Eleven years after Pan’s Labyrinth that did not get the Oscar even if, according to lots of critique, it deserved it, Guillermo Del Toro comes back with a new fantastic film: The Shape of Water, a great favourite for the Oscars 2018 run. The film already dominates the Golden Globes in terms of nomination (best motion picture drama, best performance of an actress in a drama for Sally Hawkins, best performance by an actor in a supporting role for Richard Jenkins, best performance by an actress in a supporting role for Octavia Spencer, best director, best screenplay and best original score). The movie actually won the Golden Globes for best director last weekend, and also already won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, one of the most important and renowned festivals of the circuit. Is The Shape of Water Del Toro’s masterpiece?
The events of the film happen in the 1960’s, in a top-secret governmental laboratory where Elisa (Sally Hawkins) and Zelda (Octavia Spencer) work at night as janitors. One night, the scientific unit integrates a new creature in its centre in order to study it and to establish the opportunities that this being can offer them, especially in the context of the special conquest. The race for this conquest is indeed marking the époque through the rivalry that opposed the Americans to the Russians. The creature is a strange but yet magnificent marine being, half-amphibian and half-human. The autochthones of the Amazonian used to worship the creature before the cruel colonel Richard Strickland (Michael Shannon) captured it in order to analyse and torture it. Elisa discovers the creature and quickly empathizes with it She is indeed mute, and consequently identifies deeply with this mutant creature that sees her for who she is, and not as a poor dumb mute soul like the others do. She even starts to fall in love with the creature. Therefore, when the military plans to kill the man-animal in order to dissect it and analyse him in depth, Elisa decides to make the creature to escape with the help of her neighbour and friend (Richard Jenkins).
A modern fairy-tale
The critique and the spectators compare a lot The Shape of Water with Del Toro’s previous masterpiece Pan’s Labyrinth because of their fantastical and fairy-tale like dimension. This story of a brave and clever young woman who falls in love with a creature considered as monstrous also reminds The Beauty and the Beast. The film’s strength is to adapt this old story to our current context. The true heroes of the film are all outsiders that the society rejects: Elisa is handicapped because of her incapacity to talk; her neighbour Giles is an unemployed homosexual who has to hide his true nature in the prudish America of the 1960’s while fighting to find a job; Zelda is a black young woman who has to face the omnipresent racism; and the creature itself is defined as monstrous because of its difference. Their difference is what gathers them, and their desire to be respected for who they are is what guides them in their quest. It might seem easy to make a parallel between this ultra-conservative society of the 60’s that rejects what differs from the norm and the current American society and its ascent of racism. This comparison is nonetheless truly spot-on.
A movie that spells the end of our model of masculinity
The colonel Strickland’s character represents really well this mentality. Strickland is the symbol the white male who “takes a piss the hand on his heaps” and who imagines God in his own image. He is the incarnation of the modern Human who is both ultra-conservative in his thought because he constantly needs to reaffirm its dominance on the things he judges “disgusting”- the things that are different from him-, and ultra-liberal in his actions, as he aims for a progress conducing to a constant material enrichment. This man, who has more consideration for the luxury objects like his Cadillac than for living beings, is probably the most interesting character of the film because he is the less Manichean one. Indeed, if he is a model of cruelty and wickedness, the colonel Strickland is not deprived of quality. He is a charismatic, brave and determined man. In short, he represents the model promulgated by our current society that never misses an occasion to remind us how important it is to “fight to reach one’s objectives” while “looking good”. The colonel Strickland is consequently a perfect incarnation of the modern man. His presence in the movie functions as a mirror hold out by Del Toro to show us what our best parts and our worst one look like. The numerous scenes where the colonel faces his reflexion in the glass vouch for this hypothesis. The screenwriters, by amputating this man from two fingers, seem nonetheless to tell us that this model of virility is nowadays completely obsolete and has to change if it does not want to be completely out-dated in the modern world. Because he wants to become the incarnation of an almighty God that owns the power on the life of those he considers weaker, the colonel risks to cause his own loss. Michael Shannon is excellent in this role and offers a performance that is both very sinister and magnetic.
