The Shape of Water

The Shape of Water is a 2017 period romantic dark fantasy film directed and produced by Guillermo del Toro, who co-wrote the screenplay with Vanessa Taylor. It stars Sally Hawkins, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Doug Jones, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Octavia Spencer. Set in 1962 Baltimore, Maryland, the film follows a mute cleaner at a high-security government laboratory who falls in love with a captured humanoid amphibian creature and decides to help him escape from death at the hands of an evil colonel. Filming took place on location in Ontario, Canada, from August to November 2016.
The Shape Of Water was screened as part of the main competition in the 74th Venice International Film Festival, where it premiered on August 31, 2017, and was awarded the Golden Lion. It was also screened at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival. It began a limited release in two theaters in New York City on December 1, 2017, before expanding wide on December 22, and grossed $195 million worldwide.
The Shape of Water was widely acclaimed by critics, who lauded its acting, screenplay, direction, visuals, production design, cinematography, and musical score. The American Film Institute selected it as one of the top ten films of 2017. The film was nominated for a leading thirteen awards at the 90th Academy Awards, winning four, including Best Picture and Best Director, and received numerous other accolades; it was the second fantasy film to win Best Picture, after The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003). A novelization by del Toro and Daniel Kraus was published on March 6, 2018.
In 1962, during the Cold War, Elisa Esposito works as a janitor in a secret government laboratory in Baltimore, Maryland. Found abandoned by the side of a river as an infant with scars on her neck, Elisa is mute and communicates through sign language, and lives a routine life in an apartment above a movie theater. Her only friends are her closeted middle-aged neighbor Giles, an advertising illustrator, and her coworker Zelda.
Colonel Richard Strickland has captured a mysterious creature from a South American river and taken it to the facility for study. Elisa discovers it is a humanoid amphibian, and eventually bonds with the creature after routinely visiting him in secret.
Seeking to exploit the Amphibian Man's respiration for an advantage in the Space Race, General Frank Hoyt is persuaded by Strickland to vivisect it to examine its biology. Robert Hoffstetler, a scientist who is secretly a Russian spy named Dimitri Mosenkov, pleads unsuccessfully to Strickland to keep him alive for further study, while simultaneously ordered by his Soviet handlers to kill the creature to prevent this.
When Elisa learns what awaits the Amphibian Man, she begs Giles to help her liberate him. He refuses at first, but has a change of heart after failing a work assignment and being rejected by a local restaurant manager, who he discovers is racist and homophobic.
Hoffstetler learns of Elisa's plan and chooses to assist her. Though initially reluctant, Zelda also becomes involved in the escape. They successfully get the Amphibian Man to Elisa's apartment. Elisa plans to release him into a nearby canal when heavy rain will allow access to the ocean, keeping him in her bathtub in the meantime. Strickland interrogates Elisa and Zelda, among others, but learns nothing.
The Amphibian Man later encounters one of Giles's cats and devours it. When Giles tries to stop him, he frightfully slashes Giles's arm and flees the apartment. He gets as far as the cinema before Elisa finds him and returns him upstairs. The creature touches Giles on his balding head and wounded arm. The next morning, Giles discovers his hair is regrowing and the wounds on his arm have healed. Elisa continues to develop her relationship with the Amphibian Man, culminating in sexual intercourse.
General Hoyt unexpectedly arrives at the laboratory and tells Strickland he must recover the Amphibian Man in 36 hours or his career will be over. Meanwhile, Hoffstetler is told by his handlers that he will be extracted from the US in two days. As the likely release date approaches, the Amphibian Man's health begins to deteriorate.
Hoffstetler goes to meet his handlers, with Strickland following. At the rendezvous, Hoffstetler is shot. Strickland intervenes, shooting the handlers. Realizing that Hoffstetler is a spy, Strickland tortures the dying man into revealing the Amphibian Man's whereabouts; when he alludes to Elisa and Zelda, Strickland confronts the latter in her home. She refuses to divulge anything, but her husband Brewster reveals that Elisa has the Amphibian Man. Zelda immediately telephones Elisa and warns her to release the creature. Strickland finds Elisa's apartment empty and ransacks it until he finds evidence of the creature in the bathtub and a calendar note revealing where she plans to release the Amphibian Man.
At the canal, Elisa and Giles are bidding farewell to the creature when Strickland arrives, knocks Giles down, and shoots both the Amphibian Man and Elisa. The Amphibian Man heals himself and fatally slashes Strickland's throat. As the police arrive on the scene with Zelda, the Amphibian Man takes Elisa and jumps into the canal. When he applies his healing powers to the scars on Elisa's neck by giving her kiss, they open to reveal gills like his, reviving her. Elisa and the Amphibian Man embrace.
