Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein: A Monster with a Soul

I walked out of Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein with that heavy feeling I only get from stories that stay with me long after the credits fade—the kind that crawl beneath your skin, then into your heart. It’s been a long time since a film made me feel both haunted and oddly comforted at once. But that’s del Toro for you: his monsters are never truly monstrous, and his worlds—no matter how dark—always shimmer with something painfully human.

When I first heard he was finally bringing Frankenstein to life, I knew it would be personal. Del Toro has spoken about his love for Mary Shelley’s novel for decades, and in this adaptation, you can feel that lifelong obsession breathing through every frame. This isn’t just a retelling—it’s an exorcism, a confession, and a eulogy for both the creator and the creation.

The Story That Refuses to Die

We all know the story: a brilliant scientist named Victor Frankenstein (played with volcanic intensity by Oscar Isaac) dares to defy nature and create life from death—only to recoil in horror from the being he brings into the world. But del Toro, being del Toro, flips the script halfway through. The first act focuses on Victor’s obsession, his trauma, his descent into madness. Then, once the creature (Jacob Elordi) opens his eyes, the film shifts into something else entirely—a heartbreaking meditation on identity, belonging, and the unbearable loneliness of existence.

The structure is bold. The first half feels like gothic tragedy—cold laboratories lit by flickering lamps, graveyards cloaked in snow, whispers of grief carried by the wind. The second half becomes something more intimate, almost poetic. The creature wanders through a world that despises him, searching for warmth in faces that only mirror fear.

I found myself crying during one of his earliest scenes of self-awareness—not because of what was happening, but because of how human it felt. Del Toro doesn’t show the creature as a monster; he shows him as a newborn who never asked to exist. And in that moment, I realized: this Frankenstein isn’t about horror at all. It’s about rejection.

Beauty in the Grotesque

Visually, this is one of del Toro’s most stunning films to date. Every frame looks hand-painted, every prop seems carved from the director’s dreams (or nightmares). The color palette swings between warm candlelight and icy blue moonlight, embodying the film’s emotional duality—life and death, creation and decay, father and son.

The production design is pure gothic art: massive laboratories filled with humming machinery, stained glass windows fractured like human hearts, snow drifting softly over graves. You could pause the film at any point and hang that still as a painting. It’s that breathtaking.

But what struck me most was how the visuals never overwhelm the emotion. In lesser hands, the spectacle could have swallowed the soul. Here, it serves the story. The creature’s stitched, pale skin, the glassy sorrow in his eyes, the silent tremors of understanding when he learns to speak—all of it is heartbreakingly beautiful.

The Heartbeats Behind the Monster

Oscar Isaac’s Victor Frankenstein is not the tortured genius we often see. He’s raw, erratic, almost frightening in his hunger to control the forces of life and death. You sense that he doesn’t create out of ambition—but out of desperation. His guilt, his rage, his self-loathing—they all churn beneath the surface like a storm barely contained.

Then there’s Jacob Elordi as the creature, and I have to say—this is the performance that carries the film’s soul. Elordi gives him a quiet dignity. His movements are hesitant at first, as if each step hurts. His voice trembles between childlike innocence and adult sorrow. You can see him becoming human in real time, and it’s devastating.

When he says, “I wanted only to be loved,” it lands like a prayer and a curse. There’s no theatricality in it—just truth. I think del Toro’s true genius lies in his ability to make monsters speak like mirrors. You don’t just watch them—you recognize them.

Del Toro’s Personal Symphony of Pain

Del Toro has always made films about outsiders: the faun, the ghost, the amphibian man, the orphan. In Frankenstein, he finally builds the ultimate altar to them. You can feel his empathy in every scene, as though he’s asking the audience, “Haven’t you ever felt like a mistake too?”

It’s also his most spiritual work to date. There’s a recurring image of hands—hands creating, hands trembling, hands reaching for something they can’t quite hold. The symbolism is clear: to create life is divine, but to abandon it is blasphemy.

There’s a line from Shelley’s original novel that echoes through the film’s tone: “I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel.” Del Toro embraces that sentiment fully. His Frankenstein is not a story of science gone wrong—it’s a story of love denied.

The Flaws that Make it Human

Still, for all its brilliance, Frankenstein isn’t perfect—and maybe that’s the point. The pacing is uneven; the first hour lingers too long in Victor’s grief, while the final act rushes toward its icy conclusion. Some characters, like Elizabeth (Mia Goth), feel more like symbols than people—beautiful, tragic, but underwritten.

There are moments when the score swells a bit too dramatically, telling us what to feel instead of trusting us to feel it. Yet, even as I noticed these things, I couldn’t bring myself to care much. The film’s emotional gravity is so powerful that its imperfections almost feel necessary. They make it human.

A Monster Movie That Heals

What I love most about del Toro’s Frankenstein is how it transforms one of literature’s oldest tragedies into a film about reconciliation. It’s about a father learning to see his son, and a son daring to forgive his maker. It’s about pain as a form of connection, not punishment.

There’s a scene—quiet, devastating—where the creature finally confronts Victor. He doesn’t scream or threaten. He simply asks, “Why did you abandon me?” The silence that follows is unbearable. It’s not the silence of horror—it’s the silence of truth.

In that moment, I thought of every child who’s ever felt unseen, every artist who’s ever felt their creation was misunderstood, every soul that’s ever been called “too much.” Del Toro gives voice to all of them. And when the final image fades, with snow falling softly on a dying fire, you realize he’s made not a monster movie, but a requiem for all broken things.

My Final Thoughts

Watching Frankenstein felt like standing inside a cathedral built from grief and hope. It’s grand, messy, and full of contradictions—just like life. It’s not a film you “enjoy.” It’s one you experience.

If you go in expecting a horror film, you might be surprised. There are no cheap scares here, no jump cuts or grotesque shock value. The horror lies in empathy—the kind that forces you to look inward and confront your own reflection.

For me, this is del Toro’s most personal work since Pan’s Labyrinth. It carries the same mix of magic and melancholy, but with the maturity of a filmmaker who has lived and lost more. It’s about what happens when love turns to guilt, and guilt turns to grace.

When the credits rolled, I sat still for a long time. Then, almost instinctively, I whispered, “Thank you.” Because in his own way, del Toro had given me permission to forgive the monsters in myself.

Rating: 9/10.

Not flawless—but deeply, achingly human.