Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed

Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed is a 1969 British horror film directed by Terence Fisher for Hammer Films, starring Peter Cushing, Freddie Jones, Veronica Carlson and Simon Ward. The film is the fifth in a series of Hammer films focusing on Baron Frankenstein, who, in this entry, terrorises those around him in a bid to uncover the secrets of a former associate confined to a lunatic asylum. Plot A doctor is decapitated by a masked man while a thief breaks into an underground lab. The masked man enters the lab, carrying the severed head, and fights the thief, who escapes in horror. The man unmasks himself and is revealed to be Baron Victor Frankenstein. The thief goes to the police station to report the severed head to Inspector Frisch. Frankenstein, under the alias Mr. Fenner, rents a room at a boarding house run by landlady Anna Spengler. Anna's fiancé Karl Holst is a doctor at the asylum where Frankenstein's former assistant Dr. Frederick Brandt was committed after going insane. After discovering Karl has been stealing narcotics in order to support Anna's ailing mother, Frankenstein reveals his true identity and blackmails Karl into helping him kidnap Brandt so he can get the secret formula of his experiment. While stealing equipment from a warehouse for Frankenstein's new lab, Karl and the Baron are caught by the guard. Karl panics and stabs him. Frankenstein, now with a further hold on Karl uses him and Anna to kidnap Brandt. They take him back to the house where they build a lab in the basement. Karl confides to Anna about killing the guard and begs her to leave, fearing she may go to prison for being an accessory to a murderer, but she refuses. Meanwhile, Brandt has a heart attack, prompting Frankenstein and Karl to kidnap the asylum's administrator Professor Richter to transplant Brandt's brain into his body. That night, while Anna is getting ready for bed, Frankenstein enters her room and rapes her. The next day, Frankenstein and Karl succeed in transplanting Brandt's brain into Richter's body and bury Brandt's body in the garden. Brandt's wife Ella recognises Frankenstein in the street and confronts him about her husband's kidnapping. Frankenstein assures her he has cured her husband's mental illness, but does not let her see him. She refuses to believe him and goes to Frisch.