REVIEW: Masterfully-Made "The Shape of Water" Unfortunately Exposes More Than It Should Below the Surface

If I told you about her, the princess without voice, what would I say? ~Giles, The Shape of Water

Guillermo del Toro's latest period-fantasy, about a mute cleaning lady in the 1950s who discovers (and falls for) a mysterious creature, has been gaining universal acclaim for its visual and visceral impact, including its lead performance from the remarkable and infectious Sally Hawkins (Happy-Go-Lucky, Blue Jasmine). Set during the Cold War era, Hawkins and Octavia Spencer play cleaning ladies at a testing facility, when a mysterious asset is brought in. Hawkin's Elisa forms a special bond (well, more than a special one) with the creature and eventually plans to break him out.

The central characters are three-dimensional and perfectly cast. Elisa lives above a movie theater (talk about fantasy and reality living next door to each other), boils eggs (a key visual motif) every day, and goes by daily routine. Her neighbor Giles (an unrecognizable Richard Jenkins) is an unemployed artist and closeted gay man who seems to be at the end of his rope. Elisa's friend Zelda (Spencer, as always, chews the scenery) often speaks for the both of them, Zelda being the more stern one. Facility head Strickland plans to tear apart the beast for testing and examining. (Michael Shannon is, as always, great at being effectively menacing, even when he does it subtly and quietly.) A fellow scientist, Dr. Hoffstetler (a compelling Michael Stuhlbarg), who may secretly be a Russian spy, empathizes with the asset and wants to understand it more. "This creature is intelligent, capable of language and understanding"

Sally Hawkins and Doug Jones

The visual impact of The Shape of Water is breathtaking, and complete with a captivating and fantastical score by Alexandre Desplat. It's as if del Toro and Desplat combines influences from Creature from the Black Lagoon (one of del Toro's favorite films), The Little Mermaid, Amelie, and French arthouse cinema into a beautiful and frightening fairy-tale world. There are also homages to classic film, from musicals to Biblical epics. The same goes for the Sixties era, from the recreation of vintage TV boxes to products like Corn Flakes, and jazz music by Benny Goodman for dancing and romanticizing. This is visceral and masterful filmmaking, for sure, and del Toro is certainly a pro, as his previous awards-winner Pan's Labyrinth (one of my favorite films of the past two decades) proved. With expert camerawork, suspenseful timing, and the aforementioned score and performances as key components (del Toro veteran Doug Jones plays the creature incredibly believable, although more time could've been spent on his backstory), this is a story of love and loss, and "the monster who tried to destroy it" (a possible nod to Victor Hugo's duel theme in Hunchback of Notre Dame). It's also a story about longing, connections, and distances, to and from family and close friends. The way Hawkins signs and expresses with her face most of the time is, for one, evocative.

But then there's all that problematic sexual content and "graphic nudity" that the R-rating has been warning us about. Hawkins is an amazing actress, but do we really need to see her without clothes so much? Take into equal account a character who masturbates in a bathtub, graphic bloody images, some misguided references to Scripture, and unnecessary conversations about said sexuality (potentially uncontrolled emotions and hormones) What are we to make of this in a culture that currently brings awareness to sexual misconduct, complicity, and exploitation? Is on-screen nudity really any different?

Richard Jenkins

Writer Adam R. Holz sums it up best:

So deep is that longing [from Elisa], of course, that she's quick to enter into not just an emotional relationship with the aquatic amphibian alien she rescues, but a physical one as well. And at that point, the wonder-filled innocence that's filled much of the movie falls away as quickly as her bathrobe does.

I think [del Toro] could have told this unconventional love story without including the graphic nudity the camera repeatedly gazes at, and without the clear implication of an interspecies sexual relationship.

But that is not the story he's chosen to tell. What we have instead is a fairy tale that is at times sweetly sentimental, other times exceedingly explicit.

Yes, that about sums it up.