The Shape of Water

               The shape of Water by Guillermo del Toro is a fantasy romance tale about a deaf and mute woman who falls in love with a reptilian like creature.  This film is a poignant film about how we treat people that are different than ourselves and the difference between power and control.  The character of Richard Strickland is the person that has power and in theory also has control.  Whereas the creature and Elisa Esposito do not have either.

               The character of Richard Strickland is the head military officer that brought in the creature.  He is given the power over the base and the interrogation of the creature.  He is in control of everything at the top-secret base.  He is trying to learn what the creature is and why soviets want it.  He thinks the creature is simply some animal that needs to be taught like a dog but with a cattle prod.  He exudes testosterone and machismo, but this is what eventually is his undoing.  His need to have control and shape things into the narrow and very simple world view that he has is something that destroys him.  We see him even with his wife be very unemotional and treat her like an object to have sex with.  We see his absolute need for power and control with his finger slowly rotting on his hand after it was reattached.  The only emotion he allows himself to express is anger which is a typical emotion ok for men to express.  We also the fact that he is upset he has to interview the janitors of the base that include Elisa and her friend Zelda that he has no respect for anyone below his station in life. 

               The film starts with Elisa doing her normal routine for work that we can assume she has been doing for many years now.  She is deaf and mute and is very shy and squirrely at the start of the film because she doesn’t seem to have been treated great in her life by others and she is very kept to herself outside of Zelda at work and Giles her neighbor.  She eventually becomes transfixed and curious about the creature being stored there.  Which leads her to start interacting with it and eventually falls in love with the creature.  This leads to her slowly gain the courage to take the power and control away from Strickland over this creature.  She devises a plan with Giles and Zelda to get the creature out of the base which when they do, they hide the creature in her bathtub.  They hide the creature their until they are able to release the creature back into the ocean.  We see Elisa gain control and power through her love for this being which is why she wins in the end over Strickland. 

               This film does a great job of showing how love can come from anywhere despite the differences that some people might see between those that love one another.  This shows that love an conquer all even those in power and especially those that abuse power like Strickland in the film.  Guillermo del Toro does what he always does with his movies in telling a fantastical story that hits home hard is filled with shot after shot so beautiful it that could hang on a museum wall.