Goofs

Early in the film, Dr. Waldman presents two brains in glass jars each bearing two neatly typed labels, one in Latin and the other in English. The good brain reads "CEREBRUM" and "NORMAL BRAIN," while the other reads "DYSFUNCTO CEREBRI" and "ABNORMAL BRAIN." When Fritz breaks into the medical school, the typed NORMAL and ABNORMAL labels have been replaced by larger, hand-printed ones.

When The Monster is injected and finally falls to the floor, he passes out on his back. When they pick him up to drag him back into his cell, he is face-down.

At the film's beginning, when Dr. Frankenstein and Fritz begin to dig up the newly-interred corpse, they both shed their jackets. After a dissolve to bridge the passage of time, they reach the buried casket. There is a shovel upright in the unearthed soil behind them with one of the jackets hanging on it as well as a hat. However, neither man was wearing or carrying a hat when they arrived at the grave.

When Henry and Elizabeth are sitting by the lake and talking about their upcoming wedding, the long shot that opens the scene shows a dog at Henry's feet, laying on his right side with his head up and looking around. In the next shot, however, the dog is asleep and laying on his left side.

During the chase, when The Monster first spots Dr. Frankenstein, Frankenstein's torch switches hands between shots. Then, when the two make eye contact, Frankenstein raises the torch about level with his head, but in the next shot, it is about level with his shoulder.

It's not explained how the monster, who is barely human, and only a few days old, could possess the concept of hanging Fritz, much less have the knowledge and facility on how to pull it off.

According to DVD commentary for this film, director James Whale intended this film to take place in an "alternate universe" and therefore freely mixed 19th Century and 1930s technology, hair fashions, etc.

Right before The Monster's awakening, Henry Frankenstein replies to the charge that he is crazy by taunting, "One man crazy, three very sane spectators." But there are four spectators: Victor, Elizabeth, Dr. Waldman, and Fritz. Fritz is neither a spectator nor called crazy; he is an assistant.

When Fritz steals the brain from the medical laboratory, it is in a jar very clearly labeled ABNORMAL BRAIN, yet later on Dr. Frankenstein is startled to learn from Dr. Waldman that the brain he used was abnormal. Presumably Fritz removed the label before delivering the jar to Frankenstein.

Right before Fritz climbs the gibbet to cut down the hanged man, supposedly a beam of light from his lantern hits and travels across the "sky" behind him, which is obviously a backdrop. The latter is right, the "light beam" however is a lens flare, which is obvious because it also travels before Frankenstein without being displaced---it's an optical phenomenon and not a practical one.

Huge streaks are visible across the clouded sky during the chase at the end of the film, making the presence of a wrinkled backdrop very obvious.

When Little Maria walks from the cottage toward the lake, she casts shadows in two different directions.

Early in the film, Henry is holding The Monster's hand and telling Fritz there's nothing to be afraid of. A dress shoe can be seen on the body's foot.

One of the Spanish dubs doesn't dub Little Maria's line "No, you're hurting me! No!" and is silent.

After Henry lets Elizabeth, Victor, and Dr. Waldman into his lab, there is a two-shot of Henry and Waldman (seated), and in the upper left the shadow of a crew person's arm moves in and out of the frame.

As The Monster is being raised on the gurney to be animated, a crewman is visible in the lower left. He seems to be behind a curtain and is looking down, as if at some equipment.

Frankenstein and Fritz retrieve a dead body hanging from a gallows. Upon cutting it down, he discovers the neck is broken (as was often the result of execution by hanging), rendering the brain useless. A broken neck would not necessarily damage a brain, and even if this were the case, Frankenstein has no issues sending Fritz to steal a brain that may have been resting in a jar of preservative solution for years, its cause of death unknown.

When Dr. Waldman reveals that Fritz stole a criminal brain, Frankenstein is unpleasantly surprised. However, his first attempt to acquire a brain was from a corpse on a gallows, which presumably also would have been a criminal brain.

How did the monster know the location of Henry Frankenstein's house, and how was he able to enter and leave the village unnoticed when the streets were packed with wedding celebrants, with many others peering down from windows.

It is not clear if the Monster has circulating blood or is just re-animated flesh (a la zombie). If the latter, then the hypodermic needle used to subdue him would not have worked.

It was the height of folly for Dr. Waldman to leave the Monster's arms unbound before he attempted to dissect him. As a result, the Monster was able to strangle the poor doctor.upon regaining consciousness.

Baron Frankenstein says that Henry Frankenstein's lab is in "an old abandoned windmill." In fact, it is in a castle or watchtower. According to the DVD commentary, this line of dialogue was from an early version of the script, and was left in the final version by mistake.

All of the adult actors in the film have distinct English or European accents. But little Maria sounds about as American as you can get.

When Dr. Waldman dismisses the anatomy class, he uses the word gentlemen, even though there are women in the classroom.