31 Days of Horror: The Invisible Man (1933)

From The Invisible Man

31 Days of Horror: The Bride of Frankenstein

Four years after the success of Frankenstein, Universal released one of the rare sequels which has been said to be just as good if not better than the original: The Bride of Frankenstein. Like the original, this was also directed by James Whale, but with the sequel he had complete artistic control over the entire production and added a great deal of humor, a full musical score, and by having the monster speak we're also given a deeper look into the character and growth of the monster. Artistically and story-wise, this is a fantastic example of how to correctly do a sequel to a film that was already an established classic.

You can catch this classic on TCM on October 26th at 8:00 PM eastern

31 Days of Horror: Frankenstein (1931)

To follow the definitive vampire, Dracula, 31 days of horror continues with the definitive portrayal of Frankenstein's monster by Boris Karloff. Starring Boris Karloff, Colin Clive, and Edward Van Sloan, Frankenstein was Universal's follow up to their enormously successful version of Dracula. Frankenstein was to have originally been directed by Robert Florey and starred Bela Lugosi with a script that was very different from the one eventually used. Due to the rather one dimensional, robotic portrayal of the monster in the original drafts, Lugosi eventually quit the picture, and Flory was soon replaced by James Whale. Once Whale came on to the production, he greatly revised the script and cast Boris Karloff as the monster. Whale's new vision of the picture, combined with Jack Pierce's makeup and Karloff's sympathetic portrayal of the monster, gives us the image of what will always be first to come to mind whenever someone says "Frankenstein".