- When your mother was dying... - Please, don't bring her into this!
When your mother was dying, I gave a promise
that I would see you wed your cousin Elizabeth.
That was my wife's last wish.
That you might be happily married.
You were such a brilliant child, a carefree child,
alert and inquisitive, the joy of our days...
I came to believe you would do great things
and I'd be proud of you.
Instead we have this sullennes, this melancholy,
this low fog of gloom.
You flog my authority, you do not respect
the codes by which we live!
If you insist on leaving, I cannot stop you,
but you can tell your fiancée yourself.
Elizabeth!
Where is the boy I remember?
Where is he, Victor?
Where has he gone?
Your father tells me you're leaving us.
Why Victor? Why must you go to England?
Because in England they're at the forefront of electrochemistry.
I've heard of real breakthroughs by vitalists, calvinists...
I must go and see for myself.
And for that you'd put off our wedding.
Yes. It's critical for my experiments.
What are your experiments?
I'd say that they're beyond a woman's scope.
Which part might be beyond my scope?
All of it, actually.
Are you suggesting I'm less intelligent than you?
Yes.
- I mean, less educated. - That's hardly my fault.
I wasn't allowed to go to school.
But I can learn, Victor.
I could be your assistant.
What is a voltaic pile, a Leyden jar, electric eggs?
You know perfectly well I don't know.
What is a voltaic pile?
It's for storing an electrostatic charge, linking several jars in parallel...
Oh, please, take me with you!
- It sounds so exciting. - I will go first to Oxford.
Spend several months at the University.
Believe me, there is nothing exciting about that.
- I don't care, I'll come. - I'll be in the library all day!
I'll be as quiet as a mouse. Let me come.
Subsequently, I'll travel to the islands of Scotland,
barren rocks in a barren ocean,
it is, I am told, an awful place.
I don't care, we'll be together!
Elizabeth, it's no situation for a woman!
And you think this is?
The world is turning, Victor, and I'm sitting in Switzerland watching it.
I know it's picturesque, the mountains, the lake,
but it's so quiet, it's oppressive.
And the people are dull.
I want to go to Paris, Rome, America.
I want to talk to you about your work,
about the world, about music, politics.
- Everything. - I have no interest in music or politics.
Have you any interest in me?
Elizabeth, you are...
...beautiful, you will make a beautiful wife.
Victor, what do you think I am? A specimen?
May I ask you something?
I want to have children.
Do you want to have children?
- Yes, of course, I... - No, do you want to give me children?
God willing, yes I do.
Then show me how you'll give me children.
Kiss me, Victor.
Touch me.
Feel my heartbeat.
Must you go?
Can't you stay?
I wish I could stay but I cannot.
Then go and do your work!
And be brilliant.
And after that come home to me, and be my husband,
and give me a dozen children.
Go.
Thank you.
Is the weather always like this?
This is quite a nice day.
It's not much of a croft, sir. The roof is poor.
- Will you be all right here? - For my needs, it's fine.
Your wife can bring me some food.
She can, sir. But it's simple, fish mainly.
We don't touch meat, do we, Rab?
Unless it swims, we don't eat it.
Eggs? We eat eggs.
That's the exception, eggs.
- And oatcakes, carrots... - Yeah, all right.
Where do you want it, sir?
Set it down there. Thank you, gentlemen.
Here's the price we agreed for the porterage and three months' rent.
But I would be prepared to give you very much more, Ewan.
If you could perform another service for me.
My field, you see, is anatomy. The human body.
To progress my research, I require certain materials.
It's an unorthodox discipline, and it is...
somewhat disapproved of in academic circles,
but you have my word that it is for the public good.
Ooh, I don't like the sound of that.
Quiet, Rab! We don't move in academic circles.
Go on, sir. It's illegal, I take it?
We're a long way from any court of law.
The nights are dark...
...and in science we keep our secrets.
What is it you want?
- Human remains. Fresh. - He's a surgeon!
I knew it! Here, that's grave-robbing!
We are Christians in the Orkneys, sir, we don't rob the dead in a grave.
The dead are dead, aren't they? They're not coming back.
I don't subscribe to the view that it's unethical to use them
for medical research.
- No, nor do I. - Just think!
