having worked as a film librarian and assistant director over at 20th Century Fox, his first film as director was 1954's Shield for Murder, which he co-directed with Edmond O'Brien (who also starred in the film). He went on to direct movies like 1955's Big House, U.S.A., 1957's Untamed Youth, and Jungle Heat, the same year, among others. His films as director didn't make much of an impact and he only directed a few other features after Frankenstein 1970, his last one being 1973's Badge 373, with Robert Duvall. He did direct some television, with episodes of Maverick, The Untouchables, and Miami Undercover, but after the 50's, Koch focused almost entirely on producing. While this proved to be the only horror movie he directed, he did produce some others like The Black Sleep, Voodoo Island, and Pharaoh's Curse, before going one to produce more prominent movies like The Manchurian Candidate, The Odd Couple, and, later in his life, both of the Airplane! movies, Dragonslayer, and Ghost. Koch died of Alzheimer's in 2001 at the age of 84.

The trailer for Frankenstein 1970 proclaimed that Boris Karloff was "back" but, looking at his filmography, it doesn't look like he ever went anywhere, as he kept getting work in films and television right up to when he died in 1969. Moreover, he'd been in Voodoo Island the year before this, so he certainly wasn't absent from the horror genre during this time, either. Maybe that trailer was referring to his return to the world of Frankenstein. Who knows? In any case, like I said before, if there's any reason at all to watch this film, it's Karloff, as he is great as the aging Baron Victor von Frankenstein, so much so that it makes you wonder why he never played a version of Dr. Frankenstein before. In the role, he manages to be creepy, menacing, and completely mad, while also sympathetic in some ways. You learn that he was captured by the Nazis and horrifically tortured, leaving him with a limp and a long scar on the left side of his face. He was also forced to perform medical experiments for them and it's clear that all of this has left him a very embittered man. Though he allows them to use his castle and grounds for the film they're making because he needs the money, the Baron is not at all thrilled about the crew's presence, save that of the lovely young star, Carolyn Hayes, whom he has an uncomfortable fascination with. But, he does indulge them and even takes part in the rehearsal, giving a very nice soliloquy for his ancestor, talking about his experiments, what went wrong, and how he could not bring himself to destroy the monster that he'd created, clearly having some affection for him (Karloff manages to do this whole speech in one long take, despite being in his early 70's and in poor health, a testament to what an awesome actor he was). So much affection, in fact, that he's following in his footsteps, creating his own creature out of body parts he's acquired due to his relationship with the director of the city morgue, an experiment that he hopes will restore the name of his family to its former glory. Though he's been offered a position by the government, the Baron feels that, as the last Frankenstein, and with his poor physical condition making the amount of life left in him uncertain, he must complete this experiment as soon as he can. Therefore, there's no one that he won't kill in order to complete his creature. When his loyal friend and butler, Schutter, stumbles across him while he's working in the lab, he kills him and puts his heart and brain in the body, and later on, he kills another friend of his, Gottfried, in order to make use of his eyes.

Despite the terrible things he does and the menace that he exudes, Baron Frankenstein is not completely unsympathetic. For one, it's obvious that he experienced incredible cruelty at the hands of the Nazis and that this has rendered him quite mad. For another, while he kills two of his friends to use their body parts for his creature, it's not something he ever planned to do. He laments that Schutter had stumble across his secret laboratory, knowing he can't let him live now that he knows his secret. Knowing how to induce hypnosis, he does so to Schutter, not only to ensure his obedience but also possibly so he'll feel no pain when he's killed and his heart and brain are be removed. He also warns off Gottfried from prying into his business several times, though he does so in the very threatening manner of telling him about a nosy commandant at a Nazi prison camp he was placed in, one whose tongue ended up getting sliced off. The Baron makes no secret about him being the one behind it, commenting, "Oh, I know, I was called in to examine the poor wretch. A beautiful piece of surgery, if I do say so myself. Beautiful." But, when people begin disappearing and Gottfried eventually makes it clear he's not going to back down from his inquiries, the Baron decides to satisfy his curiosity and show him the creature before killing him for his eyes. Again, he clearly didn't want to do that, given the sad way he says Gottfried's name before disposing of his clothes. And when the creature brings Judy Stevens to him rather than Doug Rowe, the film director, like he wanted, the Baron is irritated, not just because her eyes were no good but also because a woman is dead who needn't be, calling her a "poor girl." But still, none of this sympathy makes up for the fact that he does terrible things, lies about what happened to the various people who disappear, seems intent upon killing Row for his eyes simply because he dislikes him, and has an unsettling attraction to Carolyn, whom he tries to get his creature to bring down to the lab near the end. However, her ability to appeal to the mind of Schutter within the creature is what leads to the Baron's demise, as his creation turns on him and trashes the lab, the two of them succumbing to the atomic reactor's radiation when it overloads.

