In the article Looking at the Monster: Frankenstein and Film by James A. W. Heffernan, Heffernan talks about how the film versions of Frankenstein don’t give the text any justice. This is seen throughout tons of novels and films, where the movie doesn’t capture the overall essence of the text and in a way mutilates the image perceived to us by the novel. He goes on though, to compare Mary Shelley’s text: Frankenstein (1818) to three movies representing Frankenstein. Heffernan not only shows what these movies don’t capture, he shows the important details that the movies portray. These ideas showed in the movies are hard to pick up in the text, but are easily captured by the movies due to the visual aspect. Throughout the article Heffernan uses
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This can be misleading as he goes on to compare the pros and cons film can have on the text. Before he does this though, he asks questions in which provide the basis for his article. “How do we see the monster, what does he see, and how does he want to be seen” (Heffernan 4450)? The two essays he chooses to talk about really dig deep into the text and brings the reader many ideas that could have been overlooked. One of these being the way Frankenstein, the monster, looks upon Justine, “longing to obtain one look of affection from her eyes” (Shelley). Heffernan explains this quote by connecting it to Branagh’s Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1994), which is the closest film to grasping Shelley’s text. He goes on to say “we might construe this shot as an example of the way the film reveals what the novel hides” (Heffernan 448). Thus, proves how he’s trying to give the reader and viewers a better understanding and meaning between the text and films. His organization throughout the article to show this, is to me a little bit strange. He uses notes at the bottom, which seem to also be is work cited to connect his main ideas to the evidence and support he conjured them from. Although his structure works out in the end due to his exceptional style of writing and way of portraying and connecting his ideas to the text. It almost feels as if he jumps around from film, to other books and writings that
This can be misleading as he goes on to compare the pros and cons film can have on the text. Before he does this though, he asks questions in which provide the basis for his article. “How do we see the monster, what does he see, and how does he want to be seen” (Heffernan 4450)? The two essays he chooses to talk about really dig deep into the text and brings the reader many ideas that could have been overlooked. One of these being the way Frankenstein, the monster, looks upon Justine, “longing to obtain one look of affection from her eyes” (Shelley). Heffernan explains this quote by connecting it to Branagh’s Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1994), which is the closest film to grasping Shelley’s text. He goes on to say “we might construe this shot as an example of the way the film reveals what the novel hides” (Heffernan 448). Thus, proves how he’s trying to give the reader and viewers a better understanding and meaning between the text and films. His organization throughout the article to show this, is to me a little bit strange. He uses notes at the bottom, which seem to also be is work cited to connect his main ideas to the evidence and support he conjured them from. Although his structure works out in the end due to his exceptional style of writing and way of portraying and connecting his ideas to the text. It almost feels as if he jumps around from film, to other books and writings that