Guillermo del Toro is a guy who loves monsters. Not in the "I want to run away from them" sense, but in the "I want to have dinner with them" sense. Honestly, when The Shape of Water the movie hit theaters back in 2017, it felt like a weird gamble. A silent woman falls in love with a fish-man in a government lab? On paper, that sounds like a B-movie you’d find in a dusty bargain bin. But then it went and won Best Picture at the Oscars, proving that audiences were actually hungry for something that felt weird, wet, and deeply human.
It’s been years, but the conversation hasn’t really stopped. You’ve probably seen the memes, or maybe you just remember the hazy, teal-colored cinematography that made every frame look like it was filmed inside an aquarium.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Plot
People often describe this as a "creature feature." That’s a mistake. If you go into it expecting Jaws or Alien, you’re going to be disappointed. It’s a melodrama. It’s basically a Douglas Sirