Fans of Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus have been clambering for a cinematic adaptation that isn’t another Victorian era verbatim remake. Bringing the OG gothic science-fiction horror firmly into the 21st century, interwoven with modern anxieties over race relations is The Angry Black Girl And Her Monster.
Directed and written by Bomani J. Story, The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster centres around the brilliantly gifted Vicaria (Laya DeLeon Hayes) who after the violent death of her mother when she was a young girl, and the more recent shooting of her older brother, becomes obsessed with “curing death”. Encountering daily racist micro-agressions in her predominantly white upper-class school, as well as the daily danger of living in a marginalised neighbourhood, Vicaria spends her time in her crudely assembled lab in an abandoned warehouse, successfully resurrecting the corpse of her deceased brother. However, in true corpse resurrection tradition, Vicaria soon realises that the dead, should really stay dead as her reanimated brother soon goes on a vengeance fuelled rampage, leaving piles of bodies in his wake.
Laya DeLeon Hayes as Vicaria is electric as the tortured yet determined creator and the film itself is an incredible interpretation and modernisation of a gothic work from over 300 years ago
A complete ode to the life of Mary Shelley as well as her most infamous piece of work, The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster seems to take the autobiographical aspects of Frankenstein by reflecting the obsession of death Shelley was consumed with, with the death of her own mother and her child. The character of Vicaria is both the author Mary Shelley, and Shelley’s mad scientist Victor Frankenstein. Vicaria has spent the majority of her young life surrounded by death and violence, and much like Dr Frankenstein, wishes to bring forth the birth of a creation out of death.
The background setting of Vicaria’s neighbourhood is one plagued by gangs and drugs, with her own grieving father, Donald (Chad L.Coleman) struggling with addiction and the streets being run by local gangbangers Kango (Denzel Whitaker) and Jamaal (Keith Holliday). The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster successfully veers away from character stereotypes, with Donald being portrayed as a good father who sticks up for his daughter, despite being an addict, and Kango’s characterisation staying clear of becoming a tropey antagonist.
Laya DeLeon Hayes as Vicaria is electric as the tortured yet determined creator and the film itself is an incredible interpretation and modernisation of a gothic work from over 300 years ago, with its gore soaked portrayal of how anger and violence can infect a person and the community in which they inhabit.
The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster is out on Shudder
Ygraine‘s Archive: the Angry Black Girl and Her Monster
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