Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed (1970)

A lot of fun.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

Turning the Baron into a brutal, hateful character, rather than one who is consumed with scientific curiosity, this is another poor entry in the series. While I've always enjoyed Hammer for their (now light) gore, I also liked the characters. Yes, in Curse the Baron was willing to do anything to forward science, but here he's a brutal, mean character rather than a dismissive one. This story really should have been more thought about.

Forced to flee town again, the Baron learns a colleague has perfected a process invaluable to his own research and brings along new helpers to do so, but a series of incidents results in the creation of a new monster that upon realizes what he has done to him sets out to avenge his death.There was a couple of good points to this one at times, making it far more watchable than expected. The main factor with this one here is the fact that despite its extreme boredom his one manages to mostly stay interesting the whole way through its incredibly strong story. This is one of the strongest in the series, mainly due to how it manages to avoid many pitfalls and keep things moving along. Here, Frankenstein branches out into other fields of research, still homing in on the freakish advance of medicine but no longer so obsessed with creating life, a great way of bringing back an old character but giving him new things to do and not settling for a hackneyed retread of the monster. The experimentations offered up are also handled well, especially with the way that the original intent of the whole thing is pretty logical and not all that unrealistic, which serves to make the irrational actions later on seem all the more normal. There's also some really good action scenes, starting with the opening where a thief breaks into an underground laboratory only to be confronted by a horrible monster carrying a severed head when the monster rips off his face revealing the hideous skeletal visage of Victor in one of the most dramatic and engaging ones in the genre. The scenes of the monster-on-the-loose out in the countryside are always fun, and this one is no exception, taking on several fun encounters here. The best, though, is the film's explosive and undeniably fun encounter at the end. With the usual house- in-flames ending coming into play again, there's a difference with the cat-and-mouse games between the two taking place amongst the flames, which makes for some really exciting sequences and is enough to make it end on a high point. The last plus here is the fact that the film has one of the usually high-standard surgery scenes in place, and this is one of the best. There isn't a whole lot here to really dislike, though there are a few flaws to it. One of the main issues to come up is the fact that the film is just way too long and drawn-out with a tendency to drag on for way too long, getting in plenty of scenes that, while they do give the film the impression that it's actually doing something and going somewhere, ultimately suffers from the lack of energy during them. It seems to go about it's own deliberate pace, never really doing anything that really offers up some excitement until the end. The fact that the monster doesn't really show up in the film at all is another problem, and the monster here is one of the weakest. There's nothing at all to fear from this creature, as it's entirely human-looking in behavior and appearance, while the scenes of it trying to persuade his wife to recognize him generate nothing but eye-rolling at the fact that this is supposed to be a monster and is acting nothing like what one should be like. The last flaw here is the rape scene, which really should've been eliminated as it stops the film dead and barely recovers. Overall, this is a fun if slightly flawed entry. Today's Rating/PG-13: Violence including graphic surgery scenes and a Rape Scene.

For all it's impact on the industry, the heyday of Hammer Films encompassed a relatively short time, roughly 1958 to 1969. "Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed" is one of the last really good films the studio made (1971's "Blood From the Mummy's Tomb" was probably the last). Peter Cushing is back as Baron Frankenstein, and more ruthless than ever, particularly in the infamous rape scene that was imposed upon the cast, director and screenwriter by Hammer's head Sir James Careras. Nobody on the set liked the idea...but one did as one was told. In truth, it doesn't make a lot of sense within the context of the story, and the film doesn't need it. Cushing is, as always, thoroughly professional, even when the script dictates that he do silly things, and Veronica Carlson is excellent as the woman trapped by the evil of the Baron. The real acting honors, however, go to Freddie Jones, as the more-or-less monster, and Maxine Audley, as his widow, for the scene in which they reunite. Probably no sequence in any Hammer film has been played as beautifully and movingly as this one. It alone is worth seeing the film for. But there are many other memorable scenes as well. Old pro Terrence Fisher directs very capably, and the conflagration finale is well staged and spectacular.

Dr. Frankenstein is at it again. With the unwilling assistance of a young doctor (Simon Ward) and his beautiful fiancée (Veronica Carlson) he attempts to transfer the brain of a man into another's body. Naturally everything goes wrong."Frankenstein Created Women" has my vote for the best Hammer Frankenstein but this runs a close second. It has an interesting plot, moves pretty quick, has one of Hammer's most beautiful actresses ever (Carlson) and has a few nice gruesome scenes (but all within a PG-13 rating). There's an especially horrifying sequence involving Carlson and a broken water main. Cushing gives another great performance as the doctor. This is the one when he gets REAL mean and he's the monster not his creation. Ward is given nothing to do and neither is Carlson who gets attacked by Cushing in a particularly sick scene that Cushing didn't want to do. The only real faults here are it's a little too long and I hate how Carlson's character was treated. That aside this is one of the best Frankenstein. Worth catching.