Christopher Columbus. The great explorer of the Americas. Not only did he bring two continents to Europe's attention (although he always believed he had found South-East Asia) he also saw something strange.
At 10pm, 11 October 1492, somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean, often believed to be near Watling's Island, a strange light was spotted in the distance by a number of crew members, including Columbus himself. The light was described as that of a candle, that moved up and down. The voyagers believed this to indicate land and followed the light to, what is now, Guanahani in the Bahamas. The identity and precise location of this light have been debated to this day.
One explanation is that it was a torch or other light brandished by a native American hunting, either on land or in a canoe on the water. However, Columbus' log mentions that the wind was very high and so this is considered unlikely. Another, more unusual explanation, is that the light could have been caused by bioluminescent protozoa that sometimes covers the rocks in the area. But, Columbus and his crew reported the light as being like a candle flame that moved, rather than an immobile glowing blob. Finally, a similar explanation could be the worm Odontosyllis enopla, a Caribbean species that glows during the mating season. But again, this explanation has a problem - Odontosyllis enopla only glows for a few days after the full moon and Columbus' log notes that the moon was only in its first quarter phase that night.
My thoughts: I have no explanation for this. Maybe they were mistaken or perhaps it was an optical illusion or a reflection in the water from something? Who knows?
We begin our journey into the unknown with a mysterious island that disappeared in the 2nd century A.D. Called Chryse (cry-see), it was a small island off the coast of Lemnos that was said to have harboured an impressive temple dedicated to the deities Apollo and Chryse - the goddess Chryse is not mentioned anywhere else and her worship seems to have been confined to this island.
Our only sources of information on this island come from Sophocles (who very briefly mentions it in passing as the location where the mythical figure Philoctetes was bitten by a snake on his way to Troy) and Pausanias, an Ancient Greek explorer. Pausanias wrote that the island was destroyed by an earthquake and tsunami sometime before the 2nd century AD. Did this island ever exist? If it did, how come nobody else mentioned it? Many historians believe that Pausanias made it up and never visited many of the places he wrote about. Could Chryse be one of these fictionalised accounts?
However, there's just a little bit more. Some archaeologists believe that a sunken landmass off the coast of Lemnos, called Kharos Bank, may be the remains of this ancient island. However, investigations so far have proven inconclusive.
My verdict: I believe that Chryse Island never existed. It's most likely that Pausanias heard about it from some bloke down the pub and reported it as fact in his book. As far Kharos Bank, it just seems like a bunch of rocks at the bottom of the sea to me. But what do you think?
Universal's last classic monster only received one solo outing before becoming embroiled in a civil war with the other monsters that will last throughout the 1940s. Interestingly, however, the Wolf Man was portrayed by the same person in every film (in the classic era that is), something that Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster and the Mummy couldn't do.
The classic werewolf received its first major outing in 1941 in The Wolf Man, directed by George Waggner and based on a screenplay by Curt Siodmak. But it's not quite as traditional as you might think.
Plot: Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney, Jr.) is visiting his home in Wales after his brother's death to reconcile with his estranged father Sir John Talbot (Claude Rains). There, he becomes enamoured with a local antiques store owner Gwen Conliffe (Evelyn Ankers). Everything seems peachy until he rescues Gwen's friend Jenny (Fay Helm) from an apparent wolf attack and gets bitten. A local gypsy woman (Maria Ouspenskaya) informs him he will become a werewolf, but surely werewolves are just a myth right?
My thoughts: This is where the idea of the werewolf was popularised. However, two important elements are missing. There is no transformation sequence as the filmmakers deemed it too technically challenging (despite Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde being able to pull it off 9 years earlier) and there is also no full moon to be seen. That is because in this version, the transformation is not triggered by the full moon but by the flowering of the Wolfsbane, a plant traditionally used to kill wolves. As for the film itself, Chaney gives a very good performance of a conflicted character and you really feel like his curse is genuine (although he goes over the top with this in the sequels). Lugosi's back but only in a very small, minor role near the beginning. Definitely worth checking out if you are a fan of classic horror.
From the classic to the not-so-classic. After The Mummy (1999) revitalised interest in the classic monster, Universal Studios decided to bring back another one. Directed by Joe Johnston (the guy behind the disaster that was Jurassic Park 3) and based on a screenplay by Andrew Kevin Walker and David Self. With an all-star cast how could this possibly go wrong?
