Guillermo del Toro: The world breaks your heart, but you carry on

Ever since he was achild, Guillermo del Toro has been fascinated by Mary Shelley’s ​‘Frankenstein’. It is the story of aman who played God, and his complicated creation has remained aconstant influence for the filmmaker. Indeed, for much of his career he has been vocal in his yearning to adapt the novel for the screen, and the kernel of his desire can be seen in films such as Cronos, Blade II, Crimson Peak, The Shape of Water and Pinocchio. Finally, adream 30years in the making is being realised: del Toro’s operatic vision of Frankenstein brings together Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi and Mia Goth for atour de force fairy tale about the human need to reach beyond the possible, and what makes aheart beat andbreak.

LWLies: It must feel strange for you to finally be talking about having made this film, after talking about making it for manyyears.

Del Toro: It feels very strange. There’s aline in the movie that Iwrote for me, and it has become true – ​‘Having reached the end of the world, there was no horizon left, and the achievement felt unnatural.’ And Ihave had the most massive postpartum period with this film. I’ve never had anything like it. Normally you get aweek, I’ve had almost ayear. I’m good friends with David Cronenberg, and many years ago he said to me, ​‘You have to scare yourself into being young again. When you do amovie that you feel concludes something, do something really different after.’ And Iam trying to do that, but it still is disorienting. Iremember when Iwas writing ascript for ​‘The Count of Monte Cristo’, Itried to think, ​‘How would revenge feel after Monte Cristo has been aprisoner for years and years?’ And Ithought ​‘Emptiness.’ He would not make sense of the world without the vengeance. Ifeel likethat.

Which is, Iimagine, bizarre to say to people.

I mean Iam also excited, but the only thing Ican compare it to – and it sounds unfair – but it’s when somebody in your family dies. It’s like somebody takes ascoop and takes apiece of the cosmos. That’s how it feels. When you lose somebody and you don’t want to erase the number from your cell phone. It feels like, how can Iget hold of this and never let it go? The funny thing is the experience of making this film was as good or better than Iever imagined. There’s no disappointment. Ithink that actually contributes to the hollowness.

It’s interesting you mentioned Cronenberg because Ispoke to him for the first time afew months ago, and we were talking about what you give away when you make afilm, and the way it goes out into the world and you lose control of it alittle bit. That’s because people are going to have their own reaction and they’re going to take ownership of it. He said, ​‘It’s not worth worrying about that sort of thing, because you really don’t have control over it.’ Iget the sense that, for you, it feels abit more personal.

Up until apoint. David said something very beautiful when Iinterviewed him once: ​‘A filmmaker has to have two skins – athin one for the art and athick one for the promotion and destiny of the movie.’ And you know, if an audience or the critics at the moment don’t like your movie, Ihave learnt through the years that that’s not the end of it. The Devil’s Backbone came out almost secretly, and to many people now, myself included, it is one of their favourites. So you have time. There’s such athing as asecond chance.

The history of Frankenstein’s Creature is ahistory of being misunderstood or misrepresented. In James Whale’s film the Creature gets arough deal and your Creature is much more tender.

I think that Boris Karloff had alot of that stream of fragility – beauty came from Karloff and the way he played him. The famous anecdote is that, in the scene where the Creature kills Maria by the river, Karloff was horrified, and he tried to find away to justify and pardon the monster. And that was abig disagreement he and Whale had. Bride of Frankenstein [Whale’s 1935 sequel] is alot more satirical and sardonic and more Whale, but Karloff brought alot of the pathos to therole.

Your films always show alot of love for monsters of course.

Yes, the evolution of the way Ithink is that Iused to make fables where the humans were the bad guys and the monsters were the good guys, incapable of anything but innocence. But since The Shape of Water, when the creature does kill Michael Shannon at the end, and then Nightmare Alley, where the hero is the villain, and now this one, where the hero is the villain… You know, the Monster does kill six sailors and ahunter. And amyriad of wolves.

