Monsters

Frankenstein (2025) - Del Toro Mary Shelley's Frankenstein or, The Modern Prometheus, portrayed the human arrogance in the age of industrial revolution and tragedy that befalls its protagonist, a mad genius, Dr. Victor Frankenstein. In Guillermo Del Toro's version, which is magnificent by the way, Frankenstein is told in three perspectives. One from the captain of a Danish ship marooned in the arctic ice, the other from Victor's point of view and then by the creature.

Frankenstein starts in the frozen arctic sea, as Danish sailors struggle to thaw the ice so their ship can get free. There's an explosion in the distance and they rush to investigate. A gravely wounded man they find on the frozen ground is disheveled Baron Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac), he warns of a creature who is stalking him, and protecting him would put everyone around him in danger. Soon enough, the tall creature (Jacob Elodi), comes charging in with superhuman strength, killing everyone in his way. Bullets and knives are no match for him.

Secluded in the captain's quarter, Victor tells his version of a story to the captain (Lars Mikkelsen), so starts one of the most rapturous, big budget Hollywood films worthy of a theatrical experience in a long time. Production design and costume in Frankenstein are typically Del Toro-esque, but turned up to eleven, in that unmistakable Victorian gothic/steampunk way. It shows Victor's upbringing and fixation with conquering death- growing up with a stern, borderline abusive surgeon father (Charles Dance) and losing his mother early in a child birth. His younger brother William (Felix Kemmerer), with his sunny dispositions, becomes naturally father's favorite. So while he is being a brilliant but unorthodox weirdo in medical school tinkering with human corpses with electricity, William makes names for himself in the finance world. It's William's business associate Harlander (Christophe Waltz) who recognizes Victor's genius and bankrolls his grand vision of a laboratory to resurrect the dead. Willam also introduces his fiancé, the niece of Harlander, Elizabeth (Mia Goth), a fetching young woman who doesn't mind being around the corpses and flirting with Victor. It's his arrogance and drive that she finds intriguing.

So they find a decrepit castle with a large spire and a big medusa head adorned wall in somewhere in European continent and it soon becomes a corpse disposal factory - for Victor to assemble body parts from recently executed criminals and dead soldiers from the Crimean War (So Del Toro's version diverts from Shelley's in terms of timeline - the Crimean War was in 1854, the book was published in 1818). Harlander dies in an accident while pleading to be part of Victor's creation because he is dying of syphilis. And the 'IT'S ALIVE!!' sequence is spectacular. But the marveling over his creation is short lived, as Victor finds the creature not too communicative and intellectually stunted. So he has it chained in the dungeon of the castle, equipped with its own, elegant, tiled drainage system (reminiscent of a Turkish bath). But the creature finds great empathy from Elizabeth. She asks Victor whether he considered if the creature had a soul, when he was creating it. Victor admits that he hadn't. Disgusted with what he created, Victor tries to burn the castle down with the creature with it. The creature escapes and Victor loses his leg in the explosion.

And the creature comes on board the ship and tells his side of the story. Even with the POV shifts, told in chronological order, Del Toro maintains the forward momentum without a hitch. The film is a lean two and a half hour experience where you don't feel its running time. Frankenstein feels much more refined in its depiction of violence and its sentimentality than GDT's other films. The action sequences are violent, but not his usual over-the-top, sadistic way (no act of facial disfiguring, of course except for the creature. who is already sewn up with different parts.

The segment with the farmer's family and the blind man, played by David Bradley (from Harry Potter films and the voice of Geppetto in GDT's Pinocchio) is perhaps the most touching part of the film. From Oscar Isaac as arrogant Dr. Frankenstein who gets his comeuppance and his sins forgiven, to Jacob Elodi's skulking, yet highly humanistic creature, to Mia Goth's smart and kind-hearted Elizabeth, not to mention the great Dance & Bradley, the acting in this film throughout is superb. Regular character actors Ralph Ineson and Burn Gorman also show up briefly.

The story of a madman's obsession destroying everything he loves and blaming it on his own creation, their unbreakable bondage and finally forgiveness really moved me in the end. Del Toro, chasing after his childhood dreams of remaking Universal Monster films, created something classy and beautiful here. I understand that he is teaming up with Netflix because he wants to continue making big budget projects, but it's a pity that the theater run of Frankenstein is only a few weeks before it premieres in streaming. It's a gorgeous film and I want everyone to experience it big. Go see it in theaters if you can.

Water Water Everywhere

The Shape of Water (2017) - Del Toro

Simpler than his previous offerings, Guillermo Del Toro's The Shape of Water is a sweet love story between gilled aquatic creature (Doug Jones) and a lonely young mute woman (Sally Hawkins). It's also a sly stab at American Exceptionalism that MAGA crowd seems to firmly believe in. The year is 1961, it's time of the Jell-Os, teal Cadillacs & missionary position. The Cold War was still raging, society still very much segregated (the film takes place in Baltimore) and conservative.

As I said before, Del Toro has a heart and imagination of a morbid school girl who'd paint her room crimson and poison cats for fun and fantasizes about falling in love with lonely beasts rather than fair-haired, blue-eyed princes. The Shape of Water is no exception. Although it's an R rated fairytale for adults, deep down, it's a more sophisticated, elaborate version of Weird Science or Mannequin.