It was co-produced between the United States and Mexico. The film was directed by Guillermo del Toro from a screenplay he co-wrote with Vanessa Taylor. Del Toro formed the idea for The Shape of Water over breakfast in December 2011 with Daniel Kraus, his future collaborator on the novel Trollhunters. It was primarily inspired by del Toro's childhood memories of seeing Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) and wanting to see the Gill-man and Kay Lawrence (played by Julie Adams) succeed in their romance.
When del Toro was in talks with Universal to direct a remake of Creature from the Black Lagoon, he tried pitching a version focused more on the creature's perspective, where the Creature ended up together with the female lead, but the studio executives rejected the concept. Additionally, the film also shows similarities to the 2015 short film The Space Between Us.
In placing the film in the 1960s, del Toro said "the movie is a movie about our problems today and about demonizing the other and about fearing or hating the other, and how that is a much more destructive position than learning to love and understand [...] if I say once upon a time in 1962, it becomes a fairy tale for troubled times. People can lower their guard a little bit more and listen to the story and listen to the characters and talk about the issues, rather than the circumstances of the issues."
A fan of her performances in Fingersmith (2005) and Happy-Go-Lucky (2008), del Toro wrote the script with Sally Hawkins in mind for the female lead and pitched the idea to her while he was intoxicated at the 2014 Golden Globes. Hawkins prepared for the role by watching films of silent comedians Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, and Stan Laurel from Laurel and Hardy, the last of whom Del Toro told her to watch because he thought Laurel could "do a state of grace without conveying it verbally".
Doug Jones was chosen to portray the Amphibian Man in The Shape of Water, having collaborated with del Toro on Mimic (1997), Hellboy (2004), Pan's Labyrinth (2006), Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008), and Crimson Peak (2015). In an interview with NPR, Jones said his initial reaction to learning the creature would also be a romantic lead was "utter terror" but trusted the director to expand the character's development. As Jones wanted to portray a creature distinct from others in monster films, he practiced a variety of movements in a dance studio. After del Toro told him to make the character "animalistic, but royal and regal", Jones decided to also portray the character as a Matador. The voice of the Amphibian Man was created by supervising sound editor Nathan Robitaille, who combined his own vocalizations, various animal sounds, and recordings of del Toro breathing.
The part of Giles was originally written with Ian McKellen in mind, and del Toro was inspired to do so by his performance in Gods and Monsters as the real-life closeted gay filmmaker James Whale, the director of Frankenstein (1931), The Invisible Man (1933), and Bride of Frankenstein (1935), who found himself unemployable in his later years. When McKellen proved unavailable, del Toro sent an e-mail to Richard Jenkins, who accepted the part.
Michael Shannon was cast as Richard Strickland, the villain of the film. Shannon and del Toro had early conversations about the notion that Strickland would have been the hero of the film if it had been made in the 1950s, something that fascinated the actor. Octavia Spencer, who played the role of Elisa's co-worker, friend, and interpreter Zelda, found it funny that the people del Toro used to speak for the mute main character were people who represent very disenfranchised groups.
Principal photography began on August 15, 2016, in Toronto and Hamilton, Ontario, and wrapped on November 6, 2016. The interior of the Orpheum (the movie theater seen in the film), is that of the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatres in Toronto, while the exterior of the building is the façade of the Victorian Massey Hall, a performing arts theatre not far from the other one. Elisa and Giles's old flats, which in the film are just above the Orpheum, were actually a set built at Cinespace Studios, West Toronto. Parts of the government laboratory was filmed in the Humanities Wing in the John Andrews Building at University of Toronto Scarborough.
Del Toro was torn between making the film in color or in black and white, and was at one point leaning toward the latter. Fox Searchlight Pictures offered del Toro either a $20 million budget to make the film in color or a $17 million budget to shoot it in black and white. Del Toro admitted he was in "a battle I was expecting to lose. I was of two minds. On one hand I thought black and white would look luscious, but on the other hand I thought it would look postmodern, like I was being reflective rather than immersed." As a result, he chose to shoot it in color. In an interview with IndieWire about the film, del Toro said the project was a "healing movie for me", as it allowed him to explore and "speak about trust, otherness, sex, love, where we're going. These are not concerns that I had when I was nine or seven."
Three years before The Shape of Water was released, del Toro met with composer Alexandre Desplat to talk about the film's premise. In January 2017, Desplat was shown a rough cut of the finished film, and finding it similar to a musical, he agreed to compose a score. As a result, Desplat tried to capture the sound of water extensively to have audiences experience a "warm feeling" that is also caused by love. In an interview, he said the melody from the opening scene was "actually made of waves. I did not do that on purpose, but by being completely immersed in this love and these water elements, I wrote a melody that plays arpeggios like waves."
