The Horror of Frankenstein

Teenage prodigy Victor Frankenstein tells his father of his ambition to go to university in Vienna. The Baron objects, so Victor coldly sabotages his shooting rifle. The gun explodes in the Baron's face, killing him. Victor uses his inheritance to decamp to Vienna. Six years pass, and Victor leaves after getting the Dean's daughter pregnant; returning home with fellow student Wilhelm, he rescues his friend Elizabeth and her father, an eminent professor, from two highwaymen. He kills one, and covertly beheads him. Hidden away from housekeeper and 'bedwarmer' Alys, he and Wilhelm set about researches into the revival of dead tissue. The grisly career of the notorious Victor Frankenstein has begun. This bold experiment in horror comedy was directed by Jimmy Sangster in 1970, and is one of the most unusual of all the Hammer horrors. Ralph Bates stars as the young Victor Frankenstein and Dave Prowse (later to embody Darth Vader in Star Wars) plays his monster. (StudioCanal UK)