The story goes, a merman was captured in South America (duh) somewhere. The US military transported it to a facility in Baltimore to tame it and ultimately use it in the space exploration as a lab monkey (it seems to do well in extreme conditions). If the creature does not cooperates, they'd destroy it rather than risking it falling in the hands of the Soviets.

The hardass who is in charge of the facility is Strickland (Michael Shannon), he is the epitome of American white male - square jawed, bible quoting, casual racist bigot who has penchant for violence. There is Elisa Esposito (Hawkins) a mousy cleaning lady who adheres to her uneventful, repetitive daily grind - wake up, boil eggs for lunch, masturbate in the tub, take the bus, go to work & take the bus back home. Elisa's two friends who ultimately help her - Giles (Richard Jenkins), an illustrator of wholesome product advertisements who is closeted gay and Zelda (Octavia Spencer), the fellow cleaning lady at the lab who's an African American. Then there is Dr. Hoffstetler (Michael Stuhlbarg), a conscientious scientist who helps Elisa for his own reasons. Everyone is fantastic in their roles and has their moments to shine. It's been certainly a year of Doug Joneses. This Doug Jones, especially needs some recognition for his work in this.

But what's up with mutilating people's faces in his films (Pan's Labyrinth and Crimson Peak for example)? There is that too in Shape of Water. I'd love to ask Del Toro about it if I ever get a chance.

Thankfully, there are not much back stories or long drawn out expositions to any of these characters. It's Del Toro keeps things simple while slyly sliding in subversive messages - oh look, it's Carmen Rivera on TV! Ohhh, depiction of ancient slavery as the creature looks on in a movie theater! etc. Elisa conveniently lives above a grand old movie theater and Danish cinematographer Dan Laustsen's palette is all teal and orange. As always, Del Toro's world is exceptionally cinematic and beautiful.

Softer and less tragic, The Shape of Water is a rarely well balanced and most emotionally resonant film and a crowd pleaser from Del Toro since Pan's Labyrinth.

Sense and Sensibility

Crimson Peak (2015) - Del Toro

Crimson Peak occupies an interesting space and time when moviegoing experience is at its lowest point in cinema history. Barely out for two weeks, I walked in to the theater where only a handful of people came out to see it on Friday night in a multiplex, by 'the director of Hell Boy and Pacific Rim' no less. It made me feel sad because it's precisely a movie that needs to be seen on a big screen. Along with Mad Max: Fury Road, this film was the only few I actually paid to see it in theaters this year and these occasions are getting rarer and rarer for me. I hear so-called mid-size budget indie filmmaking is back and some of them manages to break even with VOD market and online services. But there is no way in hell I'd watch an indie movie, especially American indie movie in theaters, let alone pay for it.

Guillermo del Toro is back in form at what he does best - a gothic horror with Crimson Peak. It's a grand, decaying, violent fairy tale made for adults and therefore harder to make money but beautiful nonetheless. It concerns an aspiring young writer Edith (always delightful Mia Wasikowska) in a well to do household in Buffalo, NY in the 19th century, getting involved with a dashing English nobleman named Thomas Sharpe (Tom Hiddleston) and his cold as ice sister Lucille (Jessica Chastain). The brother-sister team happened to own a decrepit manor in England, surrounded by red earth. They need an investment money to dig up and sell that red bubbling earth. Decaying mansion, snowy weather, blood red clay make a beautiful backdrop for this spoiled school girl ghost/love story (just like Edith's manuscript). You realize that all del Toro's ghost stories/fairy tales are just that. That this fat, bearded Mexican man has always had a sensibility of a school girl and bloodier imagination. Any way you look at it, there is no denying how gorgeous the film is. And all three actors are excellent in it. I'm very glad I got to see it on the big screen.

Rock'n'Roll Mom

Mama (2013) - Muschietti

Surprisingly decent horror movie despite its title. Jessica Chastain finally plays someone other than a Mid-Western housewife (haven't seen Zero Dark Thirty). She is Annabelle, a dark haired, tattooed bassist for a rock band (styled after Chrissy Hines I'm sure), far from mother material who's thrown into one when her artist boyfriend Luke's long lost nieces were discovered in a secluded cabin in the woods, living wild-child style. After a child psychiatrist helps them win the custody, under the condition that he will be observing the kids as a case study, Annabelle moves into a clinic owned manor house with the newfangled family. It's totally not her thing, but she can't abandon Luke now. It turns out kids were raised by some unknown woman they call Mama with the diet consists of cherries, rats and raccoons for 5 years. They think it's the kids' imagination gone wild, some kind of mental illness, split personality disorder maybe. Then strange things start happening in the house...

Did I say Chastain is great in this? She is. Her character's nicely drawn: her interactions with kids awkward and awesome. Did I say she has giant octopus tentacles tattooed on her shoulder? Pretty hot. Mama has that dark signature Guillermo Del Toro children's movie written all over- tragic ghost story with a not so evil, just creepy antagonist. Has some real scares. It's the best J-horror a Hollywood production can muster.