None of the other characters match the interest or complexity that Boris Karloff manages to bring to the part of the Baron, particularly the cast and crew of the film that's being made. Doug Row (Donald Barry), the director, is fast-talking and obnoxious, coming off as very pushy in his directions to his cast and clearly has no respect at all for the Baron's famous ancestor or his family's past. He keeps his ex-wife, Judy, on as his assistant but their relationship is anything but friendly, especially given Row's infatuation with his lovely leading lady, Carolyn. Rowe doesn't come out and confirm his intentions for Carolyn to Judy, but he doesn't deny them, either, and, sure enough, at one point, he tries to go into Carolyn's bedroom, only to find the door locked and her refusing to let him in. When Judy disappears, however, Row feels bad that he might have possibly driven her away but is sure she'll come back. But, when his cameraman, Morgan, also disappears soon afterward, he calls in the local police inspector. He's obviously beginning to suspect the Baron, not believing him when he says that Morgan said he was going to Frankfurt for a special lens. He's not satisfied when the inspector finds nothing down in the crypt, so he goes down there himself and Morgan's view finder on the ground. This prompts him to go back to the police station and show it to the inspector, as well as get testimony from a cab driver and a porter that they never drove any of the missing people from the castle to the station or saw them at the station. This convinces the inspector that something strange is going on and they drive back to the castle, only to arrive as the Baron is trying to get his creature to carry Carolyn down into the crypt. They only manage to save her after Carolyn manages to get the creature to let her go and, after it's all over, Row joins the investigation of the lab. Down there, he and his publicity man, Mike, find one of the Baron's tapes about his hopes for his creation.

Judy (Charlotte Austin) is quite a bitter woman, particularly towards Doug Row, her ex-husband, whom she works with as an assistant, and his infatuation with the lovely Carolyn Hayes. Their first conversation at the beginning of the film has a lot of venom to it, with Row accusing her of being jealous because she's no longer an ingenue and adds that he's loyal enough to keep her on the payroll. Her response: "Oh, yes, you're loyal to wives one through four inclusive," and then she motions to Carolyn, adding, "Would you care to try your luck with five?" Row comments he'd have to sleep on it and Judy sneers, "Oh, I bet you would!" She continues not to hide her jealousy and bitterness about the situation, making condescending comments about them at every opportunity. When Row asks Carolyn to join him to go over some new scenes, Judy says, "Think of your career, darling," and when Mike then suggests the two of them take a walk, she growls, "I'd like to take a walk... right out of here!" This adds to Mike's own frustration with her, as he often accuses her of still carrying a torch for Row, despite how much ire she claims to have for him. This is proven when Judy finds herself writing some overly dramatic and romantic dialogue for the film and is unsure if it is due to her still having feelings for Row. Being infatuated with her himself, Mike tries to drunkenly come on to her in that instance, only for Judy to throw him out. He tries to get back in and she yells at him to go away, as she puts her nightgown on. She finally loses her patience when she hears another round of knocking after she thought he'd gone and rips open the door, only to find the Baron's creature standing there. Judy screams in terror and faints, and it's later revealed that the creature carried her down to the laboratory, intending for the Baron to give him her eyes. However, after they're removed, the eyes prove to be useless and the Baron disposes of them.

