One point to make about the birth process before it has even begun is the location. The room that the creation takes place in is a hidden laboratory inside the university that Victor is working at, and the room for the birth process is hidden behind a curtain so it’s hidden from people if they were to come into the laboratory. The wall is stone and the insides have beams on the roof, which remind you of a cold room. The use of stone is used because stone is generally cold and old beams, which remind you of old, haunted houses. Also the room is dark and scary which may create suspense for the audience who don’t know what may be round any of these dark corners. This is a place you wouldn’t want to be in, this may also create sympathy for the creature as he is not looked after and has been shoved away in an old room.
In the Whale version the birth scene is set in an old disused mill in the country. Inside the mill the walls are again stone which gives the cold feeling. It is dark and dingy and relies on torches for light, which adds to the gothic medieval feel of the film. In Mary Shelly’s adaptation the birth scene begins just after Victor’s wife to be Elizabeth falls out with him because she asks him to come back with her and to stop stressing himself out with his work. We then see him pull back a curtain and we see in the mis-en-scene the huge laboratory that has been set up by Victor. He then walks into the laboratory and we see a low angle tracking shot of him running though the laboratory, the use of the low angle shot gives us the impression that Victor is a big powerful man. As he is running through the laboratory we see him wearing a cloak, which suggests to the audience the idea that he has power like a scientist or magician, sorcerer. As he gets to the creature, his cloak is casually thrown onto the clothes hook, and we can see by this point Victor no longer cares. Now we can see that he has been working so hard on the birth of the creature that his shirt is now ragged, dirty and the top buttons on his shirt are un-done and his shirt is hanging off his skin more now. This may mean now that if the creature doesn’t live he doesn’t necessarily care about the creature surviving, or it could mean he has been working so hard he hasn’t had time to change and this shows his determination to his work. Also Victor wears his shirt with the sleeves rolled up; this is another way of saying he is again determined to his work. Also Victor’s beard is unshaven which is a certain way to tell that he has been persisting in this experiment for quite a while without sleep. We then see Victor pulling down several handles and we then see a tracking shot of the creature’s body which is being transported around by pulleys on the roof, and we see the creature is being banged around up on the pulleys. Still, at this time, we haven’t seen the creature; this creates suspense and is a clever idea by Branagh, as this keeps the audience wanting to know, as they don’t even know if they are going to see the creature because if the creature doesn’t live they might not see it.
Then the creature is dropped down into a box shaped as a coffin, which gives us the idea of death, he uses a coffin shaped box because the connotations of coffins are death, and when the experiment starts he is dead. Victor then thrusts through small holes long pins that look like swords. As he puts the pins in we see quick edits of the creatures body moving under the pain of the pins even though he is not alive, this creates sympathy for the creature, also as the pins are thrust into the creature Branagh ups the sound and sound effects to a more scary and critical sound. Then we see the tank fill up with amniotic fluid and the eels are put in and then we see Victor run to the mains supply and connect it to the box. We then see quick shots of the creature’s body as it is going through immense pain which are very good at creating suspense and sympathy for the audience and creature as the audience are keen to know the outcome of the creation, and whether it has worked or not. Victor jumps up onto the box and looks through the porthole and this is the first time we see the creature’s face, but still when we see the face it is distorted because of the amniotic fluid so again we are still being held in suspense. The creature’s eyes open and Victor becomes ecstatic at this and quickly runs to close off the electricity going into the creature’s body and when he runs back to the box as this is happening the build up of suspense becomes bigger as we wait to see if the creature is still alive. As he looks over the porthole he sees the eyes of the creature have closed and his head drops and he walks away, at this point all the suspense that was in this scene has gone, the music has quietened and has left us with a solitary room with one person walking away.
The next scene is very interesting as Branagh uses hands as a sign of life. As Victor walks away there is a loud bang which creates suspense and tension. He looks around and we see the hand moving in the porthole. He uses a hand because we normally associate the movement of hands with life. So Branagh is symbolising the birth of this creature by using its hands. After this the creature starts to move wildly in the box Victor rushes over to the box to open the top, as he open the top the top flies way on the other side of the laboratory leaving amniotic fluid sprayed everywhere. The creature is still inside the box and we see Victor creeping up to the box; this creates suspense for the audience because we want to know what is going to happen. As Victor looks over the edge of the box the creature springs up at him and they both fall to the floor. We then see the close up shot of when they are holding hands trying to stand up in the amniotic fluid. We see a close up of the hands clenched together; this creates sympathy for both Victor and the creature. The hands clasped together gives the impression of love and care and respect for each other.
Whereas in the Whale version we see the creature wrapped up in clothes when the experiment is about to commence, around the laboratory we see a lot of electrical equipment which makes the experiment seem more real this is the director using the mis-en-scene to its best ability again. Also to add to the amount of horror in the film the sound effects used are thunder and lightning, this helps also create suspense, because when we hear thunder and lightning it creates suspense because we always wait for the bang and in the birth scene we are waiting for something to happen. And also by the clothes Henry is wearing suggests that the experiment is very serious, as he is wearing a white lab coat and he is clean, shaven beard, his hair is gelled back unlike Victors scruffy look. The creature is strapped into the stretcher chair and is slowly raised up through the hole in the roof where the lightning is, when the creature gets to the top it is held suspended out of sight and is hit by lightning. The creature is then gently lowered down and is laying there; the camera then zooms in onto the creature’s hand, and as it moves Henry begins to say, “it’s alive!” This again tells us about the hand being used as a symbol to show life. We then see Henry drop onto his knees and the scene closes.
