Directed by Terence Fisher / Screenplay by John Elder

Between 1958 and 1974, Hammer made a total of seven Frankenstein films, five of them directed by the company’s grand master, Terence Fisher (his other credits for Hammer include Dracula, The Mummy, The Phantom of the Opera, The Hound of the Baskervilles and The Devil Rides Out). Hammer’s Frankenstein cycle differs significantly from the Universal series of the 1930s and 1940s in that the recurring character and central focus is not the Monster, but Frankenstein himself, portrayed in all but one of the Hammer series by the incomparable Peter Cushing. Maintaining narrative continuity across the years, the Hammer films depict an increasingly obsessed Frankenstein breathing life into a succession of different creatures in his efforts to prove his theories right and his critics wrong. Among the most intriguing is the fourth film in the sequence: as its title suggests, Frankenstein Created Woman offers the twist of a glamorous female creation (a rare acting role for German-Austrian Playboy model Susan Denberg), in a story based on the notion that Frankenstein has discovered how to transfer the soul of a recently deceased person into the body of another - with the unfortunate side-effect that the character of the dead ‘donor’ begins to assert itself in its new body. The idea is hardly original (a similar plot drives Universal’s 1940 Karloff/Lugosi thriller Black Friday), but Terence Fisher and the always excellent Peter Cushing carry it off with verve and conviction. No less a filmmaker than Martin Scorsese has cited Frankenstein Created Woman as one of his favourite horror films: ‘If I single this one out it’s because here they actually isolate the soul… the implied metaphysics are close to something sublime.’

Framed Dimensions: 315mm x 385mm

Acrylic on 230gsm Winsor & Newton canvas paper

Glazed, mounted and framed

Supplied with signed letter of authenticity from Barnaby.