In stark contrast to Judy, Carolyn (Jana Lund), the lovely young woman starring in the film, is quite carefree and friendly, particularly to the Baron's butler, Schutter, whom she buys a scarf for and then proceeds to give him a friendly kiss on the cheek. She doesn't give much thought to Judy's jealousy and, while he's her director, it's clear that she's not interested in Doug Row's advances, refusing to let him into her room at one point. He's not the only person who Carolyn receives unwanted affections from, as the Baron often ogles her and makes not so subtle allusions to how beautiful he thinks she is. All he succeeds in doing is repulsing and creeping Carolyn out, and she's not fond of the gloomy music he often plays on the organ in the castle's main room. In the moment where the Baron sees that she found Schutter's scarf down in the basement and takes it from her to wear himself, claiming that he'll send it to him, Carolyn is especially unnerved by this, given how the Baron keeps insisting that Schutter is away, visiting relatives. By the end of the movie, she's become uneasy due to the increasing disappearances and is really affected by that of Morgan, whom she was with down in the crypt before he vanished;  unbeknownst to her, she was with Morgan down in the crypt and left him right before he met his end at the hands of the creature. Speaking of which, she captures the creature's attention as well, quite possibly a result of Schutter's brain being inside its head. This ultimately proves to be what saves Carolyn from the Baron's clutches when he arranges for her to run into the creature downstairs. As he brings her down to him, Carolyn overhears the Baron call the creature "Schutter" and then begs him to take her back upstairs. After an internal conflict between being obedient to his master and his enduring affection for Carolyn, he ultimately lets her go and goes down to confront the Baron himself.

Mike (Tom Duggan), the crew's PR man, drums up publicity by calling a newspaper in order to tell them of an upcoming party at the castle following the airing of their program, one that will featur "goblins" from various countries for "an international horror contest." You also later find out that he spread some rumors about the revival of Frankenstein's monster, which comes back to bite him when the police inspector searches the Baron's crypt for the missing persons and throws it back at him and Doug Row, thinking it's another publicity stunt. Mike spends the movie trying to get with Judy, whom he has the hots for, only to become frustrated by her being unable to get over Row. This comes to a head when he comes into her room one night while drunk and tries to get with her, only to be thrown out and repeatedly try to get back in before finally giving up. After Judy disappears, Row confronts Mike about it and he admits that he tried to get with her but he didn't get anywhere and doesn't know what's become of her, feeling bad that it might be his fault. Following Morgan's disappearance, Mike is with Row when he finds his cinematographer view finder down in the basement and takes it to the police station to show the inspector. While he's gone, Mike covers for him, telling the Baron that he's up in his room, writing, but the Baron knows better, having overheard them on hidden microphones he has installed throughout his castle. He uses Mike's interest in some of the old artifacts found in the castle to get him to look at an old coin and uses the light shining off of it to hypnotize him. He then learns from Mike where Row is and instructs him to tell Carolyn that Row is downstairs, waiting for her, when the clock strikes a certain time, before awakening him. When the time comes, Mike reacts to the Baron's hypnotic instructions, leading to the creature taking Carolyn down to the lab, and is not seen again until the ending, when he and Row look around the lab with the police after the Baron has succumbed to his atomic reactor malfunctioning.

Morgan (John Dennis) (center), Row's beret-wearing cinematographer, is the most laid back of the film crew. All he does is go along with what Row says and does, giving him advice sometimes, like when he warns him about the thick fog in the surrounding countryside, but not pushing it when Row decides not to go for it. When Row decides that the fog would be good for atmosphere, for instance, Morgan replies, "Okay, it's your baby, but I still say it's gonna fog up the whole night scene." In all, Morgan doesn't get much screentime before he meets his end at the hands of the Baron's creation. While down in the crypt with Carolyn in order to set up shots, they're unaware that the creature is watching them from the shadows, lunging at the unsuspecting Carolyn a couple of times. She then leaves Morgan but he stays down there to line up some more shots and, once he's alone, the creature attacks and kills him. The Baron later examines Morgan's eyes, hoping to give them to his creature, but they're unsuitable because of the blood type and he has to dispose of them.

