While nothing will fill the hole in my heart left by the tragic death of Hellboy 3, Guillermo del Toro fans have a lot to be excited about. His new film, The Shape of Water , just debuted at the Venice Film Festival and is getting some great early buzz. While promoting the film, del Toro also spoke about his next project, a stop motion adaptation of Pinocchio.
Del Toro first mentioned the Pinocchio project in an interview with Bloodydisgusting in 2008, but since then he has remained mostly silent on it. In Venice, we learned his Pinocchio will explicitly be an anti-fascist film, set in Italy under the reign of Mussolini. We have his full quote from the Italian language film site, Cinefilos.it. Translation via google:
"I have puppets and ready-made concepts but lack the money. It is also true that I try to complicate my life alone, because when I wanted to make Hellboy nobody liked the idea of a superhero movie, for Pacific Rim nobody wanted to see giant robots fighting monsters and the Labyrinth of the Fauna, no one wanted to produce a film about that period of Spanish history. I admit that wanting to tell the story of an anti-fascist Pinocchio during the rise of Mussolini, I also do not make life easy. I need $35 million. If you had them you would make me a happy Mexican."
Hard to think of a better time for an anti-fascist fantasy story than right now. So if anyone has $35 million, please make del Toro a happy Mexican.
In the meantime, we still have The Shape of Water to be excited about. The Shape of Water is set in Cold War America in 1963, and stars a Sally Hawkins as a lonely worker in a research facility who discovers a strange aquatic creature who is part of the lab’s experiments. She forms a bond with the creature and comes into conflict with Michael Shannon, who plays a higher-up at the lab. Inserting a fantasy film into a historic period led to one of del Toro’s greatest successes and my favorite of his films, Pan’s Labyrinth. Here’s the newest trailer for the film and here’s the official synopsis:
“From master story teller Guillermo del Toro, comes THE SHAPE OF WATER – an other-worldly fairy tale, set against the backdrop of Cold War-era America circa 1963. In the hidden high-security government laboratory where she works, lonely Elisa (Sally Hawkins) is trapped in a life of silence and isolation. Elisa’s life is changed forever when she and co-worker Zelda (Octavia Spencer) discover a secret classified experiment. Rounding out the cast are Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Michael Stuhlbarg and Doug Jones.”
The Shape of Water will release in the U.S. on Dec. 8.
