Movie Review: The Shape of Water

The Shape of Water **** ½ / *****

Directed by: Guillermo del Toro.

Written by: Guillermo del Toro & Vanessa Taylor.

Starring: Sally Hawkins (Eliza Esposito), Michael Shannon (Strickland), Richard Jenkins (Giles), Octavia Spencer (Zelda), Doug Jones (The Asset), Michael Stuhlbarg (Hoffstetler).

 

Since his debut film Cronos – was back in 1993, it has been very clear that Guillermo del Toro loves monsters. There is not a feature film of his that doesn’t include some monster or another – often ones with large teeth that bite into you and don’t let go. Del Toro was inspired by the monster movies he saw in his youth, but has spent most of his career creating new kinds of monsters – even when he’s making a sequel about vampires (the wonderful Blade II) – they aren’t the type of vampires you’ve seen before – they are somehow worse, grosser and strangely sexual. Perhaps it was only a matter of time before del Toro made a film like The Shape of Water – where the lead character is a woman who literally loves a monsters, in every way that means. This is one of del Toro’s best films – and inarguably his most whimsical – more fantasy than horror this time out, but with his same eye for detail.

 

Set in the 1950s, the film stars the wonderful Sally Hawkins as Eliza – a mute, cleaning lady who works at a secret government facility, and because of her condition, is pretty much able to blend into the background. She does everything on a set schedule (including, um, her bath tube masturbation ritual with an egg timer) – and only has two friends – her gay artist neighbor, Giles (Richard Jenkins) and her cleaning partner at the facility, Zelda (Octavia Spencer) – she gets along with both so well probably, because neither of them will shut up. One day, into her facility arrives a man from the army – Strickland (Michael Shannon) with a large tube, full of water – and something else – that is place behind a locked door in a larger pool. Eliza is drawn to whatever it is that in that tub (which the trailer reveals far too much of – it was better to see it like I did at TIFF, without that knowledge).

 

As with all of his films, del Toro’s cinephilia is on full display during The Shape of Water – from his love of old musicals he shares with Giles (and Eliza, who has a couple of charming, solitary dance sequences) – to the old school, large movie houses that they live above –even if they are largely empty (the film was shot at the Elgin theater in Toronto – and I saw it in the same theater, a surreal experience to be sure). The creature – or The Asset as it’s called in the film – is like something out of those old movies, and as is often the case, is misunderstood by all except the woman who loves him. This movie takes that love to its logical conclusion – albeit in a scene that wisely doesn’t get graphic at all.

 

The real monster in the movie is of course man – in this case, Strickland himself. Shannon is perfectly cast as the violent, stubborn, sexist Strickland – a man who treats his own wife with contempt, so you can tell what he thinks of a pair like Eliza and Zelda. The role doesn’t give much nuance for Shannon to play, but he’s great anyway- even if in this film, his performance still trails behind the delightfully droll and comic one delivered by Richard Jenkins and of course Hawkins, who says so much without speaking.

 

This is one of del Toro’s best films. As much as I always like his work, for the most part, I think the style trumps the substance of his films – which at times, can ring hollow. His most recent film before this for example – Crimson Peak – was an absolute masterpiece of production design, costumes, cinematography and music, but wasn’t nearly as good on a storytelling or character level. He seems to work best with a little bit less money, and a little bit more freedom (his two other best films are probably The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth – films he made in his native Spanish, with Mexican money – here, he says he was essentially making a Canadian film – so you can guess he had less funds that on something like Pacific Rim). The Shape of Water represents a perfect marriage between his influences, and his own point-of-view – and while the craftsmanship remains high, it’s not at the sacrifices of the story or its characters (there are so many legitimately great, small character beats, that I normally do not see in del Toro’s work). The film takes a strange premise, and ends up making one of the best romantic fantasies in recent memory. It’s easier to make Beauty and the Beast when the best is furry and cuddly – much hard to do what del Toro pulls off here.

Movie Review: Crimson Peak

Crimson Peak
Directed by: Guillermo del Toro.
Written by: Guillermo del Toro & Matthew Robbins.
Starring: Mia Wasikowska (Edith Cushing), Jessica Chastain (Lucille Sharpe), Tom Hiddleston (Thomas Sharpe), Charlie Hunnam (Dr. Alan McMichael), Jim Beaver (Carter Cushing), Burn Gorman (Holly), Leslie Hope (Mrs. McMichael), Doug Jones (Edith's Mother, Lady Sharpe), Jonathan Hyde (Ogilvie), Bruce Gray (Ferguson).