Writing the film score took six weeks; it was purposely composed to create the sense of immersion and to give the "sense that you, yourself, are floating". The two melodies, one titled "Elisa's Theme", are heard at the beginning of the film and later merge into a single piece of music by the end of it. To emphasize this effect and its final result, Desplat changed the sounds of the accompanying flutes, accordions, and whistles to "something blurred". On composing the score overall, he said that it was "a matter of sculpting the music and making it take the shape of the storyline." As a result, Desplat opted out of giving Shannon's character a melody.
The music for The Shape of Water was released on December 1, 2017, by Decca Records. At the 90th Academy Awards, it received the Academy Award for Best Original Score. Desplat noted that "when the movie's that beautiful—and I actually think this movie is a masterpiece—it makes your life much easier. You just have to put your hands on it and it takes you anywhere you want."
The Shape of Water premiered on August 31, 2017, at the 74th Venice International Film Festival, where it was awarded the Golden Lion for best film. It also screened at Telluride Film Festival, the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival, and BFI London Film Festival, among others. The film was released in two theaters in New York City on December 1, 2017, and then expanded to several other cities the following week. It had its official wide release in the United States on December 22, 2017.
On March 13, 2018, the film was released on Blu-ray, DVD, and digital download. Special features on the Ultra HD Blu-ray includes a making-of documentary, two featurettes, a MasterClass Q & A with Guillermo del Toro, an interview with artist James Jean, and three theatrical trailers.
Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water (2017) is constructed to challenge society’s perception of the Other in both a literal and metaphorical sense. The monster of this film is a humanoid amphibian creature stolen from the Amazon by American scientists. While much of pop culture has dismissed this film as a monster-human romance, the imagery and symbolism of this film go far beyond fantasy. Through del Toro’s characterization and intentional humanization of the creature, the creature becomes a metaphor to discuss the “beauty of the Other” (i.e., those marginalized in society).
The sociopolitical context of the film becomes essential to understanding character dynamics; namely the interactions between those with power and those without. In the background of the Cold War and Civil Rights Movement, Black people, people of color, people with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ people continually occupied a lower social class in the United States. Therefore, those belonging to marginalized groups are likely to connect and empathize with the creature as they see their own experiences reflected through the creature’s interactions with the people of authority around him.
As a mute woman and someone who is not visibly Other, Elisa’s acceptance of the creature is interpreted as a testament to the human capacity for compassion and empathy. Her attempt to free the creature from government control, with help from Giles (a gay man) and Zelda (a Black woman), is evidence of solidarity among marginalized communities. Similar to Tod Browning’s Freaks, it is no surprise in this film that those who are also othered by society band together against the oppressive external powers. This may influence “viewers to consider how they too can resist oppression” in the face of institutional monstrous brutality.
For Alberta Adji, “monstrous entities help the audience perceive foreigners as something that is intimate, common, and invaluable.” The film contrasts the two societal approaches to foreigners (e.g., immigrants, refugees, etc.) through the perspectives of Elisa and Dr. Hoffstetler. In science, the creature is a specimen, until the moment the scientist realizes that he is capable of understanding human speech. This scene implies that acceptance relies simply on a person’s ability to communicate in the dominant language around them. However, for Elisa, humanity moves beyond communication as she and the creature are “both without words, they're speechless, and [yet they are] loved.”
The fairytale nature of the story is exploited as a means to humanize the creature; the viewer can look beyond his physically monstrous appearance and focus solely on his actions and behavior which we believe are synonymous with humanity. Stylistic choices, such as the romantic dream sequence between the creature and Elisa, exist as a parallel to Beauty and the Beast; viewers remain in a state of heightened awareness and suspense as they wonder whether the creature will transform into a human. Unlike traditional monster-human romances, this creature “does not die, is not killed, and does not have to become human to be acceptable to others and to live happily ever after.” This sentiment may offer hope to marginalized communities as it emphasizes that they do not need to assimilate in order to be accepted. Therefore, the acceptance of the creature symbolizes a “message of reflection, acceptance, and embracing otherness.”
The film is structured so that we determine humanity through people’s treatment of the creature. If he is a symbol of the Other, Elisa views humanity as compassion and acceptance, regardless of visible differences. For Strickland, that which is different is a threat to his way of living. Furthermore, this film delivers shades of gray through Zelda and Giles; they eventually grow to accept the monster, which can be parallel to an openness to learn and understand others to find that they are much more like us than we previously believed.