After the birth sequence in the Kenneth Branagh adaptation we see Victor drag the creature over to some chains and just drop him down on them; he then pulls a lever and a large piece of wood is dropped down onto his head. Victor obviously wanted to kill the creature because he wouldn’t have treated him with such little respect if he wanted him alive. This creates sympathy for the creature as he has been brought into this world and is innocent and doesn’t understand and is being treated as if he were a criminal.
The next scene where sympathy is shown is when Victor is sleeping and we see a tracking shot of the laboratory and the creature is no longer hanging from the chains, and we see a close up of the empty chains, all we can hear is the gently clink of the chains and the sound of a church bell which creates suspense. We are then zoomed into where Victor is sleeping and we hear thunder and the camera is quickly panned across to the window as a bolt of lightening strikes and we see the creature standing there terrified of this bolt of lightening. At this point Victor rapidly awakes and chases after the creature. He grabs a axe which creates sympathy for him and the creature; this is because it is his creation and he took time and effort to create it and he is just about to go and hunt it down to kill it. It creates sympathy for the creature because it hasn’t done anything wrong and doesn’t understand why this man is chasing after him with an axe. The creature then runs out into a busy market and stops at a stall, he grabs some food and begins to walk away with it, and as he walks away the woman at the stall shouts thief, at that time the creature looks round and the woman sees his face and then shouts he’s the murderer. This creates sympathy for the creature as he doesn’t know what he has done wrong, he begins running through the town and people are trying to catch him. He is then sectioned off into a small corner, the towns people begin to throw things at him, so he goes over to a large cart and throws it. This shows that his emotions are high when he does this he runs down a small alley, in which he sits down on his own and picks food off of the floor, this creates sympathy because he has no money or no idea what he is doing in this world. We hear shouting and dogs in the distance chasing after him, which gives us the idea that he is being hunted and also creates sympathy. We then see a very powerful scene, as the creature is sitting down in the alley we see the camera pan up and we see right to the end of the alley and we see people socialising with each other and he is just alone cold and is in need of food.
When we first see the creature in the Whale version is the day after the creation and Henry is sitting with Dr. Waldman. In this sequence we have an amount of suspense build up. When they are talking they hear taps of the creature’s heels on the stairs, they slowly get louder and louder, taking the creature a long time to come into the shot creates a lot of suspense. Then we see a shadow coming up the stairs; we then see the creature emerge walking backwards up the staircase, he does this because he is shy and is looking around at the surrounds. He gets to the top of the stairs and turns around and there is about a minute’s pause of silence. This pause is very effective as it gives the audience time to look at the creature. Within this minute the camera does a close up on the creatures face, stops, then jump cuts again closer in and becomes an extreme close up. This shows us a great amount of his face. His facial features show that he maybe depressed or not happy. Henry asks the creature to sit down; its movements are slow and cautious and is very sensitive to loudness of speech, because as Henry raises his voice the creature tries to say something back to him but comes out a mumble.
When the creature is finally sat down Henry and Waldman talk about introducing him to light, so they open the window and the creature quickly gets to his feet and looks towards the light. Slowly he begins to raise his hands up towards the light, his hands are raised high above his head as it he is begging for the sense of being free and wants to be outside with the light. He is amazed by it and tries to grab it. The skylight is slowly closed and the happiness that was in the creature has slowly deteriorated, we see a close up of him as the light is taken away, his arms slowly drop and he is once again unhappy. Just after this, Fritz, Henry’s sidekick takes this opportunity to torture the creature and to try and assert authority, this scene is put in again to create sympathy for the creature as again he just wants to be free and him being tortured by Fritz doesn’t make sense to the creature as he doesn’t know what he has done wrong.
Branagh and Whale use different ways of creating sympathy and suspense. In the Kenneth Branagh version suspense and sympathy are presented much better than the James Whale version. Kenneth Branagh represents suspense and sympathy much better than Whale. He does this by creating a build up of events, which on their own create fear and uncertainty about what is going to happen next. There are many events that give the audience uncertainty in the Branagh version, such as when the creature disappears from the chains and standing up next to Victor’s bed, or when the creature is lying in the coffin and Victor goes up to it and the creature springs out. Suspense can also be created by giving the audience an element of surprise about what happens next. You are usually kept in suspense by events, which are unusual and are usually unpredictable and unexpected. This keeps your mind active and trying to guess what is going to happen. Also description of location, moods and situation all adds to build suspense before anything actually happens because it captures people’s imagination. I think this is best done in the Whale version as the camera pans around the old mill. Sympathy is created by engaging the audience and developing a rapport or an understanding of person’s predicament or situation. In other words you can start to imagine what it feels like to be that person and their feelings and emotions, all of which creates empathy. When sympathy is created you start to put yourself in that persons shoes because you can relate to the situation they are in or perhaps have experienced similar circumstances and feelings.
James Whale version was lacking in modern day attributes such as special effects, lighting and costumes and clothing. But the horror content in the James Whale version is more scary than in the Kenneth Branagh version as it is more creepy in black and white instead of colour. Overall I think Kenneth Branagh’s adaptation of the film is better because it has all the attributes to create a good film.