Guillermo del Toro may well have been born into the wrong time. No matter if his films are large budget blockbusters (Blade, two Hellboy film, Pacific Rim), or Spanish language horror films (Cronos, The Devil’s Backbone, Pan’s Labyrinth), del Toro doesn’t do things small – his films are filled with stunning visuals and larger than life emotions. He would have made a great director of silent films in the 1920s. His latest films, Crimson Peak, could have been a silent – but it also would have fit in nicely in the 1940s or early 1950s – its clear influences including a pair of Hitchcock films, Rebecca (1940) and Notorious (1946), as well as novels like Jane Eyre, which was also adapted in the 1940s, and audiences knew what to do with them. Crimson Peak is an odd film in part because it doesn’t really fit in with what anyone else is doing right now. The studio is marketing it as a horror film – playing up the ghosts and all the blood in the previews and releasing it just in time for Halloween, and there is certainly an element of that here. But it’s not strictly a horror film – it’s more of gothic romance, albeit, one with a lot more blood than normal. I can pretty much guarantee that the film – whose critical and commercial reaction so far has been mixed – will end up being beloved by a small, but passionate group of people. They just need to find it.

The film opens in America, in the 1800s, and focuses on Edith Cushing (Mia Wasikowska), whose mother died when she was young – but did come to her as a ghost, complete with very long fingers - reminiscent of everything Nosferatu or The Babadook – to warn her about Crimson Peak. Her father (Jim Beaver) is rich and influential, and doesn’t mind the fact that his bookish daughter shuns the parties everyone else seems to adore, and wants to be writer. She even has an admirer in Dr. Alan McMichael (Charlie Hunnam), and the two are doing the kind of shy dance of flirtation typical in these types of romances. But into town arrives Thomas Sharpe (Tom Hiddleston), a Brit with the title of Baronet (which no one understands, but it sounds fancy), but no money hoping to find some financial backing for his latest scheme. He doesn’t get that, but he pursues Edith hard, and the naïve girl is immediately swept off her feet – even if she, and everyone else, isn’t quite sure what to make of Thomas’ dour sister Lucille (Jessica Chastain), who is always around and always watching. Things happen, and Edith ends up marrying Thomas, and returning to his dilapidated estate in England – full of weird noises, and secrets.

Allerdale Hall is the name of the estate – and it is masterpiece of production design. The estate is built on red clay – which was responsible for the family fortune, and which Thomas is still trying to find ways to mine to restore it. But the house has fallen into such deep disrepair, that parts of the roof are missing, and leaves, and eventually snow, sprinkle down throughout the house, as the blood red clay seeps in through the floorboards. When you run a bath, you have to let it go for minute – because at first, the water looks like blood because of the clay. Allerdale Hall is, like Manderlay in Rebecca or Thorndale Hall in Jane Eyre, is a large place, with rooms that Edith is not supposed go into, and lots of strange noises. Thomas is clearly hiding something – and seems a little bit more standoffish than before – they haven’t even consummated their marriage yet. And Lucille is always watching – like Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca or Claude Rains’ mother in Notorious – but Edith cannot quite pin down what it is that bothers her so much about her.

The actors in the film are mainly used as props by del Toro – he cast them because they look the part, and they do that wonderfully. Wasikowska, quietly building up one of the most impressive resumes of any actress of her generation, looks wonderful as the naïve woman, stalking through the dark house with a candelabra. Huddleston has the right roguish charm to play Thomas – and the right notes of cowardice later on. Chastain is made to look harsh and severe as Lucille – you know eventually whatever secrets are going to spill out, are going to come from her. Del Toro makes the most of these actors – favoring close-ups often. The trio is so good – with an assist from Charlie Hunnam – that for most of the runtime you forget just how one dimensional all the characters are – we know who they are from the beginning, and we’re right. When the third act starts monologuing, it hurts the film a little, although these types of films always include a healthy dose of monologuing.

Crimson Peak is a probably a little long for its own good. I loved the look of the film from the start, and I found the film a refreshing change for the standard horror movie that I had been expecting. Still, once del Toro establishes his story, he ends up taking it precisely where you think he will, and he takes a little too long to get there. Some critics have complained that the film is not scary – and that’s true, it’s not. But it does so much else, does it have to be scary too? The film will take it’s time finding its audience – it’s a film that I almost want to recommend to my mother – who counts Jane Eyre as one of her favorite books – but I worry she’ll be turned off by all the blood. Those who like the blood may well be turned off by the fact that it’s basically a love story. Del Toro has made this film for a very specific audience – it may be small, but I think they’ll love it more than I did when they find it.

Movie Review: Pacific Rim

Pacific Rim
Directed by: Guillermo del Toro.
Written by: Travis Beacham & Guillermo del Toro.
Starring: Charlie Hunnam (Raleigh Becket), Idris Elba (Stacker Pentecost), Rinko Kikuchi (Mako Mori), Charlie Day (Dr. Newton Geiszler), Burn Gorman (Gottlieb), Max Martini (Herc Hansen), Robert Kazinsky (Chuck Hansen), Clifton Collins Jr. (Ops Tendo Choi), Ron Perlman (Hannibal Chau), Diego Klattenhoff (Yancy Becket).