The character who I find myself having the most sympathy for is poor Schutter (Norbert Schiller), Baron Frankenstein's butler. He comes off as nothing but a genuinely nice guy, willing to do whatever is required of him. When he's not serving the Baron, he acts as a go-between for the crew and Hans Himmler, a big, German guy that they've hired to play the monster in their film. He not only has to tell him to stop trying to drown Carolyn while playing the monster during the film's opening but, after the scene down in the crypt with the Baron, Himmler is almost ready to quit the movie altogether but Schutter's easy manner and Doug Row's bribery with money encourage him to stay on. Schutter becomes fairly well-liked by the crew as a whole but Carolyn is especially fond of him, buying him a scarf while she's in town one day. Schutter is quite touched by the gesture, much to the anger and jealousy of the Baron, who growls at him, "You are richly endowed to have one as lovely as Miss Hayes bestow gifts upon you." Despite this, the Baron is also quite fond of his trusted butler, so much so that, when Schutter, while securing the castle for the night, finds his way down to his secret laboratory, the Baron laments, "Ah, my poor Schutter. Why did it have to be you?" When he sees the body of the creature, Schutter is horrified and then becomes frightened and pleading for his life when the Baron makes it clear that he's going to kill him. Using the light reflecting off the surgical scissors he was using earlier, the Baron manages to put Schutter under hypnosis, ensuring his obedience to the cause. Afterward, he places Schutter's heart and brain inside the creature, but his affection for Carolyn eventually ends up becoming the end of the Baron's plot.

Finally, Gottfried (Rudolph Anders), another old friend of the Baron's, grows concerned about his friend's increasingly unsettling behavior over the course of the story. First, as he's the one who's handling his finances, he's worried about the Baron's spending of money for equipment, having sold virtually all of his art treasures in order to come up with more money. He's also worried about the Baron's state of mind, given his bitterness towards his horrific past and his feelings about being the last of the Frankensteins, and his tendency to disappear for hours on end. Gottfried truly begins to suspect what his old friend may be up to when he learns that he's been working with the director of the city morgue, asking, "Are you interested in corpses?", and then when people begin disappearing. He questions him about where Schutter is, as he knows that, despite what the Baron told the others, he has no relatives to visit, but the Baron's story about the fate of a nosy commandant at a Nazi prison camp gets him to back off. But, he doesn't back down after Judy and Morgan disappear as well, saying that he's able to tell he's lying when he claims to not know what became of them, and the Baron decides to satisfy his friend's curiosity, telling him he best have a lot of courage for what he's about to show him. Leading him down into the crypt, he opens the fake sarcophagus that leads down into the lab and Gottfried comes face to face with the Baron's creation, after which he's killed and his eyes are given to the creature.

