Word: karloff
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Branaugh's latest vision--De Niro slathed in what appears to be Freddy Kruger's discarded latex--demands comparison to Boris Karloff"s popular 1931 interpretation of the monster. The Brattle Theatre's current series, "The Monster Within," provides an opportunity to re-examine Karloff's nifty neck bolts, and several films inspired by Mary Shelley's myth. Each presents a version of Shelley which contributes in various ways to our understanding of her classic work...
...novel (see review below). Adopting a different approach altogether, the dark and mesmerizing "The Spirit of the Beehive" explores the effect of the 1931 "Frankenstein" on a young girl in Franco's Spain during World War II. As the girl becomes deeply involved in a fantasy of the Karloff film, the world surrounding her begins eerily to echo the film. It often resembles a dark version of "Cinema Paradiso," stressing the importance of the child's imagination in creating her personal world. The 1977 new wave classic Eraserhead subjects a version of Shelley's myth to the vision...
...Family look like the Waltons. Among them: Wilhelm's inamorata, the robotically hysterical Kathchen; her fright-wigged father Bertram; an overbearing uncle who, in a hilarious non sequitur, tells the story of how Hemingway sold the movie rights to The Snows of Kilimanjaro; and a dead ancestor in Boris Karloff makeup whose only advice to the living is, "Do what thou wilt...
...instance, Mortimer's sweet old aunties, Abby and Martha, have been poisoning lonely old men as an act of charity. Mortimer's brother Teddy thinks he is Teddy Roosevelt. And as if those three weren't enough, Mortimer's estranged brother Jonathan, an international criminal and Boris Karloff lookalike who still bears a childhood grudge against Mortimer, comes home just in time to make more mischief. Toss in Jonathan's sniveling sidekick Dr. Einstein, a mad (of course) and incompetent plastic surgeon, and some (fortunately) clueless cops, and the chaos is complete...
...credit, though, belongs to the actors, who all overplay to the hilt. Adam Schwartz creates a perfectly blustery and "bully" Teddy Roosevelt--er, Teddy Brewster. Josh Frost is chilling as Jonathan, and thanks to Melanie Deas' make-up skills (I hope), he really does look like Boris Karloff. As the old aunts, Molly Bishop and Jennifer Donaldson find a surprisingly childish glee in their chemical activities...