disclaimer: I watched this movie with filters to remove any unhelpful gore/imagery.
(movie spoilers ahead)
Guillermo Del Toro explores the reality of creation in the movie Frankenstein, but through the lens of a perverse creator. The deranged creator shows his folly, and in turn points to the beauty of the one true creator. Victor Frankenstein cannot play God, because only God can be God.
There is a fundamental beauty to our existence which is created and sustained by God who is love itself. Love flows from God. Love and creation go hand in hand. We see the picture of this in human love, which is a metaphor for the cosmic reality of love in God himself. Fatherhood on earth is a metaphor for God, who fathered all things and is the originator of all things. Just as a father delights in his children, and sustains them, so also God delights in his creation and sustains it.
Well Victor, as creator in the story Frankenstein, falls short of all these things. Rather than creating from a place of love, he begins his quest for creation with pride and anger as his motive. He is distrustful of his father who maltreated him as a child, and he is suspicious that his father purposefully allowed his mother to die; his father being a preeminent doctor. It is with these things in mind that he announces he will defeat death, marking the beginning of his journey to create life.
Ultimately Victor’s desire to create does not flow from love and is by definition malformed.
Secondly Victor shows he is questionable morally. He seeks to seduce his brother’s fiancé and purposefully deceives his brother on that quest. He is a prideful man.
Rather than creating from a place of moral purity, Victor creates in the mire of sin.
Thirdly Victor is a bad father to his creation. After creating the “monster”, Victor cages him in a room. Rather than showing him fatherly love, he abuses his creation. He refers to him as “it”. He yells at him. He blames him for his faults, without teaching him and leading him to wisdom. He is a poor father, and as fatherhood points to God as creator, Victor reveals he is a terrible God.
Del Toro explores some of the grand themes of God’s world as he unfolds his work. He knows Victor is a sinner and lacking as a creator. For example Victor’s monster longs for a companion. He seeks out Victor so Victor would create another monster so he would not be alone. This brings us back to the garden. Where the one true God says it is not good for man to be alone but rather makes him a helper suitable for him. And then commands man to be fruitful.
While Victor caged his creature in a room, God tells man to fill the earth. To enjoy every good tree, except one tree. The sweetness of the true God is juxtaposed with the folly of Victor.
Ultimately the monster leads Victor on a journey of repentance. He decides to cause Victor enough pain that would cause him to be humbled in the end.
Victor is transformed in his last moments. He sees that he is a father and that the monster is his child. Creation equals fatherhood. He asks for forgiveness and in his final moments repents.
Though the Victor is a poor Father, that is a poor God, his monster is also a poor Christ. I mean this not strictly in the moral sense but holistically. While Christ was eternally with His Father in a loving relationship, the monster comes into the world in turmoil with his father. While Christ is the God of the universe, creator of all things, the monster is the work of man (a creature rather than the Creator). While Christ came to earth bringing salvation for mankind, the monster’s initial mission is to seek his and possibly Victor’s salvation. While Christ brings eternal life for all who believe in him, the monster alone lives forever. Christ saves his bride the church from eternal death, Victor’s monster is unable to save his bride, as she dies in his arms.
So Victor does not live up to our Father in heaven, and his monster does not live up to the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ.
Additional tidbits:
The waters flowing in the room that the monster is caged in are a seeming nod to the garden of Eden, where a river flowed through, and divided into 4 rivers.
The monster is referred to as a new Adam.
The monster reads the story of Adam and Eve with an old man who he meets as he ventures out into the world.
The monster is brought to life on a cross. He does not immediately live but the next day rises.
The monster is described by Victor’s brother’s wife as pure and possibly untainted by original sin.