He’s not perfect.

He’s not afrail, little, languishing creature. Ithought, can we understand each other even when we do horrid acts? And can we find forgiveness in that? In order to do that, Idedicate the first half to Victor and the second half of the film to the Creature, and the two parts Itry to infuse with alittle bit of afairytale element, including the fact that the monster is guided into the world by animals.

He’s like Snow White with all his animal friends.

He is guided into the world by ravens, which were on the battlefield with the corpses. Then the deer, then the mice, and then the wolves. They almost say to him, ​‘Look, this is the world as it is. It’s agreat place and it’s aterrible place all at the same time.’ Then to Victor, the Creature eventually says, ​‘To you Iam an abomination, but to me Isimply am.’

It feels that, throughout your filmmaking career, ​‘Frankenstein’ has been manifested in different ways: across Cronos; across Mimic; and obviously The Shape of Water. In Pinocchio, even. Hellboy as well. Do you feel that that was ahelp or ahindrance with making Frankenstein? The fact you’ve always been making tiny snippets of thatstory.

Well, when you adapt anovel, the people that love the novel have to feel the spirit of it is there, but at the same time you want to wow them with anew tale. In the first 10minutes people have to say, ​“This is not the ​‘Frankenstein’ Iknow. I’m going to stay and see what happens.” We did that with Pinocchio, by setting it in Mussolini’s Italy. Icould practise with [the character] Nomak in Blade II, an encounter between amonster and his father, saying, ​‘Why did you make me like this? Why did you cast me aside?’ But this is the granddaddy, this the big opera. This is the Puccini version of those tales. Iwanted it to be grand and beautiful and spectacular, not only in size or scope, but also in trying aperformance with the Creature that had never been done. Jacob brings apurity.

He’s magnificent. There’s achildlike nature to the Creature in your version of the story, even when he has learnt more about the world. He maintains this sense of innocence and curiosity.

Yes. You know, the movie is constructed like acircle. It starts with adawn behind the captain and ends with adawn in front of the Creature. One has his back turned to the sun and one is facing it. That circle is in the visual motifs in the movie. There are circles in the windows, mirrors, pits, etc. And the ideal thing is that this actor that is going to play the creature has to take him from ababy to aman, to ahuman being, fully formed, making adecision that is unselfish. That’s what Ifound inJacob.

The Creature’s innocence is very much mirrored in Elizabeth to me. The way that she completely accepts him upon the first meeting reminds me of the fact that, as abiological imperative, we actually don’t have that many fears built into us as human beings. Most of our fears are learnt and inherited from our experiences and from society. Do you feel the childlike nature of Elizabeth and the Creature is tied into the fact that this is astory you first encountered and responded to as achild?

I think the Creature in ​‘Frankenstein’ is instantly attractive to children because he’s agiant and amisfit. He doesn’t fit in the world the way you don’t fit in the world when you’re akid. You have instant empathy and sympathy for it. What Iwanted was to make Elizabeth recognise herself immediately. Alot of people still cannot allow femininity to have any grotesqueries or any malfunctions, but in reality, it’s monstrous. Elizabeth is tired of feeling weird. When she talks about the butterfly, she’s of course talking about herself, what apoor creature she is, she has no will and she’s weird and beautiful at the same time. And Ithink that’s the sentiment many of us have in youth, but many also find twin souls. All of asudden you recognise yourself in someone else’s art. She sees this creature and she goes, ​‘This is pure.’ He has the same purity of essence as shedoes.

And you wrote the part with Mia inmind.

What is beautiful about Mia… Iremember Kate Hawley, our wardrobe designer, came to me somewhat alarmed and she said, ​‘We need to find someone to teach her to move in that dress like aVictorian person, because they never moved like that.’ And Isaid, ​‘Don’t mention it to her. What Ilike is that she moves like aregular person in thatdress.’