FRANKENSTEIN
from the novel by
Mary W. Shelley
screen story by
Steph Lady & James V. Hart
previous draft by
Steph Lady
revised draft by
Frank Darabont
For TriStar Pictures & American Zoetrope
2ND REVISED DRAFT February 8, 1993
TITLES UNFOLD IN BLACKNESS as we are lulled by the distant
flute-like sounds of a recorder. Overall the effect is
mournful and haunting, elegant and serene ...
... and we CRASH TO:
EXT - BARENTS SEA - NIGHT
... a storm of inconceivable force and violence. Merciless
arctic winds whip the sea in a frenzy of thirty-foot swells.
This is the last place in God's creation that any human
being should be. And yet ...
...the prow of a three-masted ship rises massively before
us, looming from the darkness and chaos. it crashes upward
through a swell and slams back down again, plunging nose-
first into the trough. The sails on the forward mast are
still deployed. It's insane; in this weather they should be
stowed (as is already the case with masts 2 and 3).
Hurtling toward us. Rising and falling. Thundering through
the swells. And as she sweeps past CAMERA within a seeming
hairbreadth, we PAN with the ship and find ourselves ...
EXT - SHIP - NIGHT
... aboard the "Alexander Nevsky," along for the ride whether
we like it or not. There are men all around us, dark
screaming FIGURES glimpsed and half-glimpsed, heavy oilskin
clothes flapping in the gale. A GROUP OF MEN are in a life-
or-death tug of war
WALTON
PULL, YOU BASTARDS! PULL!
Riiiiippp! All eyes turn skyward as the uppermost sail tears
loose, the heavy canvas shredding away in huge billowing
tatters. The jib-arm wrenches free and plummets toward us,
trailing rope and fabric. The men dive aside as the jib
smashes into the deck like an exploding bomb. Splintered
shards of wood cartwheel through the air like shrapnel.
Walton catches a glancing blow to the head and slams face-
down on the pitching deck.
GRIGORI, the first mate, scrambles to Walton's aid. Walton
shoves him off, pushes painfully to his knees. LIGHTNING
throws his face into a stark relief map of pain and fury:
blood is streaming from his hairline, freezing in his eyes,
staining his teeth. He gazes up at the mainsail, still
intact and straining against the wind. We hear a huge CRACK!
The base of the mast is starting to give.
(CONTINUED)
2
WALTON
Cut the damn rigging free before we lose the
mast!
Long-handled axes are grabbed from their mounts. Frantic men
begin hacking at the ropes. Walton snatches an axe from a
passing crewman and elbows his way to the front. He attacks
a guy-rope with primal fury, CAMERA rising and falling with
the motion of his axe. Suddenly, a chilling cry from high
above:
LOOKOUT (O.S.)
IIIICEBEEEEERG!
THE CROW'S NEST (MAST #2)
The LOOKOUT is lashed to the mast by means of a safety rope
knotted at the chest. He points ahead.
WALTON and the others spin to look as A PANORAMIC SHOT OF
THE BARENTS SEA reveals a magnificent vista of storming
fury. The ship is heading into an enormous field of icebergs
dotting the ocean like boulders in a quarry, The Nevsky is
plying these waters like a man running pell-mell through a
mine field.
An iceberg passes massively and unexpectedly in the
foreground, rumbling within yards of the camera, wiping us
into darkness ...
EXT - NEVSKY - NIGHT
... and we wipe from darkness as a flapping piece of canvas
billows away to reveal 'Walton and the crew, gazing in
breathless horror as an iceberg looms from the gale before
them like a ghostly white mountain. Walton finds his voice:
WALTON
HARD TO PORT!
THE PILOT fights to turn the wheel. Men rush to his aid,
throw their backs into it, straining to the limit. The wheel
is grudging, fighting them every inch of the way.
PUSH IN on Walton and the crew:
GRIGORI
It's going to ram us.
WALTON
It wouldn't dare.
(CONTINUED)
3
THE CROW'S NEST (MAST #2)
The lookout fumbles under his coat, grabs the rosary around
his neck, clutches the crucifix tightly in both hands. Face
white with terror. Breath coming in ragged gasps.
SHIP'S POV
Crashing through the swells. Rising and falling. Tilting the
world and the audience on its ear. iceberg looming. For a
brief moment we seem to be veering past. But then we swing
back in a final, churning, vertiginous plunge...
... and smack the ice.
VARIOUS QUICK-CUT ANGLES
God just hit the ship with an anvil. Mast #1 snaps at the
base with a thunderous CRACK and begins to topple in a
symphony of shattering wood and tangled rigging ...
The lookout on mast #2 is vaulted through the railing of the
crow's nest, screaming through the air, arms and legs
windmilling as he plummets head-first toward the deck below
... And is jerked to an abrupt stop by the safety line around
his chest, We hear another horrible CRACK ... the sound of
his back breaking ...
Men are sliding, tumbling, screaming. Mast #1 completes its
fall, slamming massively to the deck,. shattering a section
of the gunwale to splinters. Utter panic. Total chaos. .
Sheer mortal terror. And as the sequence builds to a final
brain-splitting crescendo of sound and fury, we
SMASH CUT TO:
ARCTIC - TWILIGHT
Total, stunning silence.
A glittering wasteland of ice. Breathlessly cold. Even the
sun seems frozen, barely hanging on the horizon. Pellets of
snow scour the permafrost like broken glass, driven by a
desolate arctic wind. It's as if Hell had erupted through
the floor of the Earth in the form of ice. Nothing could
survive here. Nothing.
SLOW PAN reveals a distant ship frozen in the ice, tilted at
a permanent list. Silent. We see no signs of life.
SUPE TITLE: "The Arctic, 1839.
VARIOUS LINGERING ANGLES provide ominous detail-shots of the
Nevsky
(CONTINUED)
4
A flap of frozen canvas creaks in the wind ...
The pilot's wheal is now a crystalline sculpture of ice. The
forward mast lies across the deck like a broken limb,
extending out over the ice on a tangle of rigging...
The ship's prow is smashed open above the water line ...
A familiar rosary lies broken on the deck. Beads scattered.
A tiny Christ figure lies with arms thrown wide, painted
eyes staring up at the sky through a thin sheet of ice ...
HIGH, HIGH ANGLE
From the top of mast #2. A breathtaking perspective of the
entire ship below, guaranteed to induce vertigo. The corpse
of the lookout is suspended below us at the end of the
frozen rope, His posture mimics the Christ figure: His arms
thrown wide, dead eyes staring up at the sky through a thin
sheet of ice. A ghastly still-life, the corpse twisting
ever-so-slightly on the wind, rope creaking ...
A SAILOR thrusts into frame swaying precariously in the
rigging, WIDEN to reveal TWO MORE MEN as they reach out with
long gaffing poles to snag the corpse.
EXT - NEVSKY - LOW ANGLE FROM ICE - TWILIGHT
Walton watches them reel the body in. ANGLE SHIFTS as he
turns, revealing the rest of the crew working desperately to
free the ship. Axes and picks rise and fall in waves,
slamming into the ice, throwing up frozen chips. The men are
near collapse, exhaustion carved in their faces. The dogs
are nearby, huskies and malamutes huddled in the snow.
Walton rejoins the men, rams his axe fiercely into the ice.
WALTON
Put your backs into it!
SAILOR #1
What's the use? This godless ice stretches for
miles! Would you have us chow our way back to
England?
WALTON
No. But we'll chop our way to the North Pole if
we have to. Inch by bloody inch.
GRIGORI
You can't mean to go on! Our journey is ended!
The best we can hope for now is to get out of this
alive!
(CONTINUED)
5
SAILOR #2
Aye, if the ice ever lets us!
WALTON
The ice will break. And when it does, we proceed
north ... as planned.
Cries of dismay from the men. Grigori thrusts his arm toward
the sky, pointing at the corpse on the mast.
GRIGORI
At the cost of how many more lives?
He's interrupted by a long, chilling HOWL. The lead husky
rises to its feet, hackles up, HOWLING at some unseen thing
in the distance. The other dogs start rising around him,
joining in, staring off across the ice.
GRIGORI
There's something out there.
The dogs are going berserk. The lead husky breaks free and
launches himself across the ice. The men scramble to
restrain the animals, but three more break away and take off
after their leader. Walton snatches up his rifle.
WALTON
You five come with me! The rest stay with the
ship!
EXT - ARCTIC PANORAMA - TWILIGHT
The Nevsky in the distance. The dogs come howling across the
ice toward us. The men trail substantially behind.
BOOM DOWN to the icy boulders f.g. A massive hand comes
briefly to rest in one of the crags, ghastly gray skin
rippling with harsh ligaments and sinewy veins, brutal
surgical scars marring the wrist. A HUGE DARK FIGURE wipes
frame, fleeing into the rocks. The dogs come bounding past
in pursuit, snarling and slavering.
THE RUNNING MEN hear an INHUMAN HOWL rise amidst those of
the dogs. A vicious free-for-all echoes from the rocks.
Barking gives way to shrill squeals. An object is launched
from the crags, catapulted through the air in a high arc.
Some men slip and fall as the object slams to the ground
with tremendous impact before them ...
...and they find themselves staring in horror At the sight
of the lead dog. Silence now. Those who have fallen, rise.
Walton cocks his rifle. The group proceeds, picks and axes
held ready, slowly skirting the rocks ...
(CONTINUED)
6
... and the massacre is revealed. Blood-stained ice. Dead,
mangled animals strewn about. One twitching survivor crawls
toward them on broken limbs, whining piteously, dragging its
entrails in a red smear.
GRIGORI
Look.
They follow his gaze. Bloody tracks lead away from the
bodies, ascending the rocks. Most are smeared and vague ...
but one is clearly a bare human footprint. Several men
cross themselves. Walton shoulders the rifle, aims down at
the surviving dog. BLAM! A single bullet to the brain ends
its misery, punching a halo of blood onto the ice. The shot
echoes for miles.
WALTON
Back to the ship.
EXT - NEVSKY - ESTABLISHING - NIGHT
Silhouetted against the aurora borealis. The horizon swirls
mysteriously with color and light. Distant slivers of
lightning kiss the earth. Men keep watch in furtive groups,
huddled against the cold, breath punching the air with
billows of vapor. A massive CRACKLING is heard. A YOUNG
SAILOR spins, jumpy.
OLD SAILOR
Only the ice to starboard, boy.
YOUNG SAILOR
Is it breaking up?
OLD SAILOR
Just dancing on the current. It'll freeze even
tighter come next wind
CAMERA DRIFTS past to another group:
SAILOR #4
It was a polar bear. That's what I say.
SAILOR #5
Say all you want, but you weren't there. It left
human tracks.
SAILOR #6
No man could tear those dogs apart
SAILOR #5
No human. We've roused a demon from the ice.
(CONTINUED)
7
CLANG-CLANG! The men spin. A SAILOR on starboard has rung
the signal bell. The men race over, crowding the gunwale.
SAILOR
Something. In the mist.
Walton appears from his cabin and crowds his way to the
front, rifle aimed at the sky. The men wait. Holding their
breath. Scanning the darkness.
AN APPARITION looms eerily from the mist on a creaking floe
of ice, silhouetted by the shifting light of the borealis.
The figure's pose is uncanny and weird: neither standing nor
kneeling, but something in between, arm dangling at its side
and lolling slowly with the motion of the current.
YOUNG SAILOR
It's the demon! Shoot while you've a chance!
The Pilot lights the kerosene wick of a reflector box"
spotlight and swings it around. The beam seeks out the
specter and pins it in a dim circle of light ... revealing a
man collapsed on a dog sled, lashed to tiller upright
stanchions with frozen leather straps, Dead dogs lie in icy
heaps around him.
EXT - NEVSKY - NIGHT
The men venture onto the shifting ice with lanterns raised.
Grappling lines are unslung and thrown, the ice floe
snagged. Gaffs reach out, drawing it closer. Men clasp arms,
forming a human chain. Grigori is the first to reach the
motionless figure on the dog sled.
WALTON
Dead?
Grigori cautiously eases his hand into the darkness of the
furred hood to search the neck for a pulse ...
... and the figure scares the s-hit out of him. With a
convulsive shudder and a gasping intake of breath, the hood
rises up, revealing a haggard face tortured white with
frost, beard frozen solid, eyes blazingly intelligent and
aware. Walton finds himself in an extended beat of eye
contact with VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN.
EXT - NEVSKY - ON DECK - NIGHT
A HOWLING WIND has kicked up, pelting the huddled sentries
with sleet. CAMERA TRACKS past, moving steadily toward the
dimly-glowing window of Walton's cabin ...
(CONTINUED)
8
INT - WALTON'S CABIN - NIGHT
... where we find Walton and Grigori in tense discussion:
GRIGORI
Captain, I implore you. The men are frightened
and angry. They want your assurance.
