That role goes to the film’s main female character, who perceives the creature as sentient and worthy of love. For all the chewiness of its practical effects, the film doesn’t shy away from using CGI to augment the huge sets. He teaches the creature his own name, Victor, and is delighted by his creation’s first tentative interactions with the world. Seemingly indestructible in a fight, we have to wonder, is this because he feels no pain, or because he always feels pain? Where Shelley wrote a gothic thriller in a somewhat realist register, this version of Frankenstein is a grand gothic fairytale and, like all the great fairytales, it’s at its best when it bleeds.