To a New World of Gods and Monsters...

Faithful Readers,

It's with great excitement that I welcome you to the season of Halloween movies at The Blue Starlite! A plethora of frights and delights awaits you within this month of spooky cinema, not the least of them being The Bride of Frankenstein (Wednesday, 10/1) and Frankenstein (Saturday, 10/4).

I watched both of these movies as a kid - pretty often, too - and they made a huge impression on me. Now, as an adult and an English teacher, I get to introduce these movies to a whole new crop of teenagers every year when we finish reading the novel. What amazes me is that my media savvy students are always pretty enthralled with these fundamentally simple, black-and-white films from the 1930s.

I think there are some compelling reasons for this. Even though the films stray far from their source material, some credit is still due to Mary Shelley - the subject matter is fiercely fascinating and terrifying, and that all comes from the novel.

But the movies are very much their own thing, and they deserve their own conversation. They are moody and surreal, taking cues from German Expressionism, and they feel like silent movies, making each and every sound seem strange and jarring.

But, more importantly, they both have this guy:

Boris Karloff's performance as The Creature (because Frankenstein is the doctor, people!) is one of the most amazing things I've seen on film. He is both sympathetic and scary, and he manages to elicit both emotions without ever speaking any real dialogue. It's an acutely physical performance, as Karloff is large and lumbering, but wanders through the world with an almost childlike vulnerability. As a kid, I worried about him, and I find that my students do, too - always rooting for him to escape those angry villagers. It's a masterful depiction of a being that, while monstrous, is truly not a monster.

I do have to say, though, that I think The Bride of Frankenstein is the superior film. With the same director and cast, it takes the storytelling to a whole new level. Plus, as is the case with the novel, The Creature's request that Frankenstein creates a mate for him is really the central conflict, and seeing that on film is satisfying. Especially because The Bride is so interesting on screen - she's strangely pretty, but clearly undead, and her profile is iconic:

I actually dressed as The Bride for the last Halloween that I trick-or-treated. It was an awesome costume. My mom and I planned and worked on it for weeks ahead of  time, and when I put it on, I felt like Elsa Lanchester herself. I was so proud. And I spent the night going from house to house, constantly disappointed because people kept asking who I was supposed to be. I was devastated. But, near the end of the night, I happened upon a little house where a young married couple was giving out candy. He was dressed as Buster Keaton, and she was Charlie Chaplin. They instantly knew who I was, and they made an incredible fuss. I also knew who they were - which surprised them, as no one else had - and we shared this awesome moment. We were in on something cool that a lot of other people weren't, and it connected us.

Great movies do that. They connect us.

So, grab your friends, your kids, your significant others, and anyone else you love, and connect them to this awesome world of classic movies at The Blue Starlite!