Guillermo del Toro has always had a soft spot for difficult creatures — the ones that look dangerous at first glance but feel painfully human once you sit with them. His Frankenstein(2025) leans right into that instinct. The film doesn’t hurry to scare you. It takes its time, almost stubbornly, because it isn’t chasing terror. It’s chasing responsibility.
From the beginning, it’s clear this story isn’t about lightning bolts or stitched-up horror. It’s about the weight of creating something — and then failing it.
The monster isn’t the real danger here. The maker is.
Creation as a confession
Victor Frankenstein isn’t just a scientist obsessed with reanimation. He
feels like a man carrying a wound he’s never learned how to name. The more
he talks about progress, discovery, the future… the more it feels like he’s
running from something behind him.
Oscar Isaac plays him with this mix of charm and desperation. His eyes jump before his words do, like he’s always half a second away from proving something to himself more than anyone else.
And then the creature appears, the creature is created
Jacob Elordi’s creature towers over everyone, but there’s a softness in the way he moves — arms slightly unsure, eyes searching for something familiar. He reacts to the world around him like someone experiencing life for the first time. It’s unsettling at first, then strangely moving. The longer you watch him, the harder it becomes to accept the label “monster.”
You start to see the root of the film’s message: sometimes the real horror is how easily we abandon what we make
Sympathy becomes the tension
The environments mirror that mood. Deep reds, cold greens, carved stone, flickering shadows — everything looks handmade, almost bruised. The setting doesn’t feel like a backdrop. It feels like a place where pain has history.
You stop waiting for the creature to attack.
You start waiting for someone to treat him with simple dignity.
Two stories, one wound
The film divides itself into two halves — Victor’s version of the story first, then the creature’s. The shift isn’t flashy, but the emotional whiplash it produces is real. You watch Victor justify his choices, then you see the consequences from the creature’s side — the loneliness, the confusion, the anger that has nowhere to go.
And just like that, the classic “creator vs. monster” idea falls apart. Both sides are broken in different ways.
Victor wants control. The creature wants belonging.
Neither gets what they’re reaching for.
It turns into a tragedy that doesn’t announce itself. It just builds in the background until you realize there was never going to be a clean resolution.
Performances that carry the film’s weight
Elordi’s performance hits hardest. There’s strength in his frame, sure, but everything about his body language suggests someone terrified of causing harm and equally terrified of being harmed. He plays the creature like a being born curious but taught fear immediately.
Isaac’s Victor is a study in unraveling ambition. Sometimes he feels magnetic — the kind of person you believe could change the world. Other times he seems like a man standing on the edge of something he can’t control and pretending he isn’t.
Mia Goth’s Elizabeth brings a quiet clarity to the film. She doesn’t cringe at the unknown. She approaches it. She sees the creature with a kind of instinctual empathy the others lack, and that small shift changes the emotional temperature whenever she’s on screen.
Christoph Waltz adds an unsettling calmness. His motives are never loud, but they’re always present, like a shadow you don’t quite trust.
A story that feels tied to now
Even with its Victorian setting, the film feels strangely current.
It pokes at things we recognize too well:
– creating power without preparing for the fallout
– confusing difference with danger
– mistreating what we don’t understand
– thinking brilliance excuses responsibility
The creature’s pain doesn’t show up as dramatic screaming. It shows up as that slow, sinking feeling of being discarded. That hits harder than any typical horror scene ever could.
He’s strong enough to frighten, but too alone to survive without guidance. And that’s the real tragedy running underneath everything.
A few rough edges — but a lasting effect
The movie doesn’t rush. At times, it moves with the patience of a novel. Some viewers will love that — others might want a tighter, more volatile pace. The visuals are so striking that they sometimes overshadow the tension. And if you’re hoping for a wild twist on the story, this version stays closer to the classic bones.
But the emotional heft? It’s there.
And it sticks.
The real point
When the lab goes quiet and the storm fades, the film leaves you sitting with something painfully simple:
Victor wanted to be powerful.
The creature wanted connection.
Both ended up hurting each other in ways neither intended.
Del Toro doesn’t hammer the message. He lets it breathe. It feels like he’s nudging you — gently — to think about the things you’ve created in your own life, the choices you’ve made that shaped someone else, or the versions of yourself you abandoned because they didn’t turn out the way you hoped.
The creature isn’t a symbol of fear .He’s a reminder.
A reminder that creating something is easy — frighteningly easy. Taking responsibility for it is the hard part.
That’s the thing Victor couldn’t do. And maybe the thing we’re all a little afraid of, if we’re honest.