Plot: Ben Talbot is missing. His fiancée Gwen Conliffe (Emily Blunt) contacts Ben's brother Lawrence (Benicio del Toro) to do something. Lawrence arrives back home where he has an uneasy reunion with his father John (Anthony Hopkins). Ben's mutilated body turns up and the finger of suspicion points to the gypsies who have brought a dancing bear with them. As the locals try to arrest said bear, another creature turns up, killing many and biting Lawrence on the neck. Inspector Aberline (Hugo Weaving) is tasked with getting to the bottom of the mystery.
My thoughts. Meh. It's certainly atmospheric. And that's about it. The story is overly complicated with a "plot twist" everyone can see coming from a mile off. The acting is so wooden, even with acting powerhouses like Del Toro, Hopkins and Weaving, they deliver their lines with so little emotion and expression. Even Nicholas Cage and Keanu Reaves could give more convincing performances. And the CGI sucks, it doesn't work at all. Stick to the original, I say.
Frankenstein. Along with Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster is one of the most iconic horror monsters in history. Dr. Frankenstein, as well as Dr. Jekyll, is one of the most iconic mad scientists in history. It is no surprise then that after the success of Dracula, Universal Studios decided to produce an adaptation of Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus. From this series, we got two of the most critically acclaimed movies ever made, including a rare example of a sequel being considered better than the original.
It all started in 1931, the same year as Dracula, with another ambitious project from Universal directed by James Whale. And, like Dracula, the movie follows a stage play rather than the original source material.
Plot: Dr. Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) and his assistant Fritz (Dwight Frye) are attempting to create life by reanimating a corpse. His fianceé Elizabeth (Mae Clarke) and friend Victor (John Boles) are concerned that Frankenstein is spending too much time on his research and not on his upcoming wedding. So they ask Dr. Waldman (Abraham Van Sloan), his teacher, to talk some sense into him. Meanwhile, Frankenstein has succeeded in creating a new living creature (Boris Karloff). Unfortunately, due to a cock-up on Fritz's part, the creature is a slow dumb-witted monster. Frankenstein tries to dispose of it but the monster escapes and wreaks havoc.
My thoughts: This movie was a bigger success than Dracula and catapulted Karloff to superstardom. Colin Clive gives a fantastic performance as the mad scientist bent on creating life and then regretting ever engaging in such research.
The movie is iconic because of it's portrayal of the monster, with the flat, square head, bolts sticking out of the neck, largely mute and animalistic nature, all of which were invented by the movie. It also established the use of electricity to create the creature, a process that is not described much in Shelley's novel. And the character of Fritz, a stupid, often disfigured assistant (often called Igor, but that is an influence from the later Frankenstein films as we will see).
In addition to being influential, this movie was also controversial, two scenes in particular. The first is the famous "It's alive!" speech given by Clive. The original line was: "It's alive! It's alive! In the name of God! Now I know what it feels like to be God!" In some states, particularly Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and New York, the last sentence was considered to blasphemous and was edited out, to be replaced with a thunderclap (this can be seen in the trailer). The other scene is the one where the monster encounters a little girl and they play throwing flowers into a lake. The monster then picks up the girl, throwing her in the lake too (in a playful manner) but unfortunately she drowns. In the original theatrical release, the scene was cut so you only see the monster encountering the girl, the rest of the scene is explained later in the film when the girl's body is found. Subsequent releases of the film on video and dvd differ on how much of these two scenes they have, with most modern versions having the scene with the girl in full. Sadly, no good recording of the full speech has survived, so it is often inaudible. Another interesting tidbit is in the final scene where we see Dr. Frankenstein on a bed being nursed back to health. The camera is placed far away and there is a reason for that. It's not Colin Clive. Originally, the movie was to supposed to end with the monster and the doctor being killed together, but the producers wanted a happy ending so they forced the studio to film a new ending scene showing Frankenstein had survived. No biggie you might think, except that Clive was not in the country anymore so a stand-in was used instead. The identity of this stand-in is not known for certain but is rumored to have been future western star Robert Livingston.
This was then followed by what could be Universal's best movie, and one of the few times a sequel is superior to the original: 1935's Bride of Frankenstein.
Four years after the success of Frankenstein, Universal returned with a sequel, again directed by James Whale.
