Novel/Movie Difference Mary Shelleys Frankenstein Essay

As I mentioned above, Bloom starts his essay with a comparison between Frankenstein the book and movie. This seemed completely unnecessary and even erroneous to me because the movie was nothing like the romantic story of the book. Frankenstein the movie was a horror movie where the monster went around killing and destroying everything. The plot line between the two sources is not the same and therefore should not be compared and contrasted. This seems to be a weak point of Blooms essay.

Normally, when a movie is made about a story in a book the two stories are not exactly the same. The movie is adjusted by adding small details or leaving out some parts in order to make the story more

The life of the monster can be related to the motherless life led by Shelley. Shelley’s mother too left her as soon as she was born, and as a result, she had quite an arduous life. Combined with her father’s financial woes, her tumultuous relationship with her stepmother meant that Shelley did not have an ideal childhood, which would have had a serious impact on her personality. She had to put up with a lot of miseries when she grew up, and was subjected to lifelong condemnation from the society because of her affair with the married Shelley.

The novel Frankenstein was written by Mary Shelley in 1818. This gothic romance novel tells the story of a philosopher who discovered how to create life, without the full knowledge that his actions could cause grave consequences. Universal Studios made the film version of this novel in 1931. Unfortunately, the film version of Frankenstein has more differences than similarities to the novel. In the novel, Victor’s mental obsession seems to be more severe than in the film. The character of Victor Frankenstein was portrayed in both the novel and the film as a veriphobe, or one who is afraid of the truth, in this case, the truth of his actions. He

But there is also a plethora of differences and alterations in the movie than in the original written version. The book focuses on the many complex thoughts of the main character, Victor Frankenstein. We know exactly how he feels whenever he speaks. In the movie, we are only shown that he has dedicated his life to his experiment; we never really know his inside thoughts, though. The book shines the creature in a completely different light than the film. He is shown as an intelligent being full of of human emotions: love, hate, revenge, remorse, etc. He is very articulate and has much common sense and awareness. During his first verbal altercation with Victor he says, “Be calm! I entreat you to hear me before you give vent to your hatred on my devoted head. Have I not suffered enough, that you seek to increase my misery?” (Shelley 86). We learn what he encounters in life, what has shaped him into the “human” he was created to be, and what compels him to kill. The creature in the movie is more like an animal than anything else. He is unable to speak, communicate, or comprehend what is going on around him. He only kills because he has the brain of a murderer and he wanders aimlessly not knowing what is happening. We never see his character ever develop or change at any point; we are only shown that he is an ignorant, killing

As soon as Frankenstein sees “the dull yellow eye of the creature open”, he is immediately horrified by it. (p. 38-39) “His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath”. His hair and teeth “formed a … horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion, and straight, black lips”.

One other way that the stories, “Frankenstein”, and “The Rebellious Robot” compare and contrast is characters. The stories differ in character because in “Frankenstein” Victor, the creator of Frankenstein, is a grown adult who lives by himself. In “The Rebellious Robot”, the characters are still children who have to be cared for by an adult. For example, the story “Frankenstein” says, “I walked with a quick pace, and we soon arrived at my college...the

Some people see Frankenstein and his creature as complete opposites, but they are not as different as they may seem. Victor and his creature have no mother figure in the novel. Victor’s mother was there for Victor in the beginning but “resigned cheerfully to death… she died calmly” (Shelley 53), whereas the creature was born without one. Therefore, throughout the novel, both Victor and the creature have to depend on their fathers for guidance. Frankenstein and the creature are both intelligent. Frankenstein gains his intelligence through his schooling and experience, while the creature gains intelligence through observations, experience, and “Paradise Lost, a volume of Plutarch’s Lives, and the Sorrows of Werter” (Shelley 155). These characters want to be accepted in the world. Frankenstein wants to be accepted in the

Frankenstein and Edward Scissorhand are both about two different creators creating their own kind of creatures, and the journey through the whole process and the life after creation. In both the novel and film we are able to compare different aspects of both the novel and film. Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein and Tim Burton’s film Edward Scissorhands have many similarities and differences starting from the desire of wanting to feel love, to the cause of all the violence. A few of the similarities and differences visible throughout the novel and film are: quest for knowledge, companionship, and their creators.

In the novel Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, Victor Frankenstein is the true monster, not the creature himself.

Victor Frankenstein is in many ways more monstrous than the monster he created. Victor and his creation demonstrate a thesis-antithesis correspondence wherein they reflect opposite character traits. Victor has no sense of empathy or compassion, whereas the monster, although hideous and rejected by society as an outcast, has

Frankenstein had such a huge impact on the world because it mainly focused on science in a time period where science was rarely talked about. Teaching science during this time was unheard of. When this film was released, school teachers weren’t even allowed to teach evolution to their classes. This is one of the reasons why this movie was such a big hit and left such an impact on viewers.

The second change the monster makes is becoming totally motivated by revenge. He becomes completely evil, not looking for a companion but only the unhappiness and suffering of Frankenstein, his creator. “... I was the slave, not the master of an impulse, which I detested, yet could not disobey. ... The contemplation of my

“Horror and science fiction tend to present radically opposite interpretations of what may look like comparable situations.” (Kawin, 1981.) Bruce Kawin helps the reader to understand how a story in the genre of science fiction could be adapted, or bastardized if you like, into a horror. This is similar to the film adaptation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Both “Frankenstein” (1931) and “Bride of Frankenstein” (1935) portrayed characters and events differently than Shelley would have desired. Her novel had many deeper implications than the movie portrayed.

How can we think of Frankenstein and ignore the film classic of 1931? Yet the celebrated film does not follow the novel by Mary Shelley. Although the scene of a futuristic laboratory entrances movie audiences with the mad Dr. Frankenstein and his faithful assistant Igor, the scene is derived from twentieth century imaginations and interests, not the novel itself.