On the surface, Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim seems like any other summer blockbuster – full of explosions, special effects and pointless 3-D. And if that’s all you want from Pacific Rim it delivers the goods. The film was marketed almost as Transformers vs. Godzilla – and no one who walks into the theater expecting that will go away disappointed. The fight sequences between the giant robots – known as Jaegers and the reptilian or fish like monsters – known as Kaijis – are great. Unlike Michael Bay, del Toro doesn’t get lost in rapid fire editing, and movement for movement sake – you can always tell where everything is in relation to each other, as del Toro is a master of special relations in this film – something that seemingly few directors today are. But del Toro’s film is a little bit more than a typical blockbuster – at least this summer’s blockbusters. There is a human story that he never loses site of. And there are moments that truly tap into the audiences fear. While the film is effective at being a big, dumb action movie, it’s a little deeper than it first appears. It’s still not a great film – but in a summer that has largely left me wanting more from the blockbusters, it’s as good as we’re likely to get.

The plot is really quite simple. It’s 2020 and 7 years ago (or in 2013 – watch out!) a transport between dimensions was discovered deep in the Pacific ocean. Nothing humans have can enter this “rip”, and they cannot destroy it. But the Kaiji can get through – and they do, laying waste to coastal cities along the Pacific ocean. With humanity on the brink of collapse, countries put aside their differences and started the Jaeger program – essentially huge robots, that are piloted by two men, who are mentally connected with each other – and the robot. This was successful for years – but the Kaiji keep getting bigger, and the Jaeger’s are no longer enough to stop them. So politicians, as they always do, decide to abandon the Jaeger program and instead build huge walls (not coincidentally, del Toro is originally from Mexico – although surprisingly, he doesn’t really use these huge walls as a political point). The head of the Jaeger program, Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba) doesn’t like being shut down – and he has a plan to once and for all end the war. But most of the Jaeger pilots have been killed, and he only has a few robots left. So he calls on Raleigh Becket (Charlie Hunnam), who was once a Jaeger pilot, but was connected to his brother as he was killed by a Kaiji, and left the program, for one last go. He needs a new co-pilot however – and wouldn’t the adorable and brilliant Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi), haunted by her own traumatic memories, be perfect. There are only three other teams left – one from China, one from Russia, and one from Australia, and together, they are going to shut down the portal. How? Two bickering geniuses Geiszler (Charlie Day) and Gottlieb (Burn Gorman) seem to have the answer.

I’m not going to try and argue that the movie is at all original – my anime obsessed wife was so incensed by the preview she texted me that they were just ripping off the old series Evangelion (she has a point), and of course del Toro borrows liberally from old monster movies – mainly out of Japan like Godzilla and his ilk. Giant monsters have been a staple of science fiction movies for decades now – although you don’t see them much anymore. But del Toro, a movie geek at heart, wanted to bring them back – bigger and better than ever before. And he does that.

Pacific Rim is large scale Hollywood filmmaking at its finest. The movie has all the action anyone could ever want – and it’s handled with skill – and the special effects are probably the best I have seen in a movie so far this year. I’m on record as not being a fan of 3-D (I avoid it when I can, which I couldn’t this time) – but I will say that while I didn’t see much of a point to the 3-D here – it didn’t really enhance anything, except in a few, quiet moments – it doesn’t really detract from the movie either. And with 3-D, that’s pretty much the best we can expect.

The movie snuck up on me though, to the point where I didn’t really realized how involved I was – how much I cared about the characters – until fairly late in the movie. True, Hunnam’s Becket is a kind of one-dimensional hero with a tortured past – but he plays it well. Day provides quite a bit of comic relief in his role – especially when paired with Ron Perelman who has a great moment that will remind some of Deep Blue Sea. Most of the rest of the cast does what is required of them, and little more. The two standouts however and Kikuchi and Elba. Kikuchi, who was marvelous in her Oscar nominated performance in Babel, and the best thing about The Brothers Bloom, creates a real character out of Mako – who could have easily just been the token cute girl they throw into the movie. Here backstory – told in the film’s best sequence, which is probably the best sequence in any blockbuster this year – truly is terrifying, even if you can see it coming before it gets there. More surprising however is Elba – who for much of the movie seems like a square jawed, one dimensional military man who screams a lot. But there is a real person underneath that, which Elba nails.

I’m not going to try and say that Pacific Rim is some sort of masterpiece – it isn’t. Like many blockbusters, it is hampered by studio demands, who get a large say in what goes into the movie they are spending a few hundred million making. But del Toro plays the game better than most – delivering a movie that the studio wants, while also making something that fits into his filmography. Del Toro is at his best in smaller scale movies – like The Devil’s Backbone or Pan’s Labyrinth – but when he steps in and makes a big budget, Hollywood film – like Blade II or the original Hellboy – he makes something wholly his own. Pacific Rim comes close to that as well. The film is fun and entertaining – big budget filmmaking on a grand scale – both in terms of its action and special effects, and the emotions of the movie. Out of all the big blockbusters so far this year, Pacific Rim may just be the best.