Plot: After the aftermath of the first movie, Hans (Reginald Barlow), the father of the girl killed in the previous movie, wants to see the monster's body to be sure it is dead. He finds it in a pit and, lo and behold, the creature's not dead and attacks him. The creature escapes the pit and proceeds to cause havoc in the countryside, as all undead monsters do.
Meanwhile, Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) is found to still be alive and is nursed back to health by his fiancée Elizabeth (now played by Valerie Hobson). Upon his recovery, Frankenstein shows regret for creating the creature, but still believes he can unlock the secrets of life and death. Then, as if my magic, his former mentor Dr. Septimus Pretorius (Ernest Thesiger) appears, and succeeds in coaxing Henry to create a new monster (Elsa Lanchester) with him.
Of course, everything goes tits up when the monster shows up.
My thoughts: This is a better movie than its predecessor. Much closer to Shelly's novel than Frankenstein, it features possibly the greatest performance of a mad scientist from Ernest Thesiger, whose eccentricity borders on insanity and creepiness. Clive gives another brilliant performance as the conflicted doctor who on one hands yearns for more knowledge while at the same is scared of the means by which to acquire said knowledge. Karloff returns for more grunting and shuffling but he does speak in this one, as the monster could in Shelly's novel (though he will go back to grunting in subsequent movies). And of course, Elsa Lanchester as the Bride is fabulous, and gives a brilliant, almost robotic performance.
As mentioned before, Universal experienced a slump as moviegoers lost interest in horror. As a result, the studio commissioned Rowland V. Lee to make another Frankenstein movie. And, to further increase sales, it would include the two powerhouses of Universal horror - Boris Karloff and Béla Lugosi.
Plot: It has been many years since the events of Bride of Frankenstein and Dr. Frankenstein has passed away (as had Colin Clive in the intervening years). His son Baron Wolf von Frankenstein (Basil Rathbone) has moved into the town with his wife Elsa (Josephine Hutchinson) and son Peter (Donnie Dunagan) in order to redeem his father's name. This turns out to be a difficult task because the locals want nothing to do with the family and regard them as trouble. The family's only ally is Inspector Krogh (Lionel Atwill) who was attacked by the monster as a child. While investigating the family castle, Frankenstein meets Ygor (Béla Lugosi) who shows him to the creature (Boris Karloff) who is in a coma. Frankenstein decides to revive the monster and prove that his father was right all along. Of course, this goes terribly wrong because Ygor has other plans for the creature.
My thoughts: Good film. Rathbone gives a tremendous performance, especially since he didn't want to appear in the movie in the first place, he then went on to have more success playing Sherlock Holmes in a series of films in the 1940s. Atwill gives his best performance after only appearing in small parts in previous movies. Sadly, the two "big guys" Karloff and Lugosi, weren't the stellar success Universal hoped. Karloff's creature became a puppet or henchman rather than the sympathetic, misunderstood monster in the two previous films. However, this would be Karloff's last appearance as the monster as he was tired of others mocking his performance. Lugosi's acting was passable but the character is so unlikable, you forget about his performance.
The movie introduced the idea of the monster being a slave, only being able to obey simple instructions. It also introduced the character of Ygor (often spelled Igor) who is often combined with Fritz from the first movie to form a hunchbacked or disfigured assisstant to a mad scientist.
After Universal received new management, who did not see the potential in horror, it was only a matter of time before Frankenstein would receive a sub-par sequel, directed by Erle C. Kenton.
Plot: Fleeing from an angry mob, Ygor (Béla Lugosi) finds the monster's body (Lon Chaney, Jr.) and decides to visit Ludwig Frankenstein (Cedric Hardwicke), Dr. Frankenstein's other son, to revive the monster. Ludwig and his assistants Dr. Kettering (Barton Yarborough) and Dr. Bohmer (Lionel Atwill) just happen to have invented a way of "fixing" a damaged brain by removing all forms of mental illness. Of course, when Ygor and the monster arrive, they cause chaos and are captured. Ludwig, Dr. Bohmer, Ygor and even Dr. Frankenstein himself (in ghost form - hence the title) all have different plans for the monster. Of course there's a lot of double crossing, experiments, science stuff and growling.
My thoughts: This movie is "meh". This was a time when Lugosi's career was going downhill and it shows. Chaney did his best but he's no Karloff. Personally, I had a hard time following it because Hardwicke and Atwill look similar. This is Universal's final movie to just feature Frankenstein. From here on out, Frankenstein will be featured with other monsters, usually in a henchman role. Shame really.
