Del Toro's Magic

Rating: 9/10 (10 January 2018)

Guillermo Del Toro continues the magic he started with Pan's Labyrinth, my favorite movie of 2006, and Roger Ebert's. Sally Hawkins stars as a mute woman living in isolation who works at a top secret government facility who have captured a reptile like being who looks like the creature from the black lagoon. Del Toro was obviously influenced by 1960's American movies and television. Michael Shannon plays the requisite sadistic bad guy in charge of keeping the half man, half beast tamed, often with a cattle prod. Hawkin's, of course, falls in love with the lizard man and must help to save him from the evildoers. The Shape of Water is not a children's fairy tale, as Hawkins is often quite naked in the film. Along with Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri and Get Out, I would be satisfied with any number of Oscar's for all three.