The Frankenstein Origin Story Is Freakier and Hotter Than It's Ever Been In This Psychosexual 1986 Cult Film
Ken Russell’s Gothic is a standout piece of psychosexual horror, providing a fresh take on Frankenstein author Mary Shelley.
It was in 1816 that the science-fiction masterpiece Frankenstein was conceived. However, author Mary Shelley’s fateful holiday wasn’tall ghost stories and fruitful writing sessions. It was screenwriter Stephen Volk who peeled back the carefully curated layers of history to reveal the brash side of the iconic novel’s genesis in Gothic. The feverish screenplay focused on the factors that influenced Mary’s writing, namely a relationship so often explored by gothic literature: sex and death. Promising fright and seduction, who better than British director Ken Russell to helm the genre feature? With an oeuvre defined by his flamboyant, challenging style, and hypersexual, psychedelic storytelling, it was a match made in hell. Gothic leans into its namesake, combining madness and lust into a uniquely disturbing historical horror.
