Mary Shelley

The young Mary Godwin meets the radical poet Percy Bysshe Shelley in Scotland and elopes with him. The relationship is hard from the start: poverty, social pressure and Shelley's idea of free love. The summer they spend at Lord Byron's villa near Geneva becomes the starting point for Frankenstein. The second half is the writing and publishing of the novel; the book appears anonymously in its first edition and nobody around her believes a woman could have written it. Haifaa al-Mansour directed from a screenplay by the Australian writer Emma Jensen. Elle Fanning plays Mary, Douglas Booth plays Percy Shelley and Tom Sturridge plays Lord Byron. Shooting began in Dublin in February 2016 and continued in Luxembourg. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 41 percent from 130 reviews with a 5.6 average, and Metacritic at 49. Historians objected to its accuracy and to how it handles the relationships. The box office stopped at 1.9 million dollars worldwide, with only 97,321 dollars from the US and Canada. Who it is for: viewers curious about the story behind Frankenstein and who like period drama. Who it is not for: anyone after historical accuracy or Mary Shelley's thinking. The film gives its weight to the love affair.