As the film starts it has a shot of frankenstein and his friend looking through a fence into the graveyard. Having a scene like this at the start of a film was not seen as normal for this time in horror. the sound that is introduced into this film is crackly and therefore may make the audience cautious of what they are about to watch. there is a lot of use of Panning throughout this film which shows that there is a lot that the producers and directors want you to see within the mise-en-scene. As well as this there is a high sense of necrophilism throughout the film due to the way in which that frankenstein likes dead bodies and likes to experiment on them, and whilst experimenting on them enjoying himself as it is making him happy to do things that he likes. Within the graveyard scene there is a grim reaper on the right hand side and a cross on the left which suggests that they are being watched by the grim reaper, it could be seen as quite ironic as frankenstein is digging up dead bodies with the reaper staring at him. this film tackles many different aspects of religious issues, these being that it is not seen as ethnically or socially correct to be digging up bodies to experiment on them to make them come back to life. the ethnic issues is that christians believe that they should be left alone once dead and therefore digging them up from their grave disturbs them from their rest.There is an enigma used at the end of this scene where frankenstein says that they need another brain, and the scene then blacks out and cuts to the university that frankenstein attended. during this scene there is a lot of use of shadows and low key lighting which is used to make the audience feel wary. there were two brains that he could of taken one that was an average person and then one that was a criminal, he picked up the normal brain but it dropped on the floor so he took the criminal brain,as it appeared to look undamaged. There is a suspicion that this is why the monster is the way he is, violent and murderous, as well as this there is a feeling that the audience thinks that the reason he is the way he is, is due to the fact that he wasn't treated right; torches used to train him, kept in the dark for a few days of its life. there is a high sense that frankenstein is mentally ill due to the way in which he is testing on dead bodies, his fiance in the film (elizabeth) shows that she is worried about him due to the way in which she never sees him due to his experiment. when the brain is brought to frankenstein, a close up is used to show the brain, and also shows how hypnotized that he seems due to the fact that his experiment is nearly at an end. the use of big machinery is crucial, due to the time that this film was made. The machinery that is used was seen as high tech, this is due to the age that this film was set in, for this time it was seen as a ground breaking new thing that was being introduced. when the machine is turned on it make sci-fi like noises to add to the effect of the fact that it makes the audience feel uncomfortable. The first few days of the monsters life was in the darkness and therefore was attracted to any sense of light; this suggests that he was curious of things and didn't want to be locked up. Even though he was attracted to the light he was also very scared of light which suggests that this is where his fear for fire came from.
Frankenstein shows the love for his work by the way that he tested on animals before trying to make it work with a human. Even though he had a high passion or human body parts rather than animals he wanted to try to make it work before making it work for a human so therefore wanted to try and perfect it so that the human body comes out perfect. frankenstein left college due to the way that he couldn't get bodies through the uni to pursue his passion for human life and the human body. It was suggested that Frankenstein had buried his sanity when he was digging up the bodies for his experiment. He had shown a real sense of pride about his work, as he made it with his own hands he seems to be happy with the fact that its a creation he made. the body of the monster had no blood and lots of stitches due to the way that he made it with lots of different peoples dead bodies. Doctor Waldman was always sceptical that it would work, but frankenstein made it work leaving most people speechless. there is a sense that Frankenstein feels a lot of power due to the way that he can make the monster come to like it is almost like he is playing god.
The weather shows alot of what the mood is in the tower, this is due to the way that when frankenstein shouts or when frankenstein walks into the room where he sees his friend hanging there after the monster had killed him there is claps of thunder and alot of lightning as things happen, this shows that the weather effects the way that the scene is portrayed to the audience. as the storm picks up there is a high sense of danger due to the way that the machinery is producing exposed bolts of electric. The monster likes the storm, this may be due to the fact that he was brought to life by the storm, and therefore has some of the storm in him, this would therefore make sense as to why he doesn't care about the storm and isn't freaked out by it; as he is with fire.
At the end of every scene there is a snappy transition which can be slightly confusing to the audience due to it being hard to follow what is happening. As well as this the lighting is very low key. apart from when the storm kicks in and the lighting became high key to insinuate the look of a storm.all the way through this film there is a lot of panning used, this may be due to the way that it may of only just been introduced into films and therefore they were testing it out a lot to make sure that they knew what ways it helps the audience interact with the film.
the father of Henry Frankenstein, baron Frankenstein, is portrayed as a determined eager father image. this is through the way in which that he is determined to make Frankenstein more successful and not 'crazy' as the people that they know would see him for making a monster out of dead bodies.
One of the most shocking scenes from this film which was cut out by the hays office; the river scene. during this scene a young girl is left on her own by her father whilst he goes out. the young child decides to play by the river, when the monster stumbles out of the bush he goes and sits with the young girl whilst she throws flowers into the river making them float. she teaches the monster that they float, and as a result of this he picks up the young girl and throws her in, and walks off as she drowns.
After this you see the monster climbing into elizabeths window without her noticing as she is getting ready for the wedding. Frankenstein knows that the monster had escaped the tower and was searching all roundthe house for him after locking elizabeth in a room. after Elizabeth realises he is in the room it is too late to escape. Elizabeth starts to scream which alerts Frankenstein that his monster is in the room elizabeth has been locked into. When frankenstein gets to the room the monster had already left.
Frankenstein then goes out into the streets, where he sees all of the towns people standing in one place, the next thing that the audience sees is the dead child in his fathers arms. this of course made people angry so they made an army of people to go and search for this monster and destroy it. Amongst the people were hunting dogs, which made it easier to find the monster. When Frankenstein finds the monster he finds out he has hurt more people, leaving himself bait to the monster to kill, he starts shouting for help as the monster trys to kill him. the monster starts to hear people comings and flees to a nearby windmill with frankenstein in his arms after he knocked him out. after dragging Frankenstein to the top of the windmill he wakes up and tries to escape, the men that were searching for him set the windmill on fire which scared and angered the monster, which made him throw Frankenstein off the balcony.
As the end credits role in there is a spinning globe with a line underneath it saying 'a good cast is worth repeating'. As well as the rest of the film the end credits were in black and white.
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