What would be possible in the future, eh, Rab?
Shall we gain the upper hand over sickness and disease?
Have you any idea what we will be capable of
if brilliant men are allowed to do our work?
Uncle Ewan!
Quiet, Rab! I'll do nothing on my own island.
But what is it exactly that you're after?
Have you heard of any young woman who has died very recently?
- Aye, on Ronaldsay. - Not your kin?
- No, not my kin. - Not diseased?
Drowned.
May God have mercy on her.
A good looking lass, she was. Rab liked her.
- I did not! - You did!
- I liked her sister. - She was beautiful?
- Not bad. - Good.
Are you prepared to work to my exact specifications?
- Well, Rab, he can't read. - I can read!
- Do him a drawing! - Uncle Ewan...
You... will do as the gentleman says.
How far is it to Ronaldsay?
- Is she in? - There's a bit sticking out.
- Well, what is it? - I don't know! It's a girl!
Come on, laddie! Push!
She's in.
You have strange taste, Rab, that's all I can say.
- I find her terribly skinny. - I said, the sister!
The sister is fatter!
- Uncle Ewan. - Aye?
What's he going to do?
I don't know.
- This is not right, Uncle Ewan. - As the man said, they're dead.
They're not coming back!
- You ready? - Aye.
Heave!
- Have you got it? - Jesus Christ!
- Aye, sir. - Haul it to the boat.
- This is only the first, Ewan. - Is it, sir?
I shall need a regular supply of internal organs.
Very good, sir.
Organs?!
Quiet, Rab!
Meat for the dogs. Nothing you're not familiar with.
Now come on!
Uncle Ewan!
Is this how I was formed?
Stolen at night from wet soil?
Made out of meat for the dogs?
Even I can feel disgust.
And will he fashion me beauty from this filth?
And will I want her?
Stinking of death?
Wait!
Come.
Here you are, sir.
Thank you, Ewan.
This will be the last.
Thank you for all your assistance.
- You will be leaving our island soon, sir? - Soon.
- Have I done you good service? - Excellent service, yes.
And the food was all right?
The food was unbelievable.
Sir, you're not looking too marvellous, if you don't mind my saying.
I'm tired, that's all.
My work is nearly done.
And let me tell you,
I think I can say, I have excelled!
I'm very pleased to hear it.
Farewell to sickness and disease!
- Goodbye, Ewan. - Goodbye, sir.
William!
So how do you do it?
It's late, you should be in bed.
How do you bring dead things to life?
- Is it easy? - No, it's hard.
- Some kind of miracle. - Tell me the secret!
- When did you start? - At school.
Did you bring the teachers to life? That would be a miracle.
The school was so boring,
I wanted to find out why things exist,
how things exist, not absurd divinity and idiotic music,
the laws of existence!
So I started to read forbidden books.
- Agrippa, Paracelsus... - The alchemists?
Yes! They were true men of science, they mapped the heavens,
they tracked the course of the stars...
They classified the air we breathe, the circulation of our blood.
All modern medicine comes from them.
I too wished to penetrate Nature to lay bare her deepest mysteries.
So I studied mathematics, experimented with galvinism...
- What's that? - You induce spasms in inanimate flesh,
using a current from a chloride battery...
- Great! - ...where a zinc plate's laid on a solution
of ammonium chloride and Ceylon moss, and...
- How thrilling! - ...as I watched the current arc
between bismuth and antimony, I found myself asking:
Where does the principle of life, the actual spark of life itself,
where does it come from?
- It comes from God. - Yes.
- But only from God? - I don't know.
- Can a man be a god? - I don't know!
Well, I had to find out!
- So off to the graveyard I went. - Oh, Victor, yuck!
I watched their flesh rot in the soil,
I watched worms eat eyes, maggots chew the tissue of the brain.
I went to executions and charnel houses,
I studied the moment of change from life to death,
the specificity of the moment, the annihilation of the spark,
until suddenly, months later, in this fever of creativity,
I found that I could indentify and replicate the prime cause of life!
What is it?
Can't tell you that, Will, you're only little.
What are you going to do with it?
Don't know.
I have travelled where no man has travelled.
I wonder how far I can go.
I can create people, Will.
Living people, look at me!
I breathe the breath of God.
