2. Dr Frankenstein - Frankenstein (1931)
Colin Clive stars as Henry Frankenstein in this 1931 adaptation of the novel of the same name. We all know the set up. Frankenstein with the help of Fritz - his hunchbacked servant piece together bits of bodies and try to animate them with electricity. His fiancee Elizabeth is miffed at all the time he spends sequestered away, so she seeks the help of one of his old professors - Waldman. They go to Frankenstein's lab just in time for him to successfully animate a body and shout "IT'S ALIVE!" And then Frankenstein goes off to marry Elizabeth, blissfully unaware that the Monster is going on a bit of a wrecking spree - killing Fritz and Waldman in addition to throwing a little girl in the lake. Someone comes into the church and shouts that Waldman is dead. The little girl who drowned's father is none too pleased. A widescale hunt for the monster is in place and in a piece of karmic retribution the monster turfs Frankenstein off the top of the old mill but some vines break his fall. The monster is killed while jammy Frankenstein goes back to carry on with his wedding, like nothing ever happened. Frankenstein is a morbid, obsessive prick who concentrates on his shady activities so much, I am surprised that a lovely girl like Elizabeth wants to marry him. Even though she finds out he plays with dead bodies and creates a monster, she is still enamoured of him. Colin Clive is actually quite restrained apart from the "IT'S ALIVE! IT'S ALIVE!" moment. I don't know why he doesn't just take one whole body and reanimate it rather than patching bits of people together but I guess it is a plot line that creates a 'monster' instead of just a random alive, previously dead person. Frankenstein gets off remarkably lightly in the face of his interference with nature and his playing God, but maybe this is because it is a 1930s film. You wouldn't want him as a GP because during the consultation all he would be thinking about would be the removal of your left arm to complete his new 'creation'.