Comic book fable

Rating: 6/10 (8 November 2019)

Giulleromo del Toro's 'The Shape of Water' is a beautiful visual enterprise, set in a surreally exaggerated, but immaculately imagined and rendered alternative version of 1950s America. It's also a poetic love story. But behind the beautiful cosmetic detail, there's no real story beyond a straightforward account of good versus evil and love versus hate; there's simply no way to identify with the characters, attractive or repulsive, in the way one relates to normal, flawed human beings. There are rare movies (I can think of 'Edward Scissorhands' or 'Delicatessen') which tell a profound human story within a stylised fantasy universe. Without that, what we're left with feels very much like a comic book: it may be beautifully drawn, but there's no depth to what's portrayed.