By occupying a place in society as something Other, the creature becomes a “metaphorical device for investigating issues involving power, agency, and the boundaries that define and delineate what is human and non-human.” Therefore, del Toro’s humanization of the monstrous is necessary to contrast Strickland’s emergence as the moral monster. For example, in the scene where the creature is tortured by Strickland with the use of an electric cattle prod, viewers are disgusted by the gruesome act of violence perpetrated by the government official while also feeling sympathy for the creature. These sentiments are not only exacerbated by Strickland’s explicit indifference but are also influenced by the human-like behavior of the creature. Immediately, the senselessness of violence demonstrated calls into question Strickland’s humanity and morality.
Viewers are left with a visceral sense of fear and discomfort with the animalistic nature and brutality of Strickland’s actions. This recurring violence becomes a tool to emphasize his monstrosity and solidifies his place as a moral rather than a biological monster. Moreover, Strickland’s monstrosity is a product of the dominant culture; his status in society (as a cisgender, heterosexual White man) “prevents him from examining his flaws,” thus allowing him to inflict violence without reproach. This violence and oppression in the film are synonymous with aggression and marginalization of populations in real life.
Though the film is lauded for its representation of a strong woman with a disability, its main criticism surrounds the romantic relationship between Elisa and the monster. While one can understand del Toro’s intention to find beauty in the Other, viewers find it unfortunate that the messaging could also be seen as the person with a disability is so different from the rest of society that they are unable to gain respect, love, and admiration from anybody but a ‘monster’. Activists with disabilities such as Dominick Evans believe that “[the film] says to [them] that without being cured, [they're] not going to be loved or worthwhile to another human being.” This is furthered by the end scene of the film, as Elisa and the creature appear to leave our world behind. Critics emphasize that despite the romance of the fairytale, this film can be interpreted as “if [people with disabilities] don't fit into society, it's better that [they] leave.” For many, the film is a beautiful take on a love story in which marginalized people find power, strength, and love, while for others, the film leaves them questioning their own place and humanity in the eyes of society.
The Shape of Water grossed $63.9 million in the United States and Canada, and $131.4 million in other countries, for a total of $195.2 million.
After grossing $4.6 million over a three-week limited release, the film began its wide release on December 22, 2017, alongside the openings of Downsizing, Pitch Perfect 3 and Father Figures, and the wide expansion of Darkest Hour, and grossed $3 million from 726 theaters over the weekend, and $4.4 million over the four-day Christmas frame. The following weekend, the film made $3.5 million. The weekend of January 27, 2018, following the announcement of the film's 13 Oscar nominations, the film was added to over 1,000 theaters (for a total of 1,854) and made $5.9 million (an increase of 171% over the previous week's $2.2 million), finishing 8th. The weekend of March 9–11, following its four Oscar wins, the film made an additional $2.4 million. It marked a 64% increase from the previous week's $1.5 million and was similar to the $2.5 million made by the previous year's Best Picture winner, Moonlight.
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 92% based on 465 reviews, with an average rating of 8.3/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "The Shape of Water finds Guillermo del Toro at his visually distinctive best—and matched by an emotionally absorbing story brought to life by a stellar Sally Hawkins performance." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 87 out of 100, based on 53 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave it positive reviews; audience members under the age of 40 gave the film an average grade of either "A+" or "A", while those over 40 gave it an "A" to "A−", on an A+ to F scale; PostTrak reported that filmgoers gave the film an overall positive score of 80%.
Ben Croll of IndieWire gave the film an 'A' rating and called it "one of del Toro's most stunningly successful works... also a powerful vision of a creative master feeling totally, joyously free." Writing for Rolling Stone, Peter Travers gave the film three and a half out of four stars, praising Hawkins's performance, the cinematography and del Toro's direction, and saying: "Even as the film plunges into torment and tragedy, the core relationship between these two unlikely lovers holds us in thrall. Del Toro is a world-class film artist. There's no sense trying to analyze how he does it." For the Minnesota Daily, Haley Bennett reacted positively, writing, "The Shape of Water has tenderness uncommon to del Toro films. ... While The Shape of Water isn't groundbreaking, it is elegant and mesmerizing."
Rex Reed of the New York Observer gave the film one out of four stars, calling it "a loopy, lunkheaded load of drivel" and that "the whole movie is off the wall". Reed's review was criticized for referring to Hawkins's mute character as "mentally handicapped" and for falsely crediting actor Benicio del Toro (spelled Benecio) as the film's director. Reed also stated Benicio was Spanish, whereas he is Puerto Rican; Guillermo del Toro hails from Mexico.