WALTON
They knew the risks when they signed on. I've
come too far to turn back now.
GRIGORI
Then you run the danger of pushing them to
mutiny.
Walton pulls a pistol from his drawer and slams it flat on
the table before him.
WALTON
(low, tight)
Let them try.
Grigori is taken aback. He hears a shifting of blankets and
glances to the captain's bed. Walton follows his look.
Frankenstein has awakened and is watching them.
Grigori exits, uneasy under Frankenstein's gaze. Walton
rises, retrieves a pot from the stove.
WALTON
You're awake. I've prepared some broth. It'll
help restore you.
VICTOR
(hoarse, faltering)
I'm ... dying.
Victor draws a hand from under the blanket and holds it
before his face. Fingers skeletal and black.
VICTOR
Frostbite. Gangrene. A simple diagnosis.
WALTON
Are you a physician?
VICTOR
(faint smile)
How is it you come to be here?
(CONTINUED)
9
WALTON
There's a startling question, coming from you.
(beat)
I'm captain of this ship. We sailed from
Archangel a month ago, seeking a passage to the
North Pole.
VICTOR
Ah. An explorer.
WALTON
Would-be. I'm plagued with my share of
difficulties just at the moment.
VICTOR
I heard.
WALTON
I can't say I blame them. We're trapped in this
ice and bedeviled by some sort of ... creature.
VICTOR
Creature? A ... human like creature?
WALTON
(stunned)
You know of it?
VICTOR
Your men are right to be afraid.
WALTON
Then explain it, whatever it is. It could save
the voyage. I've spent years planning this. My
entire fortune
VICTOR
You'd persist at the cost of your own life? The
lives of your crew?
WALTON
Lives are ephemeral. The knowledge we gain, the
achievements we leave behind ... those live on.
Victor reaches out with his blackened claw of a hand, pulls
him closer. Impassioned, intense:
VICTOR
Do you share my madness?
WALTON
Madness?
(CONTINUED)
10
CAMERA PUSHES SLOWLY on Victor's face ...
VICTOR
We are kindred, you and I. Men of ambition. Let
me tell you all that I have lost in such pursuits.
I pray my story will come to mean for you all that
is capricious and evil in man.
WALTON
(angry, frightened)
Who are you?
VICTOR
(beat)
My name is Frankenstein
... and CAMERA proceeds into the bottomless depths of
Victor's staring eye, plunging us into:
TOTAL DARKNESS. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. A METRONOME fades up
before us.
WOMAN'S VOICE (O.S.)
Failure has no pride, Victor. You must try again.
LITTLE BOY (O.S.
Yes, Ma'am.
INT - GRAND BALLROOM - FRANKENSTEIN MMSION - DAY
We hear a HARPSICHORD begin playing as a WIDER ANGLE reveals
a huge, Magnificent room with vaulted ceilings thirty feet
high. Floor-to-ceiling windows. Hanging tapestries.
VICTOR sits at the harpsichord, a very serious 7 year-old in
his little gentleman's suit and stiff starched collar.
MRS. MORITZ, head of the housekeeping staff, conducts the
lesson. Her daughter JUSTINE, age 4, sits with her doll in a
huge wingback chair, making it dance to the music as she
listens ... but her eyes are on Victor. She adores him.
An enormous door swings open. Victor stops playing. His
PARENTS enter, ushering a somber and beautiful ELIZABETH,
age 6, across the vast expanse of floor. Victor slides off
the bench and faces them.
FATHER
Mrs. Moritz, would you and your daughter excuse
us?
(CONTINUED)
11
MRS. MORITZ
Of course, Doctor. Madam. Come along, Justine.
Bring your dolly.
Mrs. Moritz takes Justine's hand. Justine gazes back at
Victor and Elizabeth as her mother whisks her off.
MOTHER
Victor. This is Elizabeth. She's coming to live
with us.
FATHER
She has lost her parents to scarlet fever. She is
an orphan.
MOTHER
You must think of her as your own sister. You
must look after her. And be kind to her.
Victor stares at Elizabeth. She returns the gaze evenly,
self-possessed and dignified even at this young age.
ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)
I loved her from the moment that I first saw her.
EXT - FRANKENSTEIN ESTATE - NIGHT
A MASSIVE BOLT OF LIGHTNING hammers from the sky, reducing a
centuries-old oak tree to smoldering ruin ...
INT - DOWNSTAIRS PARL0R - NIGHT
... while '(slaps them on the bed) ' gazes at the storm,
face pressed against a window, astonished at the sight.
Lightning throws seething shadows of the rain on his face.
his '... and Grigori breaks the surface again, rising slowly
And impossibly from the water. arms and legs windmill
against the air, propelled from below with nearly aulic
strength. He gazes down in shock at the massive fist
clutching his chest ... and the arm ' appears.
MOTHER
Victor. Elizabeth is frightened by the storm. Go
comfort her.
INT - UPPER LANDING - NIGHT
We hear a CHILD SOBBING. Victor comes racing up the grand
staircase from below as LIGHTNING sends wild banister
shadows Littering. He caroms down the hall toward:
INT - ELIZABETH'S ROOM - NIGHT
Victor enters. Elizabeth is a tiny figure huddled in an
adult-size bed, gazing up with tear-streaked face at the
huge skylights in the vaulted ceiling, dreading the next
scary boom and flash. Victor approaches and whispers:
(CONTINUED)
12
VICTOR
Don't cry, Elizabeth.
ELIZABETH
(frightened)
Aren't you?
KA-BOOM! A LIGHTNING BOLT rips overhead, rattling the panes
of glass. Victor does find it scary ... but exhilarating.
VICTOR
We'll build a fort. So the lightning can't get
us.
He races about the room, grabbing every pillow he can find
and hurling them to her. Big decorative pillows from the
chaise, bed pillows from the armoire ... they all come
flying. She giggles as a big one knocks her flat. Victor
scampers onto the bed with her. They pile the pillows around
and above, concealing themselves in a bulging heap of
cushions.
INSIDE THE PILLOW-FORT
Victor pokes his hand up, widening a space so they can still
see. Lightning glistens in their upturned eyes.
ELIZABETH
Are you sure it can't hurt us?
VICTOR
Nothing can. Not ever.
She seeks his hand. Fingers clasp. Comfort and strength.
TILT UP to the skylight. Rain drumming the glass ...
INT - MANSION - GRAND BALLROOM - DAY
Victor and Elizabeth are learning to waltz, their movements
stiff and awkward, childlike. MRS. MORITZ is at the
harpsichord. Justine sits with her dolly, watching.
MRS. MORITZ
You must lead, Victor. The lady will always look
to you for guidance, so your steps must be sure
and strong ...
VICTOR
Mrs. Moritz.
MRS. MORITZ
... aaand, one-two-three, one-two- three, twirl-
two-three ...
JUSTINE
Mama, can I dance with Victor?
(CONTINUED)
13
MRS. MORITZ
Nonsense, Justine. Hush. And now a sweeping arc
about the room! one- two-three, twirl-two-three
Victor and Elizabeth gamely work their way across the vast
room, tripping on each other's toes. They pass within inches
of CAMERA, bodies WIPING FRAME ...
INT - GRAND BALLROOM - DAY (TEN YEARS LATER)
... and they sweep from before our eyes, waltzing away from
camera to reveal Victor now 17, intense and handsome as he
approaches manhood. Elizabeth is a blossoming and graceful
beauty at 16. Mrs. Moritz is still conducting the lessons,
but the person at t
MRS. MORITZ
... one-two-three, twirl-two-three.. Excellent!
You'll be the envy of all the young ladies and
gentlemen!
They're certainly the envy of Justine, who gazes at Victor
as he sweeps Elizabeth around the room in his arms. She
isn't concentrating and fumbles on the keyboard. Her mother
throws her a look of reproval:
MRS. MORITZ
Justine. Surely you can maintain better time than
that.
JUSTINE
Yes, Mama.
Flustered, she puts her attention back on the keyboard as
Victor and Elizabeth keep dancing, swirling fluidly about
the room, their attention only on each other.
INT - UPSTAIRS HALLWAY - NIGHT
A skylight above us. A storm is raging, rain drumming the
glass. We hear SCREAMING in the house. TILT DOWN to Victor
perched at the edge of a settee, seething with tension.
Waiting. Elizabeth is with him. She squeezes his arm, trying
to reassure him.
ELIZABETH
She'll be all right.
Another SCREAM rips down the hallway. Justine comes
scurrying up the stairs, about to enter his parent's room
with a fresh load of sheets. Victor lunges to his feet and
intercepts, trying to push past her, but finds the doorway
implacably blocked by Mrs. Moritz.
(CONTINUED)
14
MRS. MORITZ
You can do nothing here. Wait downstairs.
He can see his mother in the dim kerosene light, writhing
and screaming on the bed, belly swollen and distended. His
father, sleeves rolled up, works feverishly to save her.
VICTOR
Mother?
FATHER
Victor, do as you're told!
Justine glances at Victor, longing to comfort him. She
squeezes past into the room. The door slams in his face. He
turns to Elizabeth, eyes brimming with terror ...
INT - PARENTS' BEDROOM - NIGHT
... as his mother falls back on the sweat-soaked sheets,
blowing air like a bellows, trying to give birth ...
EXT - MANSION - NIGHT
... while her SCREAMS mingle with the howling of the wind.
the stump of the long-dead oak tree pokes from the earth in
the foreground like a gravestone, lashed by the rain.
INT - DOWNSTAIRS PARLOR - NIGHT
VICTOR stares out the window at the raging storm. Elizabeth
appears at his side. He doesn't look at her.
VICTOR
As a boy, I stood at this window and watched God
destroy our tree.
b.g screaming stops, Victor and Elizabeth turn, gazing up
the grand staircase. The sudden silence is even more
frightening. The FAINT CRY of a newborn infant drifts down
A door opens upstairs, throwing a spill of light. Victor's
father appears in silhouette, comes down the stairs toward
them. He pauses halfway down, unable to continue.
VICTOR
Father?
A FLASH OF LIGHTNING floods the room, revealing Victor's
father on the staircase. Face haggard. Eyes hollow. Clothes
spattered with blood. Hands glistening wetly red.
ELIZABETH
Oh God.
The blood.
(CONTINUED)
15
Father sits down shakily on a step. Victor and Elizabeth
race up the stairs and pause before him.
FATHER
I did everything I could.
Victor lets out a sob of anguish. Elizabeth begins to cry.
Father gathers them into his arms.
EXT - FRANKENSTEIN ESTATE - CEMETERY - DAY
A BABY CARRIAGE stands amidst leaning gravestones, gothic
and ornate, a chill breeze billowing the lace.
A PRIEST recites a Latin burial mass. DOZENS OF MOURNERS are
gathered before the Frankenstein family mausoleum ... an
imposing edifice of stone and spidery wrought-iron, its
steepled roof crowned by a massive granite crucifix.
A sleek black casket lies atop the bier, ringed with flowers
and sorrow. The trees are windswept and bare, branches stark
against a steely gray sky. Victor and Elizabeth stand apart
from the others, staring at the casket. Softly:
VICTOR
How could all my father's knowledge and skill
fail to save her?
ELIZABETH
It's not ours to decide. All that live must die.
It's God's will.
Victor raises a grim look at the huge crucifix atop the
mausoleum. Christ returns his gaze with blank stone eyes
VICTOR
What kind of God is He to will this?
ELIZABETH
She was mother to me as well. But ours is the job
of the living. It's up to us now to hold this
family together. We must think of Father and be
strong for him.
(beat)
I cannot do that alone.
VICTOR
God took her from us.
ELIZABETH
He left a beautiful gift in her place. A baby
boy. To cherish and love as our very own. Your
brother
(CONTINUED)
16
Victor glances at the baby carriage. He seeks her hand.
Their fingers clasp. Comfort and strength.
VICTOR
Our brother.
The baby starts CRYING as the casket is lowered, its thin
voice carried on the wind ...
EXT - MEADOW - DAY
A gorgeous, sun-dappled day. Tall grass waving on the
breeze. Butterflies skittering. WILLIAM, 11 months-old,
toddles into view. He doesn't get far. PLOP! Down he goes,
right on his ass. His face scrunches up in surprise and he
bursts into tears.
Elizabeth hurries over and scoops him up, cradling and
comforting him. Victor rises from a picnic blanket to join
them. Nanny Justine looks up from her task of laying out the
silverware and food.
JUSTINE
Poor William! What indignant tears!
ELIZABETH
There, there ... shhh ...
Victor takes the baby and swoops him high in the air. The
child shrieks and wails, held aloft.
ELIZABETH
Victor, have a care! You'll make him dizzy!
VICTOR
The world is a dizzying place.
She tries to reclaim the baby. Victor feints, keeping Willie
out of reach. Elizabeth grows crosser:
ELIZABETH
Oh, do give him here! He needs to be comforted
and held!
