Doctor Septimus Pretorius

The idea is out there.

And now we have Dr. Pretorius.

Yes.

Who's like, oh, you've done it.

That's what we're going to talk about.

So that's how you get here.

One of the most interesting things from watching The Bride of Frankenstein is the conflict between Dr. Frankenstein and Dr. Pretorius and the conflict of men acting in the place of God or men acting as God and creating creatures in their own image.

And it makes me think about the original Genesis story is the same.

Wait,

Dr. Septimus Pretorius?

Exactly.

This, I was looking into this a little bit.

And he just sat there smoking the cigar, watching everything burn.

We talked about Dr. Pretorius being a coded character for for James Whale and the two lines of Dr. Pretorius.

He talks about cigars being his only weakness and gin being his only weakness.

And I think that's probably just James Whale actual just being like,

We see religious iconography elsewhere in the movie.

You've got the sort of authorities who do come from that background.

You have Pretorius, who is sort of the skeptic who doesn't believe in God.

And then you have like the actual Christian, the man who has internalized the good values of Christianity, who sees the good and empathy in Frankenstein's monster.

That one's Frankenstein, but kind of from Igor's perspective.

Just to be clear, too, Igor is not a character in the novel, but a character from one of the Universal movies.

So, in fact, I think in the first Frankenstein, it was Fritz.

I don't remember when they introduced Igor, but I think it was...

It was down the road.

He eventually becomes an important character in the Monster Rally versions where they have like the Frankenstein meets whoever.

And so, by the way, if I seem a little tired or low energy, I apologize.

The past two weeks have been pretty crazy here.

Firm bones? Firm bones, yeah.

When Dr. Pretorius is in the crypt and he's hoping the lady's got firm bones.

You know, I often hope the lady has firm bones.

I

And it's Claude Rains who is fantastic in that role.

So good.

Did I hear somewhere that he was in line to be Dr. Pretorius in Guide? Yes.

Claude Rains was supposed to be in this movie as Dr. Pretorius.

Colin Clive once again plays Henry Frankenstein, Boris Karloff returns as the monster, and Valerie Hobson takes over the role of Elizabeth.

Ernest Thessinger joins them as Dr. Septimus Pretorius.

Entering Henry's life with the energy of someone who has never encountered an ethical boundary, he couldn't turn into an interesting afternoon.

Meanwhile, Elsa Lanchester plays both Mary Shelley and, eventually, the monster's intended mate.

And the whole premise of the movie is Henry has kind of realized the error of his ways.

But then this guy, Dr. Pretorius, this new character they introduce, who seems to be like a mentor of his or something... uh you know wants him to continue with his research because he's been he's been creating life too but he's he's succeeded in different ways he's managed to make very like human-like but small they usually call them like homunculi when they talk about the movie but like they're basically like little people that he keeps in these jars and he dresses them up as kings and ballerinas and and popes and all kinds of things and And when he shows them to Victor, to Henry, it's a, it's, it's, it's a really weird scene.

It's not, it's, it's not really horrifying.

It's just bizarre.

And it's got a very strange quality to it.

And that's kind of the vibe of the movie.

And Dr. Pretorius, you know, he has, he, he persuades Frankenstein, but he also meets the creature in the, in this graveyard.

And he has like cigars with the creature and talk.

Me too.

But we talked about in the last episode preparing for this film about Dr. Pretorius.

Dr. Pretorius continues to be freaky.

He's like a real freaky dude.

He is.

I thought the lighting was just spectacular in this movie.

I always comment on that with black and white, but this was particularly striking.

I thought even a couple of times when they did it, like a zoom, a close-up of Dr. Pretorius, you know, that it was so much of a high contrast on his face.