Reel Reviews | Frankenstein (TIFF ’25)

by Tim Gordon

Guillermo del Toro has always been a filmmaker drawn to monsters, not as grotesque aberrations but as reflections of humanity’s most intimate fears and desires. With Frankenstein, his long-gestating dream project, the director finally delivers a work that feels both inevitable and deeply personal, a lush, gothic meditation on grief, cruelty, and the fragile bond between creator and creation.

Oscar Isaac commands the screen as Victor Frankenstein, a brilliant scientist whose childhood tragedies shape his obsessions. The early death of his mother (Lauren Collins) and the oppressive rule of his father (Charles Dance), a cold and exacting physician, leave scars that never heal. Victor’s quest to “conquer death” is less an act of scientific progress than a desperate attempt to rewrite his own pain. In the process, he becomes the very tyrant he despised: a man incapable of nurturing what he has brought to life.

Jacob Elordi’s Creature is the revelation of the film, haunting, poetic, and devastating. Where Victor sees failure, audiences see anguish. Elordi plays him as a being caught between innocence and fury, a childlike soul locked in a body that inspires fear. His encounters with the world, from fleeting kindness with Mia Goth’s Elizabeth to heartbreak with David Bradley’s blind man, make him achingly sympathetic. He is less a monster than a mirror, reflecting the cruelty of those who cannot look beyond the surface.

Mia Goth brings tenderness and quiet strength as Elizabeth, offering the Creature a rare glimpse of compassion, while Christoph Waltz provides slippery menace as Harlander, Victor’s wealthy benefactor whose interest in science is corrupted by arms-dealing ambition. Each supporting role from Felix Kammerer as Victor’s younger brother to Lars Mikkelsen’s haunted Captain Anderson adds depth to the tapestry of loss and obsession that surrounds Victor’s descent.

Del Toro builds his world with meticulous care. The film is a feast of gothic imagery: cavernous laboratories, candlelit chambers, storm-lashed landscapes, and snowbound vistas. Every frame drips with atmosphere, reinforcing the themes of beauty and decay. At 149 minutes, the film’s ambition occasionally stretches its pacing, but the indulgence feels earned. This is a story del Toro has waited his whole life to tell, and he leaves no stone unturned.

What separates Frankenstein from other adaptations is its dual focus. We not only see Victor’s descent into arrogance and cruelty but also live through the Creature’s agony, his rejection, isolation, and rage at being denied love. Their eventual confrontation is operatic, an emotional crescendo that transcends horror and tragedy to strike at something elemental: the eternal struggle between parent and child, creator and creation.

Thematically, the film suggests that the true monstrosity lies not in the stitched flesh of the Creature but in Victor’s failure to love what he has made. In trying to defy death, Victor damns himself and, in doing so, reveals the very human cruelty at the heart of Shelley’s tale.

Ultimately, Frankenstein is not just another retelling of Mary Shelley’s masterpiece. It is a Guillermo del Toro film through and through: haunting, empathetic, and visually unforgettable. Anchored by powerhouse performances from Isaac and Elordi, it is both a faithful adaptation and a bold reinterpretation of a story about monsters, yes, but more importantly about the humanity we deny in others, and in ourselves.

Grade: B