VICTOR
He needs to vent his outrage to the skies! Make
yourself heard, Willie! Learning to walk is not an
easy thing! Why should it be so?
Elizabeth is exasperated to realize that the baby has begun
to laugh. She glares at both of them. Men.
(CONTINUED)
17
ELIZABETH
That's the nature of all progress, William. Don't
let your brother sway you otherwise.
JUSTINE
Quite right!
Victor cradles Willie as if to shield his delicate ears. He
peers at Elizabeth with mock-grave suspicion and speaks to
the baby sotto-voce, in deepest confidence, man-to-man:
VICTOR
Don't listen, Willie. Progress is a feast to be
consumed. Women would have you believe you must
walk before you can run. or run before you can
waltz!
ELIZABETH
(laughing)
Give me that child before you fill his head with
drivel!
Victor waltzes the baby in circles. Elizabeth stalks them.
VICTOR
Devil take walking, ladies! My brother shall
learn to waltz!
He grabs her by the waist, pulls her into it. There's no use
resisting. She succumbs and they dance with the baby between
them. Justine is gasping with laughter.
JUSTINE
Elizabeth, really! He's quite mad!
ELIZABETH
Scandalous! What would your dear mother say?
JUSTINE
(thinks a beat)
one-two-three, one-two-three, twirl-two-three ...
Laughing, Victor and Elizabeth waltz little William around
in a sweeping arc. They pass within inches of the CAMERA,
bodies wiping frame ...
INT - GRAND BALLROOM - NIGHT (6 YEARS LATER)
... and 'Come now. Magnus? Agrippa? Next thing you know,
you''ll be teaching toadstools to speak.' and CREATURE sweep
from before our eyes to reveal the grand ballroom ablaze
with candlelight and spectacle as a HUNDRED DANCERS swirl
about the floor in a
(CONTINUED)
18
breathtaking waltz to the music of a full string ensemble
(NOTE: The music here should be our movie's distinctive
WALTZ/LOVE THEME, which will reoccur later.)
Victor and Elizabeth dance magnificently, room spinning
about them in a blur. Now 24, he's in the prime of manhood.
Elizabeth, 23, is a drop-dead beauty radiating poise and
intelligence. They're so right for each other, so beautiful
together, your heart could break just looking at them.
Justine, now 21, has blossomed into a beauty herself. She's
at the sidelines, wearing a lovely gown, wishing someone
would ask her to dance. William, now 7, scampers to her
side. She stoops to straighten his collar and smooth back
his hair. Waltzing couples swirl past them.
WILLIE
Auntie Justine, Papa said I could have a sweet.
JUSTINE
You can. But not before dinner.
The music ends amidst applause. The men bow to the ladies,
the ladies curtsy in return. Victor escorts Elizabeth off
the dance floor. Elizabeth fans herself, flushed and happy.
JUSTINE
You dance so beautifully together.
ELIZABETH
And you look so lovely.
They share a sisterly hug and a radiant smile. The orchestra
recommences. The music is lush. Justine looks hopefully to
Victor, keeping her tone light:
JUSTINE
Victor? Spare me one dance?
Elizabeth catches Victor's eye.
ELIZABETH
Go on, ask her. Please. I'm quite out of breath,
Victor gallantly offers his arm. Justine takes it, lighting
up as he escorts her onto the dance floor ...
...and they begin to dance. She's glowing. This is a big
moment for her. But they've hardly begun, when...
...ting-ting-ting, Victor's father is tapping a champagne
glass with a knife. The dancers stop. The orchestra falls
silent. Justine hides her disappointment as servants pass
among the guests with glasses of champagne.
(CONTINUED)
19
FATHER
My friends, fatherly pride won't allow this
occasion to pass without my raising a toast.
Shouts of assent. Victor is grabbed by his friends and
dragged forward, a glass of champagne shoved in his hands
FATHER
To Victor. My son. Who read every medical book in
my library by age thirteen ... and then re-read
them, which seemed excessive even to me.
(the guests ROAR with laughter)
Drape yourself in glory, my boy. Study well.
When you return, you return a man of medicine. I
will then be honored to call you "colleague."
VICTOR
But never your equal.
FATHER
No. You'll surpass me.
Applause and roars of approval. The drinks are tossed back.
Victor is jostled with backslaps and handshakes.
EXT - MANSION -'NIGHT
Music and warm light spill from the windows. A COUPLE eases
through a French door and come racing across the lawn,
giggling and hushing each other. They take refuge under a
tree, revealing their faces to the moonlight: Victor and
Elizabeth. She leans against the trunk to catch her breath.
ELIZABETH
Smell the air. Wonderful.
VICTOR
Quite a send-off, isn't it?
ELIZABETH
Father's so proud.
VICTOR
And you?
ELIZABETH Prouder still. You'll be the handsomest student
there.
VICTOR
I'll have to do better than that.
(CONTINUED)
20
ELIZABETH
You will.
(searches his eyes)
What do you want, Victor?
VICTOR
To be the best there ever was. To push our
knowledge beyond our dreams ... to eradicate
disease and pestilence ... to purge mankind of
ignorance and fear ...
He's so serious, she can't help laugh.
VICTOR
I'm not mad.
She smiles, smoothes a lock of hair gently off his forehead.
ELIZABETH
No. Just very earnest. And very dear.
An extended moment. Unspoken words flowing between them.
Victor leans forward and kisses her. Her eyes widen
slightly. So do his. Shared excitement, gentle and sexy
beyond belief. They pause, draw back, searching each other's
eyes. He whispers:
VICTOR
I've loved you all my life
ELIZABETH
All my life live known.
They kiss again. A breath. A shiver.
VICTOR
This feels ... incestuous.
ELIZABETH
is that what makes it so delicious?
She brushes her lips against his. Gentle as a sigh.
ELIZABETH
Brother and sister still?
VICTOR
I wish to be your husband.
ELIZABETH
I wish to be your wife.
(CONTINUED)
21
VICTOR
Then come with me to Ingolstadt. Marry me now.
ELIZABETH
If only I could. But one of us must stay.
Father's not strong. Willie's just a child. Who
can look after them in your absence? Who can run
the estate?
VICTOR
Only you
ELIZABETH
I will be here when you return,
Another kiss. Turning lustful and steamy. They melt into
each other, sinking down, bodies pressing and minds afire.
These people are hot for each other. They stop, stunned at
the intensity. He lays his head to her breast. Their fingers
clasp. She whispers her secret:
ELIZABETH
My head is spinning. I want to give myself to
you.
He raises his head. She meets his gaze evenly
ELIZABETH
If we're to be married, must we wait?
He touches her face. Fingertips tracing downward, gentle and
reverent, brushing the contours of her bosom at the edge of
her bodice. She shivers. Closes her eyes. Lays her hand over
his. Guiding his touch.
VICTOR
You make me weak.
ELIZABETH
Not as weak as I.
She raises his hand to her mouth. Brushing his fingertips
with her lips. Wrestling with desire. Their eyes meet.
ELIZABETH
Our decision. Together.
VICTOR
Your decision. For us,
ELIZABETH
(hesitates)
I give you my soul ...
(CONTINUED)
22
VICTOR
(nods)
... until our wedding night. When our bodies will
join.
ELIZABETH
Victor. I love you,
VICTOR
Elizabeth. My more than sister.
They kiss again. Gently ...
EXT - FRANKENSTEIN ESTATE - CEMETERY - DAWN
A misty gray dawn. Victor is kneeling at a gravestone,
observing a moment of silence. His saddled horse is tethered
nearby. Softly:
VICTOR
I'll make you so proud, Mother.
He lays a small sprig of flowers on the grave, rises and
walks toward his horse.
EXT - MANSION - MORNING
Overcast and chill. An open carriage stands loaded. The
family and household staff have turned out. Victor stands
ready to go. Father pulls him into a back-slapping embrace.
FATHER
Write to us often.
Victor moves on to Justine, takes her hand.
VICTOR
We never finished our dance.
(she smiles)
Someday we shall.
Next is William. The little boy stands stiffly, tears on his
face, trying to be brave. Victor kneels and whispers:
VICTOR
The others will look to you while I'm gone,
Willie. Be strong.
The boy nods miserably, throws his arms around Victor's
neck. Last comes Elizabeth. She and Victor regard each
other, sharing the secret of last night. A faint smile plays
at the corners of her mouth. He kisses her cheek.
VICTOR
Elizabeth.
(CONTINUED)
23
He mounts the carriage. CLAUDE snaps the reins and lurches
away, speeding Victor off to his future. Victor turns back
for a final look at the home and family he loves so much.
William runs after him until he's gone from sight ...
DISSOLVE TO:
INGOLSTADT - ESTABLISHING ANGLES - DAY
High white clouds in a blazing blue sky. Church steeples
rising among the rooftops. Beautiful.
BOARDING HOUSE - DAY
FRAU BRACH trudges heavily up a long, steep, narrow flight
of stairs with Victor teetering uneasily behind.
FRAU BRACH
No real rooms left. All we've got is attic space.
No one ever wants the attic space ...
ATTIC SPACE/GARRET - DAY
She leads him into an immensely long space running a twisted
path the entire length of the building; various levels and
areas unhindered by wall separation, massive vaulted beams
crisscrossing as understructure to the roof. Daylight
filters dimly through dozens of dormer windows and skylights
coated with grime. Nooks and crannies abound.
VICTOR
This will do nicely.
UNIVERSITY - DAY
A monumental structure of brick. A BELL TOWER TOLLS. Dead
leaves scurry across the lawn.
LECTURE HALL - DAY
PROFESSOR KREMPE, a squat little man, paces before the
packed galleries of eager young STUDENTS.
KREMPE
In science, the letter of fact is the letter of
law. Our pursuit is as dogmatic as any religious
precept. Think of yourselves as disciples of a
strict and hallowed sect. Someday you may be
priests ... but only if you learn the scripture
chapter and verse.
(off their laughter)
Any questions?
(CONTINUED)
24
VICTOR
(hand shoots up)
But surely, Professor, you don't intend we
disregard the more ... philosophical works.
KREMPE
Philosophical?
VICTOR
Those which stir the imagination as well as the
intellect. Paracelsus, for one.
This reference is lost on all but a few. At the faculty
table: PROFESSOR WALDMAN peers up at Victor, adjusting the
glasses on his nose. Up among the students: HENRY CLERVAL
leans out and shoots an amused look in Victor's direction.
SCHILLER catches Henry's look and rolls his eyes.
KREMPE
Paracelsus?
VICTOR
Or Albertus Magnus. Cornelius Agrippa ...
KREMPE
What is your name?
VICTOR
Victor Frankenstein, sir.
(no response)
Of Geneva
KREMPE
Of Geneva.
(beat)
Tell me, Mr. Frankenstein of Geneva. Do you wish
to study medicine? Or mysticism?
Titters sweep the room. Krempe remains staunchly unamused:
KREMPE
Those of you unfamiliar with Mr. Frankenstein's
suggested reading list ... thankfully, that would
be most of you ... would be well advised to avoid
it. Here at Ingolstadt, we concern ourselves with
immutable reality...
(specific to Victor)
...not the ravings of lunatics and alchemists
hundreds of years in their graves. Understood?
(CONTINUED)
25
Victor is flushed and humiliated. Held like to say more, but
wisely swallows his anger and nods.
KREMPE
I am relieved. Are there any relevant questions?
(there are none)
Lecture hall dismissed.
EXT - UNIVERSITY - DAY
Victor exits wearing a distinctive black greatcoat, fuming
over the exchange with Krempe. He strides across the lawn,
eyes fixed straight ahead.
Henry Clerval races up behind him and falls casually in
step. Victor glances over. Henry nods pleasantly, as if held
been there all along. Victor responds with a curt nod and
resumes his straight-ahead demeanor. They walk in silence,
just two guys heading in the same direction.
Henry can't help it; he snickers loudly to himself. Victor
shoots him a sharp look. Henry's smirk vanishes, replaced
with blank innocence. Did somebody snicker?
HENRY
I was just clearing my throat.
VICTOR
Very well then.
They continue walking. Silence thick. Finally:
HENRY
You know, you're quite mad.
Victor stops. Turns
VICTOR
(low, measured)
I am not mad.
HENRY
(matching Victor's tone)
As a march hare.
Henry's expression betrays nothing ... but perhaps there's a
trace of amusement in his eyes?
VICTOR
Are you having me on?
HENRY
Of course I am. It pays to humor the insane.
(CONTINUED)
26
Beat. Victor smiles. Henry grins, offers his hand. takes it.
HENRY
Henry Clerval.
VICTOR
Victor, Victor Frankenstein.
HENRY
I know. You have a way of making an impression.