Frankenstein 1970 was shot independently on a very small budget of $110,000 in order to cash in on a recent resurgence of the Frankenstein myth in film, with movies like I Was A Teenage Frankenstein and the American release of Hammer's The Curse of Frankenstein. Despite its low-rent, exploitative origins, the filmmakers tried to make it look as classy as they could by shooting it in CinemaScope, which they felt the need to put before the film's title in the opening credits, and making use of large sets left over from another film. It's still apparent in some aspects that they weren't working with much money but the film does look good, with the black-and-white being very rich and crisp, and the long width of the screen making it feel like a much bigger film. Also, cinematographer Carl E. Guthrie does manage to create some instances of atmosphere, particularly in the opening, shot in some dark, fog-shrouded forest that leads to a darkly-lit lake, and the scenes down in the crypt beneath Baron Frankenstein's castle. Speaking of the sets, they look pretty good and, like the CinemaScope, give the illusion that you're watching a film with a fairly large budget. This is definitely true of the main set of the castle's interior, which was left over from the film, Too Much, Too Soon, which Warner Bros. produced the same year. The main room of the castle is a huge living area, with a big upstairs section, a large front door in the foyer, and a pipe organ that the Baron tends to play on. The nearby library is also quite a large room and impressive to see in a movie of this nature, and the crypt area is very mood and darkly-lit, as well as quite expansive. Finally, there's the Baron's laboratory, which is at the bottom of a flight of stairs beneath a fake sarcophagus and which, in classic haunted house style, can be opened up by turning the head of a nearby statue. Said laboratory is modern and high-tech, very different from what you often see in a Frankenstein movie, with lots of electronic equipment adorning the walls and the centerpiece being an atomic reactor, where he houses the body of his creature. There's a work bench nearby that contains an apparatus where the Baron disposes of any useless body parts or organs, a PA system where he can listen to his guests through microphones he has hidden throughout the castle, and an overhead microphone that he uses to make records of his work.

Speaking of the lab, it's part of one of the film's more interesting attributes, which is the transplanting of the age-old Frankenstein myth into, what was at the time, the modern era. While you still have a lot of the old tropes, like the creepy castle, the secret passages, and the basic idea of an iteration of Dr. Frankenstein working in his laboratory to create his own human being, it's placed in the 1950's (or 1970, if you want to actually follow the story), when laboratory equipment and surgical procedures had become more advanced than those alluded to in the original films of the 30's, where the time period depicted was very ambiguous anyway. Frankenstein is still sewing together body parts and transplanting organs taken from various sources as usual but here, he mentions that he's using synthetic flesh along with real tissue and has used plastic surgery to cover up scars. Plus, he records his exact methods on audio tape, a distinctly modern touch, as well as transplants Schutter's heart in much the same manner as a real-life transplant, and when he brings his creature to life and then tries to make contact with Schutter's mind within it, he uses an EEG to see if he's getting any kind of reaction. Most notably, however, is the notion of the Frankenstein story entering the atomic age, with the Baron using an atomic reactor he purchases from the money he receives from the film crew for letting them use his castle for their program. It's this element that cements this as a product of the 50's, fitting it in with all of the other nuclear-oriented horror and science fiction films of the period (rather than the later year it portends to be set in), as the Baron uses the reactor to bring his creature to life rather than with a bolt of lightning.

There's also the element of a film crew making their own monster movie, only to be confronted with an actual monster, which didn't happen very often in films back then (that same year, though, you had the movie, How to Make a Monster, about makeup artist turning actors into actual monsters). It's another modern take on the idea, with the notion that everybody and their mother knows the Frankenstein story by this point, mostly because there had already been so many movies by the time the 50's rolled around. This is apparent, not only in how the opening, which is not immediately revealed to be a scene for the film crew, is so typical in its depiction of a young village woman being chased by an iteration of Frankenstein's monster, but also in the production and marketing of the actual movie, where a big deal was made about them getting Boris Karloff and also with the silhouetted monster on the poster resembling the iconic Universal look. But the movie's story adds an extra twist to it in that, in this reality, there was a real Dr. Frankenstein who created a monster in the 1700's and the film crew is making a television program about that, reenacting everything in an over-the-top and tasteless manner, considering they're using the castle owned by the last remaining member of the family. And unbeknownst to them, this Frankenstein whom they're working with is secretly creating his own creature down in his laboratory, through a means very similar to the one his ancestor employed. But, as interesting as these aspects of the story are, they're not delved into deeply at all and are merely as interesting window dressing for what is otherwise a standard mad scientist flick.

