Mary Shelley (2017) - “We created monsters”

Haifaa Al-Mansour’s brush with the Gothic genre serves the purpose of giving an afternoon fling on the tale of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, born out of abandonment and disappointment. Disappointment being a word fit for this movie.

Back in the ‘80s, we got a seductive, dark take on the merry events which happened inside the Villa Diodati known as “Gothic”. We also had Gabriel Byrne and Julian Sands, a couple of talented British actors, capable of adding a few subtle touches where the director and screenwriter failed. 

Al-Mansour isn’t blessed with a solid cast and tries to navigate between a romantic tale and a tragic exposition on what was like for a woman to challenge conventions and mentalities back in the early 19th century. Fanning channels the thrills and the innocence on the eternal used archetype of the sweet adolescent girl who just happens to be everything but what the society canons expected out of her. Mary seems a darker version of Jo March trying to find her literary voice while falling in love with the ever so dashing and narcissistic Percy Shelley. 

Douglas Booth does nothing out of extraordinary with his role, he’s there for aesthetic pleasure, conveying the part of the tortured poet while looking hot and making good use of that charming British accent.

The true stars just so happen to be Ben Hardy as the depressive, forever caught in Byron’s web of seductive lies and humiliation, doctor Polidori and Bel Powley, Mary’s sister, naive and tortured by her own demons, eternally looking for love in all the wrong places - cue for Lord Byron’s sneers and lechery.

In fact, to resume the whole movie, you get one hour of Fanning navigating between romantic interested and being an abandoned woman, figuring out how to express her artistic vision and break free from the gilded cage she dutifully entered when she accepted a free union with Shelley. 

The best happens towards the end of the movie, when the tale of the Modern Prometheus begins to unfold on the white pages scribbled upon with a wooden pencil. The best summary comes from Polidori, the good doctor and Mary have created monsters out of their broken lives. The “monster” Frankenstein put together and abandoned is Mary and also Claire, creatures loved, used, abused and discarded by the men they trusted and loved, while the vampire, Lord Ruthven is Byron, a soul-sucking incubus who feed on Polidori’s own misery and hopes. In those last 30 minutes, the movies moves from the typical BBC romp to an attempt at something deeper.

“Mary Shelley” struggles between the Gothic romantic aesthetics and the origin tale of author and creator of one of the most beloved tales of horror. It’s a valiant effort but not enough. Such are the nights when “Penny Dreadful” is deeply missed for it knew how to blend all the elements

Al-Mansour tried to stitch together and then some.