INT - GASTHOF - DUSK
The tavern is packed with students and noise. Beer and food
served at a frantic pace. We find Victor and Henry at a
small table, tearing into sausages and cheese.
VICTOR
Do you really think I'm mad?
HENRY
Come now. Magnus? Agrippa? Next thing you know,
you'll be teaching toadstools to speak.
Schiller enters with FRIENDS. They pause at Victor's table
SCHILLER
if it isn't the sorcerer. Found yourself an
apprentice?
VICTOR
I'm afraid I rejected his application. He merely
dabbles
HENRY
Dilettantes need not apply. What about you?
Schiller, isn't it?
SCHILLER
Von Schiller. I'm interested in real medicine.
Treating the sick
HENRY
Really? I myself find sick people rather
revolting.
(off their looks)
I'm here to secure my degree with a minimum of
fuss and hard work that I might settle into a life
of privilege treating rich old ladies with gout
and dallying with their daughters.
(CONTINUED)
27
SCHILLER
You two disgust me.
Schiller and his friends stalk off.
EXT - INGOLSTADT - DUSK
LONG LENS magnificently compresses buildings and steeples,
distant hills and drizzly sky. Victor wears his greatcoat as
he and Henry walk along a twisty cobblestone street.
VICTOR
Rich old ladies and their daughters?
HENRY
Can you think of a better reason?
VICTOR
Quite a few.
HENRY
Do me a favor then ...
(claps his shoulder)
... keep them to yourself.
Victor takes a shocked beat and bursts into laughter,
INT - AUTOPSY ROOM - DAY
Waldman, in sinock, addresses a GROUP OF STUDENTS from
across morgue slab. He throws a sheet back to reveal a
corpse dissected to reveal the inner workings. The others
crowd for a closer look. Victor glances to Henry, who leans
back and rolls his eyes in utter disgust.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - DAY
PUSHING SLOWLY IN on Victor sitting at a tall dormer window,
writing a letter with quill and ink. It's raining outside.
The garret is tidied.
EXT - RYE FIELDS - FRANKENSTEIN ESTATE - LATE DAY
WORKERS are harvesting for miles around. PAN to Elizabeth
and Claude examining the sheaves on a wagon. She cracks the
grain and tastes it, glances to Claude. He smiles and nods.
CLAUDE
It's turning out to be a good year.
ELIZABETH
Let's return a tenth of the crop to the tenants.
(off his look)
They had a hard winter.
(CONTINUED)
28
CLAUDE
Not even your father would be that generous.
ELIZABETH
Then there's no need to tell him, is there?
Claude grins and motions to his MEN. They resume loading the
sheaves as a STABLEBOY rides up:
STABLEBOY
Miss! The mail arrived! There's one from Master
Victor!
INT - FRANKENSTEIN PARLOR - NIGHT
We find the family gathered around the fire as Elizabeth
reads Victor's letter aloud:
ELIZABETH
... and not a day goes by that I do not cherish
your faces in my mind's eye or ache to see you all
again. Be assured that I am with you in spirit,
and you are never far from my thoughts. I remain,
as always, your loving and devoted Victor. P.S.
She pauses, reading ahead.
INSERT OF LETTER
The P.S. reads: "Elizabeth ... I am holding our vow precious
in my heart."
ELIZABETH
glances up at their expectant faces.
WILLIE
What does it say?
ELIZABETH
It says, give Willie an extra big hug for me.
WILLIAM
(beaming)
Read it again?
She smiles, rearranges the pages as we
FADE TO:
29
INT - UNIVERSITY HALLWAY - DAY
A classroom door. SHOUTING from within:
VICTOR (O.S.)
That's no excuse for being a pompous ass!
Victor storms out with Krempe at his heels. Krempe pauses in
the doorway, red-faced, bellowing after him:
KREMPE
I'll see you thrown out of this university! I'll
go to the dean himself! Take me at my word,
Frankenstein! The dean himself!
Classroom doors are opening, faces peering out. Waldman
among them. Victor keeps going, doesn't look back.
INT - GASTHOF - NIGHT
Victor and Henry slouched at their regular table writes in
his thick, well-worn leather journal.
HENRY
The entire school heard it. It wasn't something
one could miss.
VICTOR
You're a comfort to me, Henry.
HENRY
What now? Writing about it in your journal won't
help.
VICTOR
(quietly)
It's a letter to my father.
Henry falls silent. Victor closes the journal, winds it
secure with its leather thong, jams it deep in the outer
pocket of his greatcoat. Brooding. The bell above the door
JINGLES. A gust of wind sweeps in. They glance up. Professor
Waldman enters, dapper and soft- spoken, impeccably
courteous. He murmurs a pleasantry to the INNKEEPER and
drifts over to Victor's table.
VICTOR
Professor Waldman.
WALDMAN
(takes a seat)
Victor, explain yourself.
(CONTINUED)
30
VICTOR
Krempe has a way of provoking my temper.
WALDMAN
You have a way of provoking his.
(beat)
I've been watching you. You seem impatient with
your studies.
VICTOR
To say the least. I came here to expand my mind,
but honest inquiry seems strangled at every turn.
All we do is cling to the old knowledge instead of
seeking the new.
WALDMAN
You disdain accepted wisdom?
VICTOR
No, I embrace it ... as something to be used or
discarded as we advance the boundaries of what is
known.
HENRY
(mutters to Waldman)
Now you've got him started.
VICTOR
These are exciting times, Henry. We're entering
an era of amazing breakthroughs. Look at Edward
Jenner. He wasn't content to bleed people with
leeches, he pioneered a new frontier of thought
HENRY
... yes, and thanks to him, smallpox has been
virtually eliminated. I've heard this speech
before.
VICTOR
But you haven't listened, Never in history has so
much seemed possible. We're on the verge of
answers undreamt of ... but only if we have the
courage to ask the questions,
WALDMAN
I understand your frustration. I was young once
myself.
(beat)
Walk me home. Something I'd like to show you.
(CONTINUED)
31
INT - WALDMAN'S HOME - WORKSHOP - NIGHT
The gaslights come up with a SOFT HISS. The first thing
Victor and Henry notice is an artist's nook situated
adjacent to big windows where the light would be best during
the day. Easels are lined with in-progress work on a variety
of subjects, everything from landscapes to anatomical
studies, all quite excellent.
The rest of the place is a laboratory crammed floor-to-
rafter with arcane equipment. Taking off his coat and
rolling up his sleeves, Waldman leads Victor and Henry down
rows of tables crammed with experiments and clutter.
WALDMAN
You know for thousands of years the Chinese have
based their medical science on the belief that the
human body is a chemical engine run by
electricity? They say we all contain streams of
energy which flow through us like currents in the
ocean, or rivers in the earth.
They arrive at a table. Waldman roots through a tray of
knickknacks, holds up an acupuncture needle.
WALDMAN
Their doctors treat patients by inserting needles
like these into the flesh at various key points to
manipulate these electric streams.
He directs their attention to an ancient Chinese silk on the
wall. It depicts the human body from front and side angles.
Acupuncture points are clearly marked.
VICTOR
Preposterous.
WALDMAN
I once saw it done, as a boy in Canton. My
parents were missionaries. The cure was nothing
short of miraculous.
(off their looks)
I've never forgotten it. Been fascinated ever
since.
HENRY
It smacks of magic.
Waldman slides forth a steel pan and uncovers it to reveal
an enormous dead toad in dissection. Copper mounting pins
trail wires to a small panel of switches. The switches, in
turn, are connected to a series of galvanic batteries.
(CONTINUED)
32
Waldman starts throwing switches. Victor and Henry jump as
the toad convulses with motion. They watch, stunned, as
Waldman puts the toad through its paces: legs kick, feet
flex, mouth opens and closes, lungs breathe.
WALDMAN
Magic. seems alive, doesn't it?
Waldman shuts the thing down, strips off his gloves, his arm
at the array of wires and batteries.
WALDMAN
Electricity.
VICTOR
It's utterly fantastic! This is the sort of thing
I'm talking about! We should be learning this!
WALDMAN
Why? God alone knows what it means. Until it has
proven value, it's nothing more than a ghoulish
parlor trick. Hardly fit for the classroom.
VICTOR
But the possibilities Combining ancient knowledge
with new? Something like this could change our
fundamental views!
WALDMAN
It is a thrilling direction to explore. Thrilling
and dangerous.
(off his look)
Nature can be wonderful and terrible. Science is
not a realm for the reckless; it needs a
conscience. we must proceed cautiously. Assess as
we go.
(drapes the toad)
What I do on my own time is my own business. The
same holds true for you. You wish to expand your
mind? Fine, do so. You can even join me here, if
you like. But not at the expense of your normal
studies.
VICTOR
I doubt that decision is still mine to make.
WALDMAN
(waves)
Nonsense. Tonight you will draft an apology to
Professor Krempe...
(CONTINUED)
33
Victor starts to object, but Waldman overrides him with a
stern gesture for silence. Listen.
WALDMAN
"...a sincere and heartfelt apology which you will
then read aloud to him before the assembled
student body and faculty.
VICTOR
Why?
WALDMAN
(draws close)
our profession needs talent like yours. Destroy
your career over an issue of pride? what a waste.
Waldman hands him the acupuncture needle. A gift. Victor
studies it, fascinated.
WALDMAN
Go home, Victor. Write the letter,
INT - LECTURE HALL - DAY
DOLLYING VICTOR IN A SWW 360: He stands before the students
and faculty, reading his apology.
VICTOR
... and I further wish to extend my sincerest
regrets to Professor Krempe for my display. My
behavior toward him was both rash and inexcusable
Up in the gallery, Krempe nods grudgingly to himself.
INT - FRANKENSTEIN MANSION - DUSK
Exquisite silverware goes CLINKING SOFTLY onto polished wood
as:
ELIZABETH (O.S.)
(laughing)
I knew held get himself in trouble.
TILT UP to reveal the expansive dinner table being set for
guests. KITCHEN STAFF are to-ing and fro-ing. Elizabeth
splits her attention between supervising and reading
Victor's letter, while Justine busies herself with a flower
arrangement. Willie gets underfoot. Father just sits.
JUSTINE
Must've been a terrible row.
(CONTINUED)
34
ELIZABETH
He was almost expelled for calling one of his
professors a "pompous ...
(glances to Willie)
... fellow.,,
FATHER
He always was opinionated.
ELIZABETH
(reads on, laughs)
He set things right with a proper apology ... and
now they've put him in charge of dissection lab!
WILLIE
What's that?
FATHER
That's where they cut things open and peer about
inside.
WILLIE
Things? What sort of things?
Father is about to press on with the gory details, but
Elizabeth freezes him with a glance.
ELIZABETH
It's far too ghoulish for your young ears.
The old man throws Willie a look. We'll talk later.
ELIZABETH
The point is, your brother is a brilliant student
well on his way to becoming the finest-and most
compassionate doctor ever ...
INT - WALDMM'S WORKSHOP - NIGHT
A DISSECTED DOG convulses through its electronically-
induced paces. Kicking. Twitching. Tasting the air with its
dead tongue. TILT UP to reveal Victor at the switch.
Waldman leans close to observe. Softly:
WALDMAN
Re-configure the leads?
VICTOR
Numbers four and twelve directly into the nervous
system?
Waldman nods.
WALDMAN
Worth a try.
(CONTINUED)
35
INT -.AUTOPSY ROOM - DAY
With Waldman at his side and Henry providing the tools as
needed, Victor instructs a freshman class in the internal
workings of a dissected corpse. Professor Krempe observes
from a distance.
VICTOR
... and the medulla oblongata is the transition
between the spinal cord and the two parts I've
already named ... cerebrum and cerebellum. Any
freshmen feeling queasy yet?
(glances around, smiles)
All of you, from the look of it. We'll resume
your torture tomorrow.
He waves them dismissed. They laugh and exit, relieved.
Waldman squeezes Victor's elbow. Well done. Victor stiffens
at Krempe's approach.
KREMPE
You seem to be adapting well to the approved
curriculum.
VICTOR
Despite the lack of challenge.
Krempe reddens, but says nothing. He gives Waldman a curt
nod and walks off.
WALDMAN
Victor. He was trying to be gracious.
VICTOR
The strain was evident
HENRY
Come now, you must take some satisfaction. You've
risen to the top of your class. A position of
prominence and regard.
Victor weighs this, glances at both of them, smiles.
VICTOR
What keeps me going are my friends.
He throws his arm around Henry's neck, pulls him into an
affectionate headlock. Henry struggles and laughs:
HENRY
Leave off!
(CONTINUED)
36
JEWELER'S SHOP - DAY
Victor is gazing with reverence at a gorgeous oval locket
dangled before him by a smiling JEWELER. He glances to Henry
for an opinion.
HENRY
Your Elizabeth must be quite a treasure, Victor
(pointedly to jeweler)
... to justify these prices.