Touching performances
The quality of the actors is generalised in this movie, as we can guess seeing their selection in all the correspondent categories. Even if he is not selected for the Golden Globes, Michael Shannon is truly perfect in the role of the colonel. His magnetic gaze and his deep voice suit very well the man who materializes the rupture of masculinity. Sally Hawkins is really impressive in her incarnation of a mute young woman who does not fit in. She signs with grace and act with expressivity and thus succeeds in transmitting a lot of emotions through her facial expressions and her moves. Richard Jenkins is for his part very touching. He incarnates perfectly the masculine character that counterbalances the colonel Strickland. If Giles and the colonel are both animated by the desire to succeed, Giles is able to accept his weaknesses. He is afflicted because he ages and has no one in his life, but he does not give up. Nonetheless, his ascent does not imply to crush the others, contrarily to the colonel’s one. As usual, Jenkins uses his very expressive gaze to materialize both the fragility and the determination of his character.
Cinematography of hope
The cinematography is rather efficient too. The film resituates very well the ambiance of the 60’s while furnishing a visual atmosphere that corresponds perfectly to the theme of the film. All the shades of green are used, from the pale and gloomy green of the laboratory to the beautiful marine green of the creature. Green is the colour of hope, and as the hope grows in the film, this colour becomes stronger and stronger.
An enchanting creature
The creature is especially interesting visually. Despite the diversity of his already existing bestiary, Del Toro succeeds in creating a being that has never been seen before. The texture of its scales is fascinating, the grace of his moves is hypnotising and the humanity of his gaze is striking. Additionally, the director achieves to generate an interesting feeling among his spectators when he approaches the romance between this character and Elisa. Indeed, it is rather perturbing to see this human falling in love with a hybrid animal. If it is difficult to really know what was the objective of the director when he decided to produce this surprising feeling, it is nonetheless interesting for the audience to feel something stronger at this peculiar moment than during the rest of the film.
A classical storyline
Indeed, if the idea is original and the film is full of fantasy, the progress of the story is for its part quite classical. Once they have seen the introduction that plunges the spectator in the film’s universe, the spectators do not really feel any surprise anymore, as the screenplay remains predictable. The characters are not really clichés, but they are really not complex either. The heroine excluded from society because of her handicap, the good and funny black friend, the gay and super-sensitive friend… All of those has been seen before and is not really subtle. As said previously, the colonel’s character distinguishes himself from the others, but only if you try to read this character from another standpoint than the first degree. Indeed, at first, Michael Shannon’s character seems purely cupid and evil. The fact that the film borrows from the fairy-tale universe justifies a bit the simplicity of the characters; however, it does not belong to a dimension that is sufficiently enchanting to really excuse this weakness.
A lack of enchantment
This lack of enchantment comes probably from the film’s cinematography. Indeed, if the colorimetry is really interesting, it is not necessarily the case of the framings and their composition. It is a pity, because the themes that the film approaches (the difference, the fear that it can produce, the love of knowledge, the questioning of the masculinity’s supremacy) would have been emphasized by a more symbolical cinematography. The movie could have become a complete fairy-tale, and therefore justify the lack of layer of its characters and the lack of surprise of its scenario, if it had benefited from more visual metaphors.
A dark fairy-tale that lacks of enchantment and of darkness
In sum, The Shape of Water is a dark fantastic film very enjoyable to watch. Its images are very beautiful, and the actors are excellent. Del Toro succeeds in providing his fairy-tale with a reflexion about the society of nowadays in a way that is probably not subtle, but nonetheless very efficient. However, the movie does not reach its fullest potential, which is very sad considering the strength of the subjects its approaches. Despite having an aesthetic and a style that are really similar to the ones of Pan’s Labyrinth, The Shape of Water does not reach the level of Del Toro’s previous masterpiece, which was way more darker and unpredictable than his new film. Now that he works in and for American studios, the director furnishes a weaken version of what he can do, and unfortunately, his all stars cast is not sufficient to save the movie from its lack of magic.
