With Frankenstein, Guillermo del Toro writes his career's thesis in blood and snow

Yet, high-minded dialogue about gods and monsters drives Frankenstein, much of it delivered by Isaac as the arrogant young doctor who truly believes that he can improve on Nature’s flawed design. “God is inept, and we must correct his mistakes!” he cries, shortly before being expelled from the Edinburgh medical school where his story really begins. Del Toro completely reimagines the portion of Shelley’s novel where Dr. Frankenstein actually conquers death, adding a new character, the deep-pocketed industrialist Harlander (Christoph Waltz), who comes to Frankenstein with an offer of unlimited funding if he will allow Harlander to document his process. 

Harlander also has access to lots of dead bodies, which begin to pile up in the catacomb-like basement of the imposing stone tower where Dr. Frankenstein does his work. There’s some mumbling about chi and the lymphatic system, but the real purpose of the lab scenes is for del Toro to recreate the morbid aesthetic of a 19th-century anatomical drawing. This is fair enough, as the science is all made up anyway. And there is a glistening, bloodless beauty to the gray corpses, posed like sculptures made of rotting flesh, their skin peeled back to expose their brains and spinal columns and fastened with wires in intricate patterns. 

These echo the lacing that crawls up the spine of Elizabeth’s gowns, one of many sumptuous details in the costuming and production design. Visually, Frankenstein plays like del Toro’s greatest hits: The flocked velvet and crumbling stone of Crimson Peak are reflected in the costuming—the capes and veils in a pair of funeral scenes are especially striking—as well as in Frankenstein’s hilltop lair. Inside, giant tanks made of orange and green glass evoke the government facility in The Shape Of Water, but with a steampunk flair.

Cinematographer Dan Laustsen (Nightmare Alley) also produces some gorgeous images, ranging from an impressive tracking shot through the muddy, crowded streets of Victorian-era Edinburgh to a simple, sublime image of Elordi’s Creature against a pale Arctic sunrise. Nobody spends money on a movie like Guillermo del Toro; Frankenstein reportedly cost $120 million to make, and it looks like it. Aesthetically, the film is just about perfect, a Gothic memento mori—Elizabeth is introduced contemplating a human skull—as lush and romantic as we’ve come to expect from the filmmaker.

Where the whole experience becomes a bit ponderous is in the unwavering solemnity of its tone. Maybe two or three minutes of Frankenstein are actually light or funny; a low ratio for a 90-minute film, let alone a 149-minute one. The rest is all deathly serious, and Frankenstein bends under its own weight as the runtime wears on, particularly in the sections where del Toro blatantly telegraphs the themes. The cast dutifully trudges along, but all seem exhausted by the film’s end. 

Still, it’s the ideal subject matter for this particular filmmaker. Del Toro’s love for the grotesque and the abject is sincere and passionate, and there are scenes in Frankenstein that play like thesis statements for the director’s entire career. One takes place in a modest cabin, where the Creature finds refuge with a blind man who does not fear him for his looks. After finding out the truth of his origins, the Creature despairs: “I am the child of a charnel house!”

To that, the old man replies, “You are my friend.”

Director: Guillermo del Toro
Writer: Guillermo del Toro
Starring: Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi, Mia Goth, Felix Kammerer, Lars Mikkelsen, David Bradley, Lauren Collins, Charles Dance, Christoph Waltz
Release Date: October 17, 2025; November 7, 2025 (Netflix)