One of the funniest films ever made, Mel Brooks’ marvellously crafted, beautifully shot comedic homage to James Whale’s 1931 classic Frankenstein is both a loving tribute and a raucous, irreverent parody of the classic horror movies of the 1930’s.

When young neurosurgeon Frederick Frankenstein (Gene Wilder) inherits his grandfather's Transylvanian estate, along with his hunchback friend Igor (Marty Feldman), lab assistant Inga (Teri Garr) and housekeeper Frau Blücher (Cloris Leachman), he finds himself rather overwhelmed at the prospect of running his own castle. His scientific curiosity is piqued though when he discovers his grandfather's notebook in which he documented his experiments with reanimation, and Frederick sets about conducting experiments to piece together a creature of his own.

A movie that is a brilliant send-up of a style and not just of the source material, from its opening title (which manages to satirise Frankenstein and Citizen Kane at the same time) to its closing, uh, refrain, Mel Brooks comic masterpiece also serves as a loving commentary on our love-hate affairs with monsters.

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