The jeweler's smile goes frosty.
WALDMAN'S WORKSHOP - DAY
TIGHT ANGLE ON the locket lying open against canvas,
dangling from an easel frame. TILT DOWN to reveal a
magnificent miniature oil portrait of Victor in progress, no
more than three inches high within its penciled oval.
Waldman paints with an extraordinarily delicate touch,
jeweler's glasses riding low on his nose, eyes unnaturally
large behind the magnifying lenses. Victor sits patiently
for the portrait, suffused with daylight.
Henry leans in over Waldman's shoulder, studying the
portrait. Waldman stiffens a bit, aware of his presence. He
clearly hates people looking over his shoulder.
HENRY
(deadpan)
Shouldn't the nose be above the mouth?
Waldman heaves a long-suffering sigh. He abruptly jabs his
brush at Henry's nose, daubing it with paint. Dignity upheld
he resumes his careful work as Victor laughs.
INT - WALDMAN'S HOUSE - DINING ROOM - NIGHT
Victor, Waldman, and Henry are gathered around the remains
of a meal, laughing uproariously, enjoying one another's
company. Cigars are lit, wine is flowing. Conversation is
fast and loose, intense and passionate:
WALDMAN
I'm quite serious. Look at all the charity and
clinic work we do. Up until thirty years ago, the
concept of vaccine was unheard of.
HENRY
You're saying all disease will eventually be
eradicated?
(CONTINUED)
37
WALDMAN
I'm convinced. Not by treating symptoms, but by
diving nature's most jealously-guarded secrets.
HENRY
(turning serious)
Do you foresee this happening in our lifetimes?
WALDMAN
No. But someday.
HENRY
Thank goodness. We'd be out of work
A HOWL OF OUTRAGE AND LAUGHTER. Victor flings his napkin in
Henry's face.
VICTOR
Only you would think of that!
HENRY
(laughing)
Somebody has to!
Victor raises his wine glass. The others join. A toast.
VICTOR
I tell you what we need, my friends. Forget the
symptoms and diseases. What we need is a vaccine
for death itself.
WALDMAN
(laughter)
Oh, now you have gone too far, There's only one
God, Victor.
HENRY
(raises his glass)
And here's to Him. Everything in moderation,
Frankenstein.
VICTOR
(grins)
Nothing in moderation, Clerval.
INT - POOR HOUSE - DAY
CAMERA, TRACKS the gritty reality of a big-city poor house,
crammed with society's dregs: the poor, the uneducated,
wailing babies, stampeding children. Absolutely jangling
with noise and confusion ... loud and stifling ... people
getting eye-ear-nose-throat exams ... being vaccinated ...
(CONTINUED)
38
The "doctors" in attendance are all Ingolstadt STUDENTS
performing community service, none of whom look like they're
enjoying it. Schiller looks particularly harried
We find Victor and Henry giving out vaccinations. They keep
glancing over their shoulders at Waldman as he gets further
embroiled in a no-win argument with a wiry, ferret-faced MAN
terrified about getting his vaccination:
MAN
Yer not stickin' it in me! Got pox in it, I hear
tell!
FAT WOMAN
Pox? They givin' us pox?
Ripples of panic spread. Waldman is as tense and clipped as
we've ever seen him, valiantly trying to control his temper
amidst the surrounding cacophony and ad-lib dialogue:
WALDMAN
No, it's not pox, it's a vaccine ...
FAT WOMAN
Vaca-what?
WALDMAN
... vaccine, from the Latin vacca, meaning cow
(glances at her girth)
... or vaccinia, meaning cowpox ...
MAN
I told you there was pox in it I
WALDMAN
... no, no, cowpox in a minute quantity,
perfectly harmless, gives you a natural immunity
to small ox, which is the point of this whole
bloody exercise ...
Victor and Henry are pausing work. Concerned. Drifting
closer. The ferret-faced man is cornered.
MAN
You doctors kill people! I don' care what you
say, you ain't stickin' it in me!
WALDMAN
I most assuredly am! It prevents disease and it's
the law! Why am I explaining myself? Somebody
restrain this damn fool!
(CONTINUED)
39
It happens this fast: There's an innocuous blur of motion as
the man seems to tap Waldman lightly in the stomach, then he
darts away, slamming past Victor and Henry. Victor looks
after him running away, hears something clatter to the
floor. He glances down. A thin knife. Victor looks to
Waldman. Puzzled. It still hasn't really dawned.
Waldman turns to them, face drained of color, hand pressed
to his sternum, lips tight. He looks more annoyed than
anything else. He exhales slowly.
HENRY
Professor?
WALDMAN
(softly)
Oh God
That's when the blood starts pumping through his fingers.
They catch him as he collapses, cradling him as he sprawls
to the floor. People are pushing and crowding to see.
EXT - POOR HOUSE - DAY
A cobblestoned street-scene. carriage. A delivery wagon.
Vendors. Pedestrians.
The doors of the poor house burst open, releasing a frenzy
into the street: Victor and Henry carrying Waldman by his
arms and legs, all the students running alongside, some of
them weeping with panic, the crowd at their heels still
trying to catch a glimpse, pedestrians scattering, the
students dwindling up the long winding street, bearing their
professor toward the school, shouting for help...
INT - UNIVERSITY CHAPEL - DAY
Krempe delivers the eulogy before the open casket. The
chapel is full. Victor is seated near the back. Dazed. Henry
comes up the aisle and slides in next to him. Victor doesn't
even glance over. Henry whispers:
HENRY
They just caught the man who did it.
VICTOR
He was a frightened soul who acted out of fear
and ignorance.
HENRY
They'll hang him all the same.
VICTOR
Good. I'll be there to hear his worthless neck
snap.
(CONTINUED)
40
People glance back. Henry lays his hand on Victor's elbow.
HENRY
Keep your voice down. You don't know what you're
saying.
VICTOR
It was wrong, Henry! It shouldn't have happened!
The bastard deserves to die.
Victor is causing ripples of attention throughout the
chapel. Even Krempe falters briefly in his eulogy. Henry
pulls Victor from the pew, drags him up the aisle ...
INT - CONFESSION BOOTH - DAY
... and into the confessional where they launch at each
other in harsh whispers.
Dialogue here is overlapping and intense:
HENRY
You're making a scene!
VICTOR
Why Waldman? He of all people should have cheated
death!
HENRY
You can't. Death is God's will!
VICTOR
I resent God's monopoly
HENRY
That's blasphemy!
VICTOR
Blasphemy be damned! Waldman spent his life
trying to help people!
HENRY
All the more reason for us to continue his work
with the poor!
VICTOR
(beat, low)
No. He had more important work.
HENRY
There are sick people who need our help. Here and
now. Not in some future time. Consider that.
(CONTINUED)
41
Henry exits. Victor tries to compose himself, clasping his
hands together as if in prayer ... or quiet rage. He gazes
up. There on the wall hangs a crucifix.
VICTOR
Life and death.
(beat)
Why should You alone have the final say?
VICTOR"S POV PUSHING SLOWLY IN on the Christ figure before
him, bleeding from a crown of thorns, arms thrown wide.
DISSOLVE TO:
DA VINCI'S STUDY OF MAM rises from the image of Christ,
striking an eerily similar pose, arms thrown wide within the
perfect circle. We hear a DOOR BEING UNLOCKED as ...
INT - WALDMAN"S WORKSHOP - DAY
... a WIDER ANGLE reveals the deserted workshop. the door
swings open as MARIE lets himself in. He sees the finished
locket lying open on a table, picks it up, studies the
beautiful miniature portrait it contains. Snaps it shut.
He looks up, eyes falling upon the Da Vinci print hanging on
the wall. He stares. Intense.
INT - WALDMAN'S WORKSHOP - NIGHT
TRACKING SHOT: Things are in the process of being sorted and
boxed. We find Victor poring over Waldman's notes:
VICTOR
To understand the causes of life, we must first
have recourse to death ... and examine the process
in minutest detail ...
EXT - TOWN SQUARE - DAY
A gray day. Waldman's ferret-faced MURDERER stands weeping
helplessly on the scaffold as sentence is read:
MAGISTRATE
... his body to be left on public display for a
twenty-four hour period, thereafter to be
consigned to an unmarked pauper's grave. So the
court has spoken.
(CONTINUED)
42
The EXECUTIONER draws the hood over the murderer's head,
cinches the noose tight. The condemned man is blubbering,
pleading for his life.
Victor stands in the crowd. 'Watching. Waiting. we hear the
THUMP of the body dropping, the CRADK of a snapping neck..
EXT - TOWN SQUARE - NIGHT
Dark as Hades. Pissing down rain. A FLASH OF LIGHTNING and a
CRASH OF THUNDER. The dead man still hangs from the
scaffold, lashed by the wind.
Victor looms from the storm, hands jammed in the pocket of
his greatcoat. He pulls out a thin, glittering blade. The
very weapon which took Waldman's life. He gazes up at the
dead man ... at the rope from which he dangles ...
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
The dead murderer lies pale and naked on a slab. Victor
leans close, still dripping, studying the face closely. A
FLASH OF LIGHTNING throws wild Littering shadows through the
dormer windows and skylights. Softly:
VICTOR
No longer pathetic and useless
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - DAY
The dead man, dissected and wired, jerks bolt upright,
flopping and convulsing, eyes opening and closing, mouth
gaping open and shut. He falls back limply as Victor shuts
the power off, making careful notations in his journal.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - DAY
TRACKING the dissection table ... up the length of the
murderer's body ... now in an advanced stage of decay ... we
hear the SOFT BUZZING of flies ...
We find Victor standing over the corpse. Gaunt and hollow-
eyed. Exhausted and obsessed. Wearing a butcher's apron.
Staring down at one of the dead man's forearms. Maggots are
swarming in the flesh. He abruptly raises a cleaver and
WHACKS it off at the elbow.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
TRACKING SLOWLY past the forearm lying in a steel pan, we
find Victor performing an intense chemical analysis. Dead
tissues are breaking apart in solvents, distilled over a
slow-burning flame. Victor smears a glass slide, places it
under a microscope.
(CONTINUED)
43
INT - GASTHOF - DAY
Victor is hunched over his notebook, pale and unhealthy,
scribbling notations next to a rendering of the human form.
Henry is across from him:
HENRY
Victor. This has got to stop.
(Victor glances up)
Nobody's seen you in months. You haven't attended a single
class.
VICTOR
I've been preoccupied.
HENRY
We all know how hard you took Waldman's death.
Even Krempe is sympathetic. But it is time to move
on. It is time to concern yourself with life.
VICTOR
That is my concern.
(faint smile)
I'm involved in something just now. I want to
finish it in Waldman's memory.
HENRY
How much longer?
VICTOR
Few months perhaps. I'm gathering the raw
materials even now.
EXT - GRAVEYARD - NIGHT
The wrought-iron doors of a crypt have been forced open.
CAMERA PUSHES through to find Victor standing inside over a
stone sarcophagus with a pry bar in his hands. He's nervous,
working up his courage:
VICTOR
Materials. That's all they are Tissue to be re-
used.
He pries off the stone lid. It THUMPS heavily to the floor,
cracking in half. He opens the casket, reaches in, raises
the pale arm of the deceased to inspect it.
EXT - GRAVEYARD - NIGHT
Stone monuments. Bare trees. Ivy-covered ground. Victor
shoulder-deep in a grave. Shoveling. A lamp burns low.
(CONTINUED)
44
COFFIN - NIGHT
Pitch black. The lid swings open, cascading dust and soil.
Victor peers down, holding the kerosene lamp high.
VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
TRACKING ALONG the shelves, crammed now with formaldehyde
jars of feet and hands, brains and kidneys, the occasional
head staring through the glass, dead cats ...
... and we find Victor working into the wee hours. Hunched
over his specimens. Candle flame flickering low. Referring
back to Waldman's notes. Making notations in arcane books
such as "De Occulta Philosophia," by Agrippa, and "Le
Sciences et les arts D'alchimiste," by Paracelsus.
FRANKENSTEIN ESTATE - LATE DAY
A magnificent backdrop of mountains against a cloudless blue
sky. TILT DOWN to Elizabeth and Justine with the mansion
distant. A steady breeze ripples the fields as Elizabeth
regards a stack of mail.
ELIZABETH
Nothing. Still nothing.
JUSTINE
It's been months. It's not like him.
ELIZABETH
Something's wrong. I know it.
(off her look)
I've heard rumors of cholera spreading south from
Hamburg.
JUSTINE
So have I
ELIZABETH
I should go. I should leave today.
JUSTINE
Elizabeth. If it's true, travel into Germany
would be banned. You'd never get near Ingolstadt.
(beat)
Besides, they're only rumors.
ELIZABETH
(beat, nods)
And not a word of them to Father. He's agitated
enough not hearing from Victor.
