Loved this - well deserved it's Oscar plaudits....

Rating: 8/10 (13 January 2020)

I appreciate that this probably isn't to everyone's taste - but I really enjoyed it. Set in 1960s America this is a story about a mute woman "Elisa" (Sally Hawkins) who ends up working as a cleaner at a top secret military facility where an aquatic creature is being held captive/experimented upon. Over the course of the film, she befriends him and they establish a bond despite the cruel treatment he is receiving from a truly unpleasant "Colonel Strickland" (Michael Shannon). Octavia Spencer is also superb as her close friend who interprets for her and ends up being her partner in crime. This is story about humanity (and inhumanity), trust, hope and ultimately vengeance filmed in a magnificently enigmatic fashion by Guillermo del Toro and scored by Alexandre Desplat.