8 Classic Monster Movies You Never Knew Were Reboots

8. Young Frankenstein (1974)

Obviously Young Frankenstein is not the original Frankenstein film: that's not actually the point here. 

It's obviously an inspired spoof of the Universal horror cycle in general and of the Frankenstein films in particular, of which Mel Brooks was clearly a devoted fan. When he made this hilarious tribute to them in the 1970's, he went as far as searching out the original, then-40-year-old electrical apparatuses made by Kenneth Strickfaden to line Colin Clive's laboratory.

Despite lampooning the entire Universal canon, Young Frankenstein is actually a comedic remake of 1939's Son Of Frankenstein. Both feature sober, mustachioed descendants of the infamous monster-maker returning to claim an inheritance only to become seduced by mad science. It also offered the first ever hunchbacked Ygor, memorably played by Bela Lugosi. In 1931's Frankenstein and its immediate sequel, the doctor was aided by men called "Fritz" and "Karl." Even Kenneth Mars' Inspector Kemp, with his thick German accent and improbably British name, was inspired by Lionel Atwill's equally baffling, RP-spouting Teuton, Inspector Krogh.

So, how is it that Young Frankenstein has become better known than the film it parodies? To put things bluntly, it IS better, and while both films are funny, only one was trying to be.