It's nowhere close to the level of the full-color gruesomeness that made The Curse of Frankenstein as controversial as it was successful but Frankenstein 1970 does have instances of being a bit more grisly than what had been seen in previous Frankenstein films. The notion of Baron Frankenstein having been tortured by the Nazis and forced to perform horrific medical experiments for them is quite disturbing in and of itself, especially when you know just how appallingly evil their crimes were. Therefore, it gives the scar on the left side of his face, which runs from his eye, down his cheek, and to his mouth, and his limp a little more dramatic weight, even if the makeup for the scar is merely serviceable and often inconsistent in its look. More impactful is the idea that the Baron is killing people and using their organs to complete his creation, which had only recently become prevalent in depictions of the Frankenstein myth (Peter Cushing's Victor Frankenstein in the Hammer films is definitely not above this), which had typically involved mere grave robbery before. You actually see him doing this in graphic close-up, such as when the Baron removes Schutter's heart and continuously massages it as he walks over to the monster's body with it. They used a real cow heart for this scene, which must have been pretty shocking for the time and it still has the power to take you aback even now. Granted, the original Universal Frankenstein films sometimes had shots of brains in jars but those were obviously fake and, for me, a detached brain is not as grisly as a bloody heart, let alone one that came from a real animal, something you don't often see in a movie made in the safe, conservative 1950's. The film also has close-ups of eyeballs in a jar, which the Baron accidentally drops on the floor when his freezer's door hits him in the arm, and another close-up of Morgan's eyes as the Baron studies them before deeming them unsuitable for his creature. And speaking of eyes, the dissolve from a close-up of Gottfried's eyes to his eyes now inside the monster's sockets behind the bandages is an effectively unsettling touch without getting too graphic with it. However, one part of the film that was ultimately deemed too grotesque by the censors was a crunching, grinding sound that was heard whenever the Baron put disposable body parts in a device at his work station. In the finished film, they used the sound of a flushing toilet, meant to insinuate that whatever he put in there was expelled from the premises. Not surprisingly, when audiences heard this sound, they could help but laugh at it.

You practically don't see any of the monster's physicality, even after he's brought to life, as he's covered from head-to-toe in bandages, save for two holes in the face where his eyes are meant to be. When you first see him while he's still being created, you see a skull in place of his head, as the Baron hasn't yet grafted skin onto it, but after he's brought to life, his bandaged head suddenly becomes hydrocephalic and bloated, which doesn't make sense when the bandages are removed at the end of the film. The monster is played Mike Lane, who also plays Hans Himmler, the man the crew have playing the monster in the film they're making, but with no voice or facial expressions to work with, he isn't able to do much other than just lurch around, lunge at people, and yell in a couple of scenes. The monster's interest in Carolyn in a moment down in the crypt is supposedly a result of it being Schutter's brain that's inside his head but the only real traces of Schutter within this thing are his obedience to the Baron and the way Carolyn is able to make him let her go at the end of the movie, which leads into his turning on his creator and dying from the atomic reactor's overload with him. Other than that, the monster is just a run-of-the-mill, lumbering goon, and his having Schutter's brain ultimately has little impact. However, the reveal at the end of the movie, that the Baron modeled the monster's face on his own, using a clay sculpture and a picture of himself from his younger days, before he was scarred, is a nicely poetic touch. Not only was it the Baron's way of trying to recreate the man he once was so his family name could live on but its face being that of Boris Karloff, the man who made the Frankenstein monster forever iconic, makes for an honorable tribute and, as James Rolfe said, brings him full-circle.