(CONTINUED)
45
JUSTINE
Read him one of the old letters and rephrase it.
We'll say it came today. It'll set his mind at
ease.
Elizabeth gives her a hug. They walk toward the mansion
INT - BLACKSMITH SHOP - DAY
Murky and dark. Bellows are pumping. Showers of sparks
cascade. The BLACKSMITH and his ASSISTANT are pounding a
metallic sledgehammer litany, beating a huge copper sheet
into shape. Victor enters. The blacksmith directs his
attention to a finished copper piece leaning against the
wall. Victor runs his hand over the surface. Nice.
INT - MATERNITY WARD - CHARITY HOSPITAL - NIGHT
A WOMAN lies on a table, screaming as she goes into labor.
Her water breaks, cascading into a steel bucket. one of the
ASSISTANTS snatches it up, scurries around the corner.
Victor is waiting in the shadows. Money changes hands.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor is examining the amniotic fluid. Boiling it off.
Working to synthesize it.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor pours the final drum of fluid into what appears to be
a large copper vat. He dips his hand in, examines the
consistency and smell. ANGLE WIDENS, spinning slowly up to
reveal that the vat is human in shape. A sarcophagus.
EXT - ALLEY - NIGHT
We find Victor examining three corpses on the back of a
wagon, checking nostrils and teeth with gloved hands. A PAIR
OF MEN lurk in the shadows, waiting.
VICTOR
That one
The corpse is lifted off. Money changes hands.
MAN
With this cholera come to town, we'll have plenty
more for you.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor wearing elbow-length gloves, hacking furiously away
with a bone saw. Tossing aside the scraps.
(CONTINUED)
46
VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor has an arm wired, testing reactions. He scrapes off a
small shred of tissue, drops it in solution, watches it
break apart. it doesn't look good. He glances feverishly at
the clock, makes a fast decision, scribbles in his journal:
VICTOR
Not optimal. Must use. No time to replace. Body
can't wait.
VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor stitches a torso with one of those big, awful curved
needles, yanking up hard to draw the catgut tight.
ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)
I stitched it together with my own hands ...
VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor pulls on a chain, hoisting the body off the slab via
block-and-tackle mounted on a ceiling track. The body rises
limply into the air, spinning slowly, arms and legs
dangling, long black hair covering its face.
ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)
a patchwork man of my own devising.
Victor reaches up with one hand to stop the body spinning.
He pushes it down the length of the lab, rolling it along
its ceiling track like a side of beef in a meat locker.
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
The Creature lies on an improvised bier of crates,
surrounded by shadows and clutter, draped/sprawled like
Christ taken from the cross in Michelangelo's "Pieta."
Beakers bubbling and dripping. Intravenous lines seeping and
secreting. A misty chemical haze in the air. Victor is
watching his patchwork man. Glowering. Waiting.
ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)
It took nutrients like a child receiving milk ...
blushed like a young girl with the blood I forced
through its veins ...
A FLASH OF LIGHTNING rips through the skylights, bathing the
scene purple/white. Eerier and eerier.
ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)
... all in preparation.
(CONTINUED)
47
VICTOR'S GARRET - DAY
We find Victor passed out in a chair. His creation is still
taking fluids. Gray daylight streams through the windows.
There's commotion in the street outside: shouting, horses'
hooves clattering on cobblestone, an occasional scream or
wail. Victor doesn't stir. Dead to the world. Somebody
starts POUNDING on the door. Victor rouses, takes a moment
to remember where he is. He lurches from his chair, grabs a
canvas tarp, throws it over his "patchwork man."
STAIRWELL - DAY
Henry is pounding. Finally the latch is drawn. The door
swings open a crack. Victor peers out. Gaunt and furtive.
Suspicious. Henry is stunned at his dissipated appearance.
HENRY
God's sake, what is that stench?
Henry peers past him.
Victor shifts, blocking his view
VICTOR
This is a bad time, Henry. I'm busy just now.
What do you want?
HENRY
Things have gone worse with this cholera
outbreak. Thousand new cases a day now. Classes
have been suspended. University's shut down.
VICTOR
Yes? And?
HENRY
Listen to what I'm saying. The militia's arriving
to quarantine the city. Most of us are getting out
while we still can.
VICTOR
You'll be leaving then.
(beat)
Just as well. You never were cut out for this,
Henry. Goodbye.
And the door slams shut. The bolt is thrown. Henry pounds.
HENRY
VICTOR! OPEN THE DOOR! LISTEN TO REASON!
(CONTINUED)
48
Nothing. Stunned and hurt' Henry turns from the door and
heads back down the stairs.
EXT - VICTOR'S BUILDING - STREET - DAY
Henry exits into a nightmare. REFUGEES are streaming from
the city, horses and wagons, people on foot, carrying their
possessions. Henry steps into the street and is nearly run
down by a carriage.
VOICE (O.S.)
OUT OF THE WAY!
Henry glances up to see Schiller at the reins, struggling to
control the animals as the carriage eases past.
HENRY
Schiller? You're leaving? Where's all that high
talk about treating the sick?
SCHILLER
(icy)
To hell with them. And you.
He snaps the reins, not caring who he runs down. The
carriage lurches away, scattering refugees before it.
Henry keeps walking. Jostled by the hostile crowd. Looking
around. Dazed. Dead bodies are stacked along the street like
cordwood, waiting for the death carts. ANGLE WIDENS as Henry
stumbles along through utter despair and devastation,
stunned at the human suffering around him as we
FADE TO:
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Victor glances at the clock. Scribbles in his journal:
VICTOR
Time running out. Rate of decay accelerating.
Must strike now ... or start again from scratch.
He gazes down at his creation, lying once again on the slab
before him ... but now the Creature lies on a full body-
length steel grate. Steel chains with hooks dangle from the
ceiling above ... along with long coils of thick copper wire
tipped with glittering needles big enough to knit with.
Victor glances up at the Da Vinci. The Study of Man has been
daubed with red paint at key acupuncture points. Victor dips
a huge cotton swab in a bowl of iodine, starts dabbing
identical marks on the body before him ...
(CONTINUED)
49
Now he's ramming the huge wire-fed needles deep into these
spots, brutally working them around in the flesh to get good
contact. The forearms, the neck, the rib cage ...
Now he's attaching the steel chain-hooks to the four corners
of the steel grate ...
Now he's pulling on a rope, straining to hoist the whole rig
into the air. It lifts slowly from frame: body, needles,
wires and all ...
HIGH WIDE ANGLE
... and we get our first spectacular look at Frankenstein's
gloriously low-tech and stupendously arcane 2LicU the
Creature dangles below us from the ceiling-hoist, lying
full-length and horizontal on its steel grate, spinning
slowly, thick copper wires trailing from its arms and legs,
rib cage and neck, armpits and groin. The copper cables
trail upward, coil along the ceiling like garden hose to
provide necessary slack, meander down the wall to culminate
in a splendiferous array of galvanic batteries, steam
engines and generators.
Frankenstein reaches slowly up, fingertips straining toward
the ceiling as if worshipping the creation revolving
endlessly above his head in a perfectly-described circle not
at all unlike the Da Vinci ...
.And he grabs the lever on the platform and pulls to start
it spinning, with a mighty heave, he sets the whole thing
gliding in motion, CAMERA TRACKING FASTER AND FASTER as he
rolls it along the ceiling track through the lab, passing
table after table of desiccated leftovers and discarded
scraps, LIGHTNING BLAZING through the windows to mark his
way with wild and sinister shadows ...
... and he yanks the platform to a stop over the copper
sarcophagus. Amniotic fluid steaming and murky within. He
positions the platform, unties the rope, lowers the Creature
down and down, lower and lower, sinking into the vat, the
steel grate a perfect fit in size and shape.
Faster now, moving furiously. Reaching into the murk,
unhooking the chains. Arraying the copper wire through air-
tight guide holes. Spinning on his heels and reaching up,
grabbing hold of the upper shell of the sarcophagus also
suspended from the ceiling, stunningly heavy, gleaming with
reflections and secrets. CAMERA ROCKETS DOWN on Victor as he
swings the upper shell into position, lowers it into place
with a THUD-CLANK! Working the wing-nuts on the bolts,
spinning frantically, tightening them down, sealing the
sarcophagus air-tight. Faster now. Faster.
(CONTINUED)
50
The frenzy builds and the CAMERA GOES WILD, rocketing,
zooming, gliding, spinning the audience on its ear:
Frankenstein. Turning up the heat on the burners. Cooking
the copper from below. Double double, toil and trouble.
Frankenstein. Gazing through the thick glass portholes
checking on his creation drifting in the murk.
Frankenstein. Whipping up the galvanic batteries,
supercharging them with steam generators. Watching as they
send voltage humming and throbbing through the copper cables
along the ceiling beams. Building up a charge.
Frankenstein. Gazing at his gleaming handiwork. LIGHTNING
painting his features into a twisted mask. Hand on the
switch. Ready to rev it up and throw the throttle.
Over it goes. WHAM! Overdrive.
The body convulses violently in its copper womb as the first
jolt of electricity hits. THUNX-THUNK-THUNK! Blazing with
energy and arcane light, fingers of light throbbing through
the portholes, sparkling, glittering, seeking.
Frankenstein races to the sarcophagus. A long glass tube,
two feet in diameter and ribbed with steel, gets lowered on
a boom and rammed into a hole, collate spun tight, inner dam
wrenched out like a Polaroid plate.
He reaches up and grabs holds of a pull-chain, fingers going
knuckle-white on the wooden handle. one hard yank. A dump-
tank is released, murky water cascading down the glass tube.
And here's the final perversion, the ultimate icing on this
twisted cake: the copper sarcophagus is literally a womb,
with the giant glass tube serving as a massive gleaming
phallus down which come pouring dozens of electric eels,
wriggling and streaming like huge black sperm ...
EEL POV (IN THE TUBE)
... rocketing down the tube, slithering and squirming,
faster and faster, racing into the sarcophagus, seeking out
the creation in the murky womb-fluid, lashing at the hapless
gray flesh, zapping it again with high-intensity voltage.
the Creature convulsing, thrashing, jerking from side to
side, raising its head against the top, mouth gaping open
and shut, jaws snapping with electrical surges.
Frankenstein's face appears at the porthole, peering in,
watching his dark seed fertilize his unholy child.
VICTOR
(muffled through the glass)
Live, you bastard!
(CONTINUED)
51
A huge bony hand slaps against the porthole, fingers clawing
and spasming against the glass.
FRANKENSTEIN jerks his head back, stunned. The fingers are
scratching. He turns, runs to the electrical rig, shutting
the whole thing down. It cycles off, whining into silence
INSIDE THE SARCOPHAGUS
... and the body relaxes, shutting down with it, going limp
and lifeless in the murk, spasms trailing off.
FRANKENSTEIN stares at the sarcophagus. Realizing his
creation has stopped moving. Nothing now. He sags to his
knees, utterly devastated at the loss of his dream. Nothing.
It was all for nothing ...
INSIDE THE SARCOPHAGUS
... And The Creature opens its dim yellow eyes, Aware. Its
mouth goes wide, teeth bared in a silent scream as it tries
to breathe and finds nothing in its lungs but fluid.
FRANKENSTEIN is wrapped in his despair, face cradled in his
hands. A SOFT TAP. He glances over his fingers. Thinking he
imagined it. No. There's another tap. And another.
We see it in his eyes. Sheer joy and stunned exultation.
Triumph and wonder unbelievably sublime. A bare whisper:
VICTOR
It's alive. It's alive.
And then hell breaks loose: Massive convulsions wrack the
sarcophagus, damn near shaking it off its cradle. THUMP-
THUMP-THUMPI Pounding from within. Head ramming against the
inner lid. He races over, frantic, fingers fumbling on the
wing-nuts, spinning them loose, trying to free the drowning
man within. He unscrews the final bolt, reaches for the rope
to hoist the lid away ...
... and the lid launches itself across the room, propelled
from below with rocket-booster force. The massive copper
shell goes hurtling/spinning/cartwheeling across the lab,
demolishing an amazing array of equipment in its path, and
thunders massively off the wall in an explosion of masonry
and splintering coat rack. Victor's greatcoat goes flying.
(CONTINUED)
52
Silence. Frankenstein is frozen. Staring at the roiling
surface of the amniotic fluid as it settles. An eternity
passes in the space of a heartbeat.
The Creature erupts from the vat like a vision from Hell,
thrashing and gagging. murky fluid cascading in all
directions-, The Creature seizes Victor by the shirtfront,
trying to pull itself from the vat, slipping and sliding
like an epileptic in a bathtub full of oil, damn near
dragging Victor in, eels leaping and frothing and crackling
with electricity. Victor screaming, trying to pull away,
trying to break the Creature's grip ...
