I arrived early and was walking around with time to kill when a young man approached me at an intersection: "Sorry to bother you, but do you know where the new library is?"
While wandering around aimlessly, I had been wondering the same thing: The newly opened big-deal-of-a-library was somewhere in the area, but I hadn't seen it. I apologized for not knowing, explaining that I was just killing time before a movie. What movie? I told him. His girlfriend had just "made him" see "The Shape of Water," but he didn't like it. Why not? He didn't know --- just wasn't his thing. What about (my second and third choices for holiday films) the Churchill movie and "Three Billboards"? He liked Churchill... I wished him luck as we crossed separate streets.
After briefly contemplating changing my movie plans after talking to a complete stranger (!), I went on see "The Shape of Water."
It was, in many ways, an intensely beautiful movie. It was shot beautifully. And I am so utterly alone that I, of course, related completely to the mute main character, to her ageing gay neighbor, to the "monster." To the sympatico, delicate connections. THAT was the beautiful part of the movie: "We are not alone."
Plot-wise, the film was also intense: The Evil Villain versus the Good Guys. I cringed and got angry where appropriate; I cried.
The acting was great: Michael Shannon as the Bad Guy (whom I'd just recently seen in a funnily evil bit on the Amy Sedaris show) was the best; Sally Hawkins as the The Mute was very good (especially her "FUCK YOU" signing scene).
The film was based on "The Creature of the Black Lagoon" --- director Guillermo del Toro has said in interviews that he had a fantasy about the Gill-man ending up with the Girl. That's a thing unto itself. (I had my own fantasy about "Sunset Boulevard.) And that fantasy of "the Beast" winding up with its object of desire is a long-standing thing (realized here). As is the non-sexual fantasy of "the Beast" potentially being rescued: Frankenstein, King Kong, ET, Trog...
My problem with this movie, though, was that the "other" wasn't explored very intelligently or subtly. There was a lot of heavy-handed social critiquing going on. For instance, the main character and her gay neighbor like to go to a "Southern" diner where the studly young counter-man calls out to customers "Y'all come back now, y'hear!" The gay neighbor has a crush on the young man. At one point, the two start to have a personal conversation about being alone in the city; as soon as the older gay man takes the young man's hand, the latter pulls back ---- then a black couple comes into the diner and the young man tells them to get out... Point taken: "Southern" and "white" is "Evil."
Same goes for the main "Bad Guy": He's a Fed; he reads "The Power of Positive Thinking" in his spare time; he fucks his wife with his shirt on; he crudely comes on to the saintly Eliza; he mocks black people; he sucks up to a general; he adheres to protocol. In an A-movie, I've never seen such a blatantly negative portrayal. Shannon was riveting in the role, but his role was cartoonishly one-sided.
(In other blatant ridiculousness from the director: "Movie-watching = Good; TV-watching = Bad.)
In other, more intelligently done, movies where an "alien" was involved, directors were more subtle. Think of "ET." Often, there's a scientific argument about what is to be done with the alien creature... This movie, though, takes a completely simplistic ham-handed approach. I got over that to enjoy the ride, but I was still obviously aware of the ham-handedness.
"The Shape of Water" was a very good, simplistic B-movie. In the "olden days," not Oscar-worthy (but just watch --- it'll get a bunch this year.)
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