However, all the good that I can find in it doesn't change the fact that Frankenstein 1970 is hardly one of the most entertaining movies of its type. It starts out strong enough, with the opening featuring Carolyn being chased through a dark, fog-enshrouded forest and into the shallows of a lake by a monster whose face is never shown and who attempts to drown her, before it's revealed that it's a scene for a movie, and the introduction of Baron Frankenstein and the scene with him in his family crypt feature superlative acting by Boris Karloff, but after that, things get very bogged down. For most of the running time, we're either watching the Baron acting menacing towards those around him, limping around his laboratory, working on the monster, and recording his notes, or the inner conflicts that the TV cast and crew are caught up in, and despite Karloff giving his part of it nothing but his absolute best, it stops being interesting after a while. Even after he manages to bring the monster to life, things don't pick up much, as the scenes involving the monster are nothing special. All he does is show up at Judy's bedroom door, causing her to faint; appear in front of Morgan down in the crypt and attack and kill him (he constantly moves to block his attempts to escape, despite the fact that, at this point, he still doesn't have any eyes!); almost get the Baron caught when he opens up the fake sarcophagus from the bottom of the stairs while the police are investigating the crypt; appear to Gottfried before he receives his eyes; almost carry Carolyn down to the lab, only to let her go when she tells him to; and then confront the Baron, leading to their deaths. That is literally everything meaningful the monster does in the film, which is disappointing, to say the least, and Karloff can only continue to carry this crappy movie by himself for so long. The climax is also very lackluster: the Baron has the hypnotized Mike send Carolyn downstairs, where the monster is waiting for her and then tries to bring her down to the lab. While this is going on, Doug Row rushes back to the castle with the police inspector (in the exterior shots of the car, the fog is actually a bad compositing effect) and when they arrive, they search the castle for the Baron. Hearing them over the intercom, the Baron tries to hurry the monster in bringing Carolyn down to him but she's able to appeal to Schutter's mind and make him let her go. Realizing he's about to be found out, the Baron throws every single switch in the laboratory, seemingly planning to kill himself by overloading the atomic reactor, when the monster shows up and lunges at him. He tries to warn Schutter to go back, that the radioactivity will kill him, but the monster doesn't listen and the atomic steam that emits from the malfunctioning reactor overwhelms and kills them both. Trust me, it's not nearly as exciting as it might sound.

And as for the music score, I have barely anything to say yet again. The score was done by Paul Dunlap, a veteran composer who mostly worked in westerns but who also did his fair share of horror and sci-fi flicks, scoring movies like I Was A Teenage Werewolf, I Was A Teenage Frankenstein, Blood of Dracula, How to Make a Monster, Invisible Invaders, and The Angry Red Planet. I haven't seen most of those films but I do remember thinking his score for Teenage Werewolf was pretty good at capturing its vibe; with Frankenstein 1970, though, he simply went through the motions and made a generic, 50's horror score. There is nothing memorable about the music and it will leave your brain as soon as the movie is over. The only thing I can remember, and it wasn't even part of the score itself, is this rhythmic "doo-doo" sound made by a machine down in the Baron's laboratory. When I first heard it, I thought it was music, until I realized I was only hearing it in the lab and that it was in sequence with some flashing lights on a control panel on the wall. That is honestly all I can remember about anything musical in this movie!

Frankenstein 1970 can't be called a good movie but it's also not completely without its merits. Boris Karloff is the absolute highlight of the film, really helping to elevate it with his great performance, and the movie has an interesting means of paying tribute to his legacy as the original Frankenstein monster. In addition, the film also has a brief but likable and pitiable character in Schutter, some nice cinematography, the CinemaScope format making it feel much more prestigious than it really is, the use of some lavish sets left over from another movie, a story that transposes the Frankenstein myth to the then modern day of the 1950's and also has the notion of a film crew making a television documentary about the myth, only for them to be confronted with a real-life Dr. Frankenstein and his monster, and a few surprisingly grisly images and ideas. But, none of that can change the fact that most of the actors outside of Karloff are not interesting and neither are their characters' inner conflicts, the monster is a complete dud that doesn't do anything you haven't seen before, the music is forgettable, and the movie just isn't very exciting, save for a few scenes, and the climax is very ho-hum. It's ultimately a by-the-numbers mad scientist movie whose innovations are little more than attempts to differentiate it from its peers and that doesn't quite cut it with me. I would recommend it if you want to see a good performance from Karloff but not if you're looking for a genuinely good Frankenstein movie outside of the Universal and Hammer classics.