... and the whole thing tips over. Victor reels back,
falling as the vat SLAMS to the ground, cascading its murky
contents,, washing the Creature limply across the floor like
a body tossed from the ocean, eels flipping and flopping,
snapping electrical discharges into the air. Victor
scrambles back, slipping and sliding on the amniotic muck,
desperately jerking his legs away. He finds his traction and
scrambles to his feet.
The Creature is grasping and crawling toward him. Flopping
and jerking. Gripped by seizures and convulsions. Vomiting
murky liquid as his lungs heave grotesquely to dispel the
fluid. Swiping the air with palsied hands. Malfunctional.
VICTOR stands dripping fluid and goo, chest heaving, staring
down at the Creature, not quite able to believe he was
midwife to this ghastly birth. Softly:
VICTOR
What have I done?
The Creature lunges to its knees, grasping him, clutching
his clothes, pawing him.
VICTOR
LET GO OF-ME!
Victor can't break free. Panicking. He snatches a hammer
from a nearby table and brings it down on the Creature's
head. THUD! Again and again. Beating the thing down,
pounding it into submission. The Creature finally collapses,
sliding down Victor's legs, curling up like a fetus,
twitching and jerking in its own afterbirth.
Silence now.
A ghastly tableau: Victor stands in the middle of his ruined
lab with his creation moaning and twitching at his feet in a
dying heap. A FLASH OF LIGHTNING silently bathes the room,
jerking wild shadows across the walls.
(CONTINUED)
53
Victor steps over the Creature. Dazed. He drops the hammer.
It clatters to the floor. He stops to jot a final entry:
VICTOR
Massive birth defects. Result is malfunctional
and vile.
(beat)
Have chosen to abort.
He walks stiffly away, disappears into the bedroom ...
INT... BEDROOM - NIGHT......
... where He staggers to the canopied bed, beyond exhausted,
and collapses face-down into oblivion. Weeping.
FADE TO:
INT - VICTOR'S BEDROOM - NIGHT
The wee hours. Rain pattering desolately on the roof. Victor
sleeping. Wrestling with troubled dreams. Through a crack
in the bed curtains, we see the bedroom door slowly creak
open, throwing a twisted spill of light. A shadow appears.
Entering. Shambling and gliding across the floor. Silent and
furtive. Creeping toward the bed.
PUSHING SLOWLY IN on Victor. Moving into close-up. Sleeping.
Unaware. The shadow falls across his face
Beat. His eyes fly open. An intake of breath. Paralyzed.
Sensing the presence. Feeling the shadow. Working himself up
to something. Perhaps a scream. He can stand it no longer,
thrusts out his arm, jerks the curtain aside ...
... and the Creature is there, Looming like a specter of
death. Naked. Beseeching. Dull yellow eyes trying to
understand. 'The pilot''s wheal is now a crystalline
sculpture of ice. The forward mast lies across the deck like
a broken limb, extending out over the ice on a tangle of
rigging...' lurches from bed, sends a nightstand and vase
CRASHING to the floor. the Creature circles, seeking him,
threatening to cut off his path to the door.
VICTOR
Stay away!
He darts past the thing, careening out into the lab. The
Creature whips around, unsteady for a moment, then follows
him with surprising speed.
INT - LAB - NIGHT
Victor races through the lab with the Creature hobbling
behind, trying to catch up. Victor hurling lab equipment,
tipping shelves in its path, anything to slow it down.
(CONTINUED)
54
Victor rips the door open, lunges through, slams it in the
Creature's face. The Creature presses against the wood with
pathetic little moans, begging not to be left alone.
He sinks to the floor. Abandoned. Shivering with cold. Sees
Victor's greatcoat where it fell. Grabs it. Drags it over.
Shrouding himself.
EXT - STREET - NIGHT
Victor races into the downpour, soaked to the skin in
seconds, mind racing. He needs a plan. He presses on.
INT - SHOP - NIGHT
Victor appears at the window. TILT DOWN to reveal an array
of gleaming swords lying in their velvet display. Victor
hurls a brick through the glass. Snatches up a sword.
INT - VICTOR'S BUILDING - NIGHT
Victor careens in from the storm, drenched, racing up the
stairs, sword glittering in his grasp. He gets to the top of
the stairs ...
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
... only to discover the door torn off It's hinges. He
enters, stunned. The thing is gone.
EXT - STREET - NIGHT
Victor races back into the storm. Searching. Slogging grimly
on. Lashed by the wind and rain. Mocked by the lightning.
He'll never give up. Not until he finds the thing and takes
back the life he gave it. He dwindles from view, vanishing
into the gale as we
FADE TO:
EXT - ALLY - MORNING
Gray and drizzly. Heaps of wet garbage. Crawling rats.
There's a shifting, heaving motion. The vermin scatter as
the waking Creature peers at the world from beneath the
greatcoat like a frightened child peering from under a
blanket. Lost and confused.
He scrabbles through the garbage for something to eat. He
finds a rotted scrap, chews it anxiously. Ravenous.
TWO FERAL DOGS appear, grizzled denizens of the city's
gutters and back-alleys, peering with insolent eyes.
Watching him eat. Assessing his potential as a threat. The
Creature stares ingenuously back. Not knowing to be afraid.
(CONTINUED)
55
The lead dog curls his lips back with a guttural SNARL. The
Creature draws back sharply with a fearful MOAN. That's all
it takes. The dogs are on him, snarling and snapping, the
food torn from his hands. The dogs dart away, growling and
fighting over the scrap.
The Creature is left whimpering and shaken. He pushes to his
feet and hurries in the opposite direction, legs bare and
pale beneath the swirling greatcoat, clutching his collar
against the cold. He hears a distant CLANGING.
VOICE (O.S.)
Bring out your deeeaaad! Bring out your deeeaaad!
A death cart clatters slowly past the mouth of the alley,
DRIVER ringing his bell. It makes no sense to the Creature,
but it's a sign of human life. He presses on ...
EXT - TOWN SQUARE - DAY
... and emerges into the square as ANGLE WIDENS. There's a
fair amount of activity. People are still leaving the city,
though the earlier flood has thinned. Some citizens are
still trying to go about their normal lives. VENDORS are
calling out, selling foo
The Creature moves through the square, unnoticed, just
another figure mingling with the flow. People trudge along,
eyes downcast, miseries great, paying little attention.
The Creature pauses, sniffing the air. An aroma draws him to
a vendor's stand. Loaves of bread are laid out. He hunches
down to smell one, picks it up, bites off a chunk. Chewing.
It's good. A bigger bite. Snatching up more.
WOMAN (O.S.)
Here! What do you think you're doing?
The Creature glances up. The VENDOR'S WIFE is within arm's
reach, breath catching in her throat at the sight of him.
Mouth gaping. Too stunned to scream.
The Creature cradles the loaves to his chest, terrified
she's going to take them away. He remembers his recent
experience with the dogs and decides to try out the lesson
he learned: he curls his lips back and snarls.
He's rewarded with a PIERCING SHRIEK. The Creature jumps
back, startled. This wasn't the desired effect. The woman
SCREAMS like she'll never stop. He turns to run away ...
... and plows right into the stream of refuge S. He goes
sprawling, scraping his knees bloody, still clutching his
(CONTINUED)
56
loaves. Confusion all around. People converge angrily. A
ROUGH MAN grabs his hair, jerking him upright ...
ROUGH MAN
Stupid bastard!
... and the Creature staggers to his feet before them,
whimpering to protect his food, showing his face to all.
Screams and panic. The Creature whips around, seeing
horrified faces on all sides ...
He's the cholera! He's the one been spreadin' the plague!
... faces which turn into an angry mob, glaring sheer
hatred. Somebody hits him in the face with a heavy stick,
spinning him to the ground, loaves of bread scattering. they
surround him, hitting, flailing, throwing stones. He tries
to crawl, whimpering for them to stop.
VENDOR'S WIFE
BURN HIM! BURN HIM!
The Creature finds himself hoisted into the air, falling
back onto a sea of hands, kicking and screaming as the mob
sweeps him across the square like some pagan sacrifice. He
gets tossed onto the hard cobblestone in a thrashing heap,
scrambles to his knees as the crowd surrounds him. He's
wailing with terror now, long inhuman howls of fear. Men
start flinging lamp oil, spattering him, blinding him. A
torch is lit, swung toward him. Feel the heat.
The Creature lunges to his feet, panic and terror complete
bulldozing through the crowd to get away from the torch,
bowling people over, scattering them in all directions. He
breaks free, hobbling wildly across the square, greatcoat
billowing. The mob streams after him, thirsty for blood,
hurling rocks and sticks.
EXT - STREETS/ALLEYS - DAY
The Creature is weeping as he runs, bleeding from his many
cuts and bruises. He turns a corner, collapses against a
wall to catch his breath. He can hear them coming, shouting.
They'll be here any second.
He sees a death cart heaped with bodies. He hurls himself up
on the cart to conceal himself among the putrefying corpses.
The crowd streams past the mouth of the alley. The death
cart WORKERS appear, heaving another corpse onto the cart,
gaping fearfully at the confusion. They scramble into their
seats, snap the reins. The cart rattles off as we
DISSOLVE TO:
57
EXT - STREET - DAY
Elsewhere in Ingolstadt. Death carts and devastation. This
part of town was hit hard. Bodies are heaped in gutters,
stacked along the walls. People are huddled in doorways,
quaking with sickness and pestilence. CART WORKERS move
among them, faces shrouded with kerchiefs and burlap masks.
WORKER #1 moves down a row of the sick and dead, shaking
them to see which is which, his face hidden behind heavy
burlap. He pauses, seeing Victor unconscious against the
wall, pale and covered with filth, shaking with fever. The
worker's eyes widen. Stunned. He calls over his shoulder:
WORKER #1
over here!
WORKER #2 hurries over. Stares down. Eyes also widening.
WORKER #2
Oh my God.
Worker #1 rips his mask away. It's Henry. He leans down and
grabs Victor, trying to rouse him.
HENRY
Victor
Worker #2 also sweeps his mask aside. Professor Krempe
KREMPE
Don't dawdle, lad! The sick cart! Lift on three!
One, two, three!
They hoist Victor off the ground by his arms and legs and
carry him into the street. Victor rouses, feels himself
being carried. He sees a death cart looming ahead, stacked
with heaps of reeking dead. Staring. Waiting.
VICTOR
(delirious, struggling)
No ... no ... I'm not dead ... please ... Don't
put me on the cart! I'm not dead! I'm not dead!
I'M NOT DEAD!
ANGLE WIDENS UP as they carry him kicking and screaming past
the death cart and on across the square ...
WIPE TO:
EXT - MASS CEMETERY - DAY
A death cart rattles past, bearing its load. PAN WITH IT to
reveal a scene utterly Dante-esque. Here's where the dead
are brought to be burned en masse. Fires are burning. Smoke
(CONTINUED)
58
is drifting in thick clouds, obscuring the sky. Soot is
drifting like black snow. BODIES are dumped into a slit-
trench, rolling and tumbling in heaps. Barrels are kicked
over. Streams of oil come pouring down, splashing and
soaking.
One of the corpses moves, heaving the others aside, The
Creature gazes around, terrified once again at the smell of
oil. He knows what that means. He pushes free, clambering
over bodies, desperately trying to scramble from the trench,
loose soil crumbling under his fingertips ...
ON THE LIP OF THE TRENCH
... as WORKERS prepare to light the blaze. A MAN turns
toward the trench with a burning torch ... And then the
Creature erupts from the trench of dead bodies right before
big eyes, The man SCREAMS. The Creature SCREAMS even louder,
cowering back. The man hurls the torch. The Creature ducks
as it goes spinning over his head into the trench.
WA-BOOOM! A massive wall of flame punches sky-ward. The
Creature whirls, stunned at the searing heat, arms thrown up
in horror. He flees, scattering the workers as he goes,
running from this ghastly place of flames and death ...
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT - WOODS - DAY
The Creature comes blundering into view. On the move. He
knows not where. Just away, He arrives at a pond. Water.
He's thirsty. He scrambles to water's edge, starts lapping
it up with his hands. He pauses, noticing his broken
reflection. The water settles and his face comes clearly
into view. He throws his hands up and SHRIEKS, terrified at
his own reflection ...
... and then he realizes it's him down there. He stirs the
water with his fingertips to make sure. He reaches up,
touching his face, utterly horrified at the sight of it...
... and utterly heartbroken. He drops his face into his hand
and weeps helplessly. BARKING DOGS in the distance. He looks
up, thinking they're after him. A moan of grief. He pushes
to his feet.
TRACKING THE CREATURE faster and faster through the trees,
running from this world he's been born into. Gasping for
breath. Crashing through branches.
(CONTINUED)
59
The BARKING draws closer. He hurls himself into a thicket,
scrambling to hide himself, covering himself with dead
leaves. Panic. Exhaustion. Mortal terror.