- Will they reproduce? - What?
Will they have wombs, the females?
Will they breed? How quickly will they breed?
How fast is the cycle? How many in a litter?
- Fifty, a hundred, a thousand? - William...
And if the children breed with the children?
- Will they do your bidding? - What do you say?
You are their King... will they do as you tell them?
Or they will be bad like the one who killed me?
Frankenstein!
Where is she?
- She's... she's here. - Show me, genius!
Wait!
Isn't she fine?
She is... beautiful!
Yes.
Your work is so detailed the cuts so fine,
- the luster of her skin... - She is perfect.
- A perfect wife. - Frankenstein, I admire you!
I can't give her to you.
Why not?
How do I know what will happen if I bring her fully to life?
I didn't know how you'd turn out,
how dangerous you'd be, how can I know about her?
Sir, if it has been possible to me to overcome my disgusting origins
and transform myself into a rational being,
she, my wife, will do the same.
- And if she doesn't? - But she will!
I will teach her morality as De Lacey taught me.
But you have sworn to live as an outcast. Supposing she prefers the town?
She has no choice, we go to Argentina!
What if she refuses to accept the bargain made before she was even created?
Come on! Use your brain!
She might reject you.
She might abhor the sight of you, she might take one look at you and run!
She might say she prefers to live with a man,
not a monster.
- Stop talking, you are cruel! - Look at her, look!
Exquisitely constructed, don't you agree?
Look at those cheeks.
Those lips.
Look at those breasts, who would not desire those breasts?
What if she leaves you? What if she finds someone else?
How will you feel if you are rejected by one of your own species?
The only one of your own species, the only one you can take to your bed,
- how will you react? - I will run mad if she leaves me!
- It's a risk then, isn't it? - No, because I'll show her such admiration,
such devotion she will never want to leave me.
- Is that a risk I should take? - You must, you must.
Please, she is mine! Please.
Please.
- Are you saying you will protect her? - Yes, I will be there,
nobody will harm her.
- Are you saying you'll love her? - Yes, I will!
'Cause love is not something one can learn,
it's not something one can teach,
- either you feel it in your soul or... - Master, I love her, I do, I do!
Are you telling me you have a soul?
Master, say you believe me.
How does it feel? To be in love?
It feels like...
...all the life is bubbling up and spilling from my mouth,
it feels like my lungs are on fire,
and my heart is a hammer and that I can do anything in the world!
Anything in the world!
Is that how it feels?
Yes, that is how it feels.
Bring her to life and I will cherish her forever.
Those are the words I was waiting to hear.
You have shown you have some grasp of the emotion we call love.
Now be patient! I will complete her.
You can help me, we will not send her out into the world
in this condition, we will dress her, dress her as a queen.
- A queen! - Go to that trunk,
it contains some clothes, my fiancée's.
Select the finest for your bride.
Now let me work! I'll call you when you're needed.
I will dress her in lace and velvet,
I will give her silk and pearls!
I will walk in the garden with my fair, angelic Eve.
I will be Adam, she will be Eve!
And all the memory of hell will melt like snow.
What do you know of the power of love?
It is irrational, a pool of unreason, it is anarchic, volatile, vertiginous, mad!
Above all, it is uncontrollable! A million of you on the earth,
coupling, procreating, no!
You are the only one of your species and that is how you'll stay.
Awake, awake, my fairest, my espoused!
- Awake! - She will never awake!
- Sir! Sir, open the door! - Victor, let us in!
Frankenstein, you broke your word.
You may expect me again.
Victor! Victor!
- There's something running off! - Jesus Christ, what is it?
Victor, open the door!
Stay away!
- Father... - What in God's name is this place?
- Father, you came... - Victor, you were gone too long,
we were worried!
- You don't know what I've done. - No matter what, boy, come home!
I must be married at once! I must marry Elizabeth at once! At once!
Please, help me get him to the boat!
Take this, destroy it.
I want you to promise that it will be destroyed.
- Your journal? - Destroy it, burn it!
You give me your word as a magistrate,
no one must read it again. Give me your word
- that it will be destroyed! - I give you my word! Come home!
Come, come!
What has he been doing here? You man, speak!
Medical research, sir. As he said!
Medical research...
Holy Christ.