Rowing with the Wind

This film has promise that is never fulfilled. Curly-topped Hugh Grant as Lord Byron has to be seen to be believed. He wears the frilliest costumes imaginable. With long hair and chest bared, he looks like he's auditioning for a Lifetime biopic of Siegfried and Roy. One of the best (and unintentionally comical) scenes is Grant howling out on a boat. He is too fey and whimsical to make a credible Byron.

Another newcomer is a furry-browed, heavier set Elizabeth Hurley. She is beautiful. Yet, like Grant, she isn't ready for prime time. The scene where her sister, Mary, consoles her following a suicide is funny due to Hurley's exaggerated facial expressions.

The music labors on to new melodramatic Gothic depths. Music can enhance an atmosphere when the atmosphere is right. When it isn't, music only makes for another distraction.

The monster speaks in staccato. Due to editing, it's difficult to determine if he's a villain or victim. Sometimes it's difficult to determine if he even is.

I've always been fond of Rowing with the Wind. Admittedly, it's flawed: the characters are stiffly presented and excessively iconic, and the dialog is often just a series of aphorisms. It would have benefited from a more naturalistic 'mud on the hem' approach. I also believe the American backers insisted a lot of footage be cut out of the original version so that might account for some of the problems. But, on the plus side, the cinematography is gorgeous, the Fantasia on a Theme music is lovely, and the movie does have an elegant feel. I suspect the director was aiming for a somewhat arthouse, dreamlike approach. It might not quite work but it does have its moments.

The recurring presence of the Creature is, I'd suggest, meant to be a psychological projection of the characters growing instabilities and griefs. It's also, I think, a symbol of mortality. Initially the principal characters are shown as young, beautiful, and talented but their lives are haunted by premature death and sadness. Mary's life was even more challenging than the film indicates; three of her four children died in infancy or by miscarriage. I think the movie is suggesting that her real 'child' was the literary one of the Creature; Mary says in a couple of scenes that she feels the Creature has escaped from the book and become real and, in a sense, that did become true; in the two centuries since the novel was written Frankenstein and his monster have become immortal, especially when compared to the tragically short lives of many of the people associated with the original story.

At a mansion by a lagoon nearly Geneva reunite (1816) various known characters as Lord Byron (Hugh Grant), the poet Percy Shelley (Valentine Pelka), his fiancée (Lizzy McInnery), her stepsister Claire (Elizabeth Hurley) and Doctor Polidori (Jose Luis Gomez), Byron ex-lover and secretary . The movie is situated in the time when Mary Shelley wrote her novel "Frankenstein". There happens mysterious events with appearance a fantastic personage trying to scare each other and then occurs unfortunate deaths . Meanwhile , Mary Shelley has fabled and hallucinatory nightmares .

This haunting film is based on real events about famous characters as the eccentric poet Lod Byron, , his secretary Doctor Polidori, Percy Bysshe Shelley and Mary Shelley . It concerns the deeds were inspired to write their classic Gothic novels , as Mary Shelley created ¨Frankestein¨ and Doctor Polidori wrote ¨The vampire¨. It's a romantic drama paced in slow-moving , enjoyable visuals and some nudism . It packs glamorous gowns by Ivonne Blake , Oscar winner for ¨Nicholas and Alexandra¨. Luxurious scenarios by Wolfgang Burmann , such as interior with lush palaces and breathtaking mansion from Venice (including a giraffe where resides Byron) and exteriors filmed in Norway , Venice, Veneto, Switzerland , Toledo , Asturias (beaches of Llanes), Spain. Colorful and brilliant cinematography by Carlos Suarez, director's brother . Stunning score with a sensitive leitmotif by Alejandro Masso , adding classical music by Bethoven , Mozart and Paganini . The picture was beautifully directed by Gonzalo Suarez who gives special treatment this interesting flick.

This story was formerly depicted in the ancient classic ¨The bride of Frankestein¨ by James Whale in which Elsa Lanchester played Mary Shelley . Subsequently in 1986 Ken Russell directed ¨Gothic¨ with Natasha Richardson as Mary , Gabriel Byrne and Julian Sands in similar characters and full of ordinary Russell's bag of tricks . And the same tale was told two years later by Ivan Passer who directed ¨Haunted summer (1988)¨ with Eric Stolz , Alice Krige and Laura Dern . But I think that ¨Rowing with the wind¨ is better than ¨Gothic¨ and ¨Haunted summer¨.

I've been seeking out a bunch of Frankenstein films after re-reading Mary Shelley's novel, and I count ones such as "Rowing with the Wind" to be part of that. It's one of a few semi-historical movies to self-reflexively be about the creation of the story, which itself is about creation. "Bride of Frankenstein" (1935), "Gothic" (1986), "Haunted Summer" (1988), "Frankenstein Unbound" (1990) and "Mary Shelley" (2017) also feature the author of "Frankenstein." In this one, the creature of Shelley's Frankenstein comes to life, or rather to apparition, and haunts her through the deaths of those in her life, which is also what happens in the novel to Victor Frankenstein. None of the aforementioned films I've seen managed to accomplish such a feat: of integrating the fictional and historical myths, of the doppelgänger of creature and creator, and of placing within the milieu of 19th-century Romanticism.

This is the second unorthodox Spanish production of a Frankenstein film that I've seen, as well--the other being "The Spirit of the Beehive" (1973)--and while they approach the story in different ways and by different media (this one, by writing; the other through the 1931 film), they are both two of the most complexly layered and beautiful films to portray the monster. Even though, like others, I viewed the butchered Miramax cut, which reportedly eliminates a fourth of the film, "Rowing with the Wind" is a far more intelligent conception than the opium-induced madhouse of "Gothic," which offers only the simplest readings of the book and isn't even especially gothic itself. It was made at Gaddesden Place, which is of Palladian architecture, whereas the relevant scenes of "Rowing with the Wind" look as though they could've been filmed at Lord Byron's Villa Diodati. And even "Gothic" is better than "Frankenstein Unbound," which treats the Frankenstein story as an historical event and reduces Mary Shelley's authorship to that of a reporter taking liberties with the facts. "Gothic" reduced Mary's inspiration to her dead children, and while "Rowing with the Wind" is more encompassing than that, it even handles that part more poetically. The scenes of the monster approaching Mary's son William (also the name of Victor's brother) is one of the more haunting here--especially so for those who've read the book and seen the similar scene of the little girl in Universal's 1931 adaptation.

I also like the beginning shots of a boat in an icy sea, which recalls Captain Walton's search in "Frankenstein" for the Northwest Passage, but also through a recitation of Lord Byron's poem "Darkness" situates this film's beginning in the Year Without a Summer of 1816--when by Lake Geneva, Byron, Mary, her then-lover-and-would-be-husband Percy Shelley and John Polidori decided to compete in writing ghost stories. From that night, Polidori wrote "The Vampyre" and, more famously, Mary began the creation of what would become the novel "Frankenstein; or The Modern Prometheus." Percy Shelley's "Wake the Serpent Not" is also later recited, and the film is full of allusions to the Romantic era in which Mary wrote her masterpiece, including in the classical and romantic musical score and, most impressively, the cinematography, especially of nature. Such lush photography of natural landscapes is especially appropriate given the volcanic winter of 1816 and later Romantic settings--complete with the sailing motif. Even the interior views, including the giraffe in Lord Byron's Venetian residence, and the costumes--Elizabeth Hurley in a men's suit, for instance--contain sumptuous visuals.

Although Elsa Lanchester and Gavin Gordon will probably always remain by favorite film Mary and Lord Byron for their one scene in "Bride of Frankenstein" (1935), Lizzy McInnerny and Hugh Grant do well here. Certainly, this is a much more developed Mary than I've seen in the other versions, and Grant affects Lord Byron's limp well and provides a more refined variation on the caddish roles he'd later become well-known for. This is also the best Percy I've seen, although, of all the things Miramax could've cut out, they seem to have left in (at least I hope so) all of the many foreshadowing references to Mr. Shelley's inability to swim. The English Polidori, however, seems out of place as played by a Spaniard. And, one of the least interesting things to me regarding this film is its place at the beginning of Grant and Hurley's real-life romance.

I don't care much for the slow speech delivery of the creature, either, and the picture does appear somewhat dull and disjointed at times--likely as a result of the Miramax cuts. Someday, I'd like to see the complete version, but even as it is, this is Romantically gorgeous and an intelligently self-reflexive integration of two stories of creation and horror. In one scene, after facing so much death already throughout her life, Mary states, "I do not want to see a creature born that is destined to die." In the case of her novel's creature, this wish has been fulfilled. Like the one in "Rowing with the Wind," Shelley's monster has taken on a life of its own. Surpassing its 200th anniversary in 2018, it remains very much alive.

I disagree with most of the critics, I think it's an excellent film. Camera, music, colors, everything is an harmonic combination. The only possible critic might be, the film can be a little be pretentious, but I would never describe it as tedious. You like it or hate it, I am fortunate ones.