The Bride (1985)

A scientist (Sting) creates a woman (Jennifer Beals) for the male creature (Clancy Brown) he has made from various body parts from corpses. But when his female creation turns out to be perfect and beautiful, he has second thoughts about giving her to the creature and decides to create a "new" woman, one who will be the equal of men. Directed by Franc Roddam (QUADROPHENIA), this reimagining of the 1935 BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN was a failure upon its initial release but plays far better today than it did then. I think audiences and critics were expecting a horror film and while the horror trappings are definitely there, the film has more of a feminist dynamic. The patriarchal father figure as exemplified by Sting's Frankenstein and the woman he has literally created who simply will not be ruled or owned. But the film's heart is actually elsewhere in the relationship between the clever dwarf (David Rappaport) and the childlike hulk that is Brown's creature (he's definitely not a monster in the sense of the Universal Frankensteins). An imperfect movie but an engrossing one. There's a beautiful underscore by Maurice Jarre. With Geraldine Page, Anthony Higgins, Cary Elwes, Phil Daniels, Timothy Spall, Alexei Sayle and Veruschka Von Lehndorff.