The Shape of Water received 13 nominations at the 90th Academy Awards, the most of any film in the 2018 race. It won in four categories: Best Production Design, Best Original Score, Best Director, and Best Picture. It was the second fantasy film to win Best Picture, after The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003). The Shape of Water was acclaimed by critics, who lauded its acting, screenplay, direction, visuals, production design, and musical score. The American Film Institute selected it as one of the top 10 films of the year. At the 75th Golden Globe Awards, the film earned seven nominations, winning for Best Director and Best Original Score. It received twelve nominations at the 71st British Academy Film Awards, winning three awards including Best Director, and fourteen at the 23rd Critics' Choice Awards, winning four awards.
The film also sparked some debate about whether it should have been eligible for a Canadian Screen Awards nomination, as it was filmed in Canada with a predominantly Canadian crew and many Canadian actors in supporting roles. Under Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television rules, to qualify for CSA nominations under the rules for international coproductions, at least 15 percent of a film's funding must come from a Canadian film studio. Even the film's Canadian co-producer, J. Miles Dale, stated that he supports the rules and does not believe the film should have been eligible. The Shape of Water also appeared on many critics' year-end top-ten lists, of which 25 critics chose it as their favorite film of that year. A novelization by del Toro and Kraus was published on March 6, 2018.
In February 2018, the estate of Paul Zindel initiated a lawsuit in United States District Court for the Central District of California against director Guillermo del Toro and associate producer Daniel Kraus, alleging that The Shape of Water "brazenly copies the story, elements, characters, and themes" of Zindel's 1969 work Let Me Hear You Whisper, which depicts a cleaning lady bonding with a dolphin and attempting to rescue it from a secret research laboratory's nefarious uses. The complaint spends more than a dozen pages detailing alleged "overwhelming similarities" between the works. Del Toro denied the claim of the Zindel estate, saying that "I have never read nor seen the play. I'd never heard of this play before making The Shape of Water, and none of my collaborators ever mentioned the play." Distributor Fox Searchlight also denied the claim and said that it would "vigorously defend" itself in court.
In July 2018, Judge Percy Anderson dismissed the suit and stated that del Toro and Fox Searchlight were entitled to recover their legal costs. On April 5, 2021, the following statement by plaintiff was released: "David Zindel, the son of Paul Zindel, author of Let Me Hear You Whisper, acknowledges, based on confidential information obtained during the litigation process, that his claims of plagiarism are unfounded. He acknowledges Guillermo del Toro as the true creator of The Shape of Water. Any similarity between the two works is coincidental."
There have also been accusations that The Shape of Water plagiarised Amphibian Man, a 1962 Soviet film based on a 1928 novel of the same name by Alexander Belyaev. Indie Cinema Magazine noted that both have a similar plot, the use of the name "Amphibian Man" in both films, the Soviet connection in both stories, and the 1962 setting. Amphibian Man was one of the highest-grossing Soviet films of all time, with up to 100 million box office admissions in the Soviet Union.
The film also received accusations of plagiarism by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the French director of the romantic comedy Amélie and the cult classic Delicatessen, who claimed that del Toro plagiarized some of the scenes within his works Amelie, Delicatessen, and The City of Lost Children. Other observers vehemently disagree with Jeunet's assertion. Jeunet pointed out some of the similarities in the saturation of the colours, overall art direction and the use of anthropomorphic objects, as well as the music, which is reminiscent of Yann Tiersen's soundtrack on the former. Responding to Jeunet's accusations of plagiarism, del Toro cited the influences of Terry Gilliam's works as the inspiration for The Shape of Water. Both composer Alexandre Desplat and del Toro have cited French composer Georges Delerue, whose work predates Tiersen's by decades, as the inspiration for the musical score. Desplat has also emphasized the importance of water as essential to both the score and to the themes of the film itself.
While covering the plagiarism accusations from Jeunet and Zindel, comparisons were also drawn between The Shape of Water and the 2015 short film "The Space Between Us", the latter of which was created by Marc S. Nollkaemper as a student project at the Netherlands Film Academy. Outlets reported that both films held a similar premise, that of a janitorial worker falling in love with an amphibious man held captive at a research facility, as well as other similarities such as the time period as well as "scenes in which the woman feeds the creature and dances to records in front of it; and rescue missions, both involving laundry carts, devised after plans to kill and dissect the creatures come to light." After screening a copy of The Shape of Water, the Netherlands Film Academy and students issued a statement acknowledging the films as uniquely different and that "They have separate timelines of development and are not in any conceivable way interlinked or related."