He flinches as something comes CRASHING through the brush
nearby. The legs of a DOE come into view. Staggering.
Falling. Thrashing down into a cushion of dead leaves. Two
arrows protrude from her heaving side.
A tiny FAWN stumbles into view on ungainly legs, mouth open,
frothing with exhaustion and terror. waiting for his mother
to rise. Her thrashing grows weaker. Dying.
The Creature moans at the sight. The fawn turns, meets his
gaze. An extended beat. A rush of empathy. The Creature
reaches out. The fawn takes a few hesitant steps toward him.
The BARKING draws closer. HUNTERS shouting. The Creature's
fingertips make contact with the fawn ...
A pack of the biggest, nastiest Staffordshire terriers
you've ever seen throw themselves HOWLING AND SNARLING onto
the doe, savaging her like whirling dervishes, The Creature
lets out a SHRIEK, snatches up the fawn as he lunges to his
feet, crashes off through the foliage with the fawn cradled
to his chest. The dogs take off after him.
DOLLYING THE CREATURE
Running full-tilt, SHRIEKING in terror all the way. Trying
to save the fawn. Trying to save himself. The dogs are
snapping at his heels, trying to sever his hamstrings and
bring him down. He hears RUSHING WATER ahead, crashes
headlong through a thicket ...
EXT - RIVER - DAY
... and sails SCREAMING into empty SPACE, twisting and
spinning as He falls, plummeting head-first into the rapids.
the dogs are left behind. the Creature gets swept along,
gasping and choking, caroming off huge boulders, fawn still
clutched protectively to his chest.
Finally the water starts to settle. He manages to lash out
and secure a handhold. He pulls himself up, clambering over
the rocks and staggering onto firm soil. He collapses to his
knees, dripping water and heaving for breath.
He lowers the fawn away from his chest, joyous at their
escape ... only to realize the small animal is limp and
lifeless in his hands. He crushed it to death trying to save
it. He lays it down, moaning, trying to understand. ANGLE
WIDENS UP into the trees as we
DISSOLVE TO:
60
WOODS - DUSK
TILT DOWN to reveal a solitary figure in a greatcoat
trudging across the sodden countryside under a dismal,
darkening sky. Cold. Hungry. Wet. Tired.
The Creature pauses, hearing FAINT MUSIC drifting on the
breeze: the lovely flute-like sounds of a recorder. He slogs
to the crest of a ridge. There's a small house in the valley
below. A peasant dwelling. Smoke drifts from the chimney.
That's where the music comes from (a simple and plaintive
rendition of our movie's WALTZ/LOVE THEME).
The Creature proceeds down the ridge ... drawn by the music
and the promise of warmth.
HOUSE - DAY
The Creature approaches cautiously. Furtive. He eases to a
window, catches a glimpse inside, draws back. Listening. The
tune ends. We hear the pleasant murmur of VOICES. FOOTSTEPS
come clumping across the floor. The Creature reels back and
dives around the side of the house as the door unlatches and
swings open. FELIX exits, a poor man trying to scratch an
honest living from the soil. He heads in the same direction
as the Creature ...
ANOTHER ANGLE
... and walks around the corner of the house just as the
Creature scrambles from view behind the chicken coops. The
Creature watches through the wire and wood as Felix
approaches and stops, only his legs visible. Feed is
scattered through the wire. The chi
PIGSTY - DUSK
... and finds himself in the company of PIGS. the animals
GRUNT and SQUEAL in alarm.
FELIX (0. S.)
Yes, yes, I'm coming ...
The Creature scurries further back into the shadows as
Felix's feet stop just outside. A pail is upended. Slop
pours into the trough. Felix walks away. The pigs scurry to
eat. The Creature leans forward intently. Food?
He crawls to the trough and squeezes in among the pigs. They
jostle, but he jostles right back, wanting his fair
(CONTINUED)
61
share. He laps up the slop with his fingers, dribbling it
down his chin. Not much on taste, but it's edible.
He stops, hearing the recorder MUSIC again, turning toward
the sound. He follows it, crawling back into the darkest
recesses where the sty adjoins the wall of the house. He
places his eye to a chink between the logs ...
... and sees GRANDFATHER playing the instrument near a
fireplace of glowing embers. The Creature shifts for another
view, sees the family preparing the table for dinner. Felix
and his wife MARIE are helped by their children, MAGGIE AND
THOMAS, ages 6 and 8
MARIE
Bring Grandfather to the table.
The old man stops playing as the children scurry over. As
Maggie helps him to his feet, Thomas tosses another log on
the fire. It BLAZES UP. Fire and sparks. in the pigsty, the
Creature draws back with a fearful moan ...
... that nobody but GRANDFATHER hears, He pauses to gaze
blindly toward the wall, eyes milky with cataracts,
wondering what it might have been. Probably nothing. He lets
the children lead him toward the table. the meal is brought
from the stove and ladled out.
The Creature eases back to the chink in the wall, smelling
it from here. A string of drool spills from his mouth. It's
humble fare, not very appetizing, but it looks like a feast
compared to pig slop ...
DISSOLVE TO:
INT - VICTOR'S BEDROOM - NIGHT
Victor lies sleeping. Wrestling with troubled dreams. In an
eerie echo of before: the door creaks open in a spill of
light. A shadow enters, creeps to the bed, falls across his
face. Victor's eyes fly open. He tries to erupt from bed,
choking on a scream ... and Henry wrestles him back to the
pillow to feel his clammy forehead.
HENRY
Thank God your fever broke.
(offers him water)
Slowly, now. Just a sip.
(Victor sips, falls back)
I've been worried we might lose you. It's been
touch-and-go for a week.
VICTOR
A... week?
(CONTINUED)
62
HENRY
We feared cholera. Turned out to be pneumonia,
brought on by nervous exhaustion and some idiot
running around in a storm. -
VICTOR
Is that your diagnosis?
HENRY
Mine and Professor Krempel's.
(off his look)
We've been trading off nursing you in shifts. The
rest of the time we're out working with the
cholera victims. It's his turn for that just now.
VICTOR
You've been going round-the-clock?
HENRY
We catch a few hours sleep where we can. Usually
here at your bedside.
VICTOR
(deeply moved)
Everything in moderation, Clerval.
HENRY
Nothing in moderation, Frankenstein.
Victor takes Henry's hand. Squeezes it.
HENRY
It's the down-and-outs I pity most. Those who
can't fend for themselves. They'll be dead by the
thousands before this is done. They don't stand a
chance out there.
VICTOR
(thinking of his creation)
No. They don't.
HENRY
Victor. This place looked like a charnel house.
What went on here?
Victor pauses, too emotional to respond. Softly:
VICTOR
I want to go home.
Beat.
Henry accepts this, though he doesn't like it.
(CONTINUED)
63
HENRY
It'll be months before you're well enough.
Meantime, your family must be frantic not hearing
from you.
Henry grabs a stack of letters from the nightstand.
HENRY
I found these. Some of the postmarks go back nine
months.
(slaps them on the bed)
Why don't you open them? And when you've the
strength, have the decency to ease their minds
with a reply. Soon as the city ends quarantine,
I'll even mail it for you. Along with this.
(raises the locket)
It's a beautiful gift. Does her no good lying
here.
Henry leaves him alone to wrestle with his guilt. Victor is
swept with emotion and remorse. He closes his eyes. Softly:
VICTOR
It can't survive.
INT - PIGSTY - DAY
The Creature and the pigs are sleeping in a heap. He rouses,
scattering them, crawls to the slats of the sty. Felix is
returning wearily from the fields with a large basket on his
back. The Creature moves to his chink in the wall to see
Felix enter the house and dump the basket out for Marie. A
pathetic array of potatoes and turnips.
FELIX
Not much to look at. Even less to eat. I don't
how we're going to get through the winter with
this yield.
MARIE
We'll sell another pig at market.
FELIX
one less for us.
MARIE
We'll make do. We always have.
He sinks into a chair, weighed by worry. She moves to
comfort him, cradling his head to her breast. He returns her
embrace, drawing strength. A tender, gentle moment. The
Creature watches, puzzled and empathetic, deeply moved by
her sympathy. Felix gathers himself, wipes his eyes.
(CONTINUED)
64
FELIX
I'll see if I can scratch a few more out of the
ground.
He hoists the basket and exits. The Creature turns to watch
Felix trudging back toward the fields.
EXT - FIELD - DAY
Felix digs for potatoes, tilling as he goes. Back-breaking
work. Thomas provides what help he can. Some distance away,
Maggie and Grandfather are tending the cow. ANGLE SHIFTS to
reveal the Creature watching from the brambles ...
INT - PIGSTY - NIGHT
The Creature watches the family eat their dinner. Potatoes
and turnips. A glimmer of understanding in his eyes.
EXT - HOUSE - NIGHT
A long shadow looms toward the dwelling ... circling the
house...approaching the shed. Baskets and tools ...
EXT - FIELDS - NIGHT
We find the Creature working by the light of a refulgent
moon, hacking away at the soil, tilling the earth ...
INT - PIGSTY - DAWN
The Creature stirs, hearing movement within the house. He
scurries to the slats of the sty and peers out. All the
baskets from the tool shed are stacked to overflow before
the door.
The door opens. Felix steps out and trips on a basket,
sprawling to the ground in a torrent of potatoes and
turnips. He sits up, gazing in wonder.
INT - PIGSTY - NIGHT
A sliver of warm light spills through the chink in the wall.
The Creature looms into frame, busily munching a raw potato.
A pig comes snuffling at his elbow. He shoves him away. Go
find your own. Inside, the family is enjoying a much more
generous meal than the last one:
GRANDFATHER
I wish we could thank our benefactor.
FELIX
Nothing in this life comes free of cost. I'd like
to know who and why.
(CONTINUED)
65
MAGGIE
It's the Good Spirit of the forest.
FELIX
Who's been filling your head?
GRANDFATHER
It does no harm.
FELIX
(peers at him)
Oh, I see.
THOMAS
Is it, Papa? Is it the Good Spirit?
Felix and Marie exchange a look. He's not as amused as she
is, but lets it go. She smiles at the children.
MARIE
of course it is. Now finish your food before it
gets cold.
EXT - POND - DAY
Grandfather sits playing his recorder. The cow is grazing at
a distance. The Creature creeps into view, listening to the
music. Grandfather senses his presence. Turns.
GRANDFATHER
Who's there? Felix? Children?
No response. He turns back. Unsettled. Continues playing.
INT - PIGSTY - NIGHT
The Creature watches Marie instructing the children in their
letters. A half dozen words are written in chalk on a slate
board. Maggie is trying to puzzle one out:
MAGGIE
ff..reh..nn..nd. Friend? Friend.
MARIE
Good! And now the next
CREATURE
(mimicking the effort)
... freh ... nnn..nd. Freehhnnnd.
He's delighted to have uttered his first word.
EXT - WOODS - DAY
Felix is chopping lengths of wood, dulled by the task. The
(CONTINUED)
66
children are stacking the wood on a litter.
EXT - FIELD - DUSK
Felix and the children walk home. The litter of wood is
being dragged by their cow ...
EXT - HOUSE - DUSK
Felix stacks the last pile of wood under the eaves. Marie
meets him at the door, takes his hands.
MARIE
Your hands are bleeding again. Come in. I'll rub liniment.
They go inside. The door closes. CAMERA PUSHES to the
pigsty. Eyes peering out.
EXT - WOODS - NIGHT
The Creature walks along, munching a turnip, axe slung over
his shoulder, muttering:
CREATURE
.brread ... motherrr ... frriend ...
(stops, gazes up)
Treeeeee
EXT - HOUSE - MORNING
The walls around the house are stacked impossibly high with
cords of wood. Felix and Marie gaze out the door. Stunned.
FELIX
What is going on here?
INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT
Snow is drifting outside the tall dormer window. We find
Victor at his desk, reading a letter:
VICTOR
... but it's been so long since I've heard from
you. Remember the vow we took the night you left?
You must be honest with me if your feelings have
changed. Answer for the sake of our friendship,
and both our future happiness."
(pause)
She wrote that four months ago.
ANGLE SHIFTS to include Henry. He's been listening.
(CONTINUED)
67
HENRY
A woman like that is far too rare to be taken
lightly.
Victor ponders the letter. He lays it next to the locket,
pulls out a sheet of paper and quill, begins to write ...
INT - PIGSTY - NIGHT
The Creature observes another lesson. Six more words are
chalked on the board. Thomas is struggling with the first:
THOMAS
Ch...uur-ch. Church.
CREATURE
Ch...uuur ... ch.
MARIE
Good. And the next.
THOMAS
Fl ... oww.
CREATURE
Floww ...
And then, amazingly, the Creature finishes the word before
Thomas does:
CREATURE
... wwer. Flower.
THOMAS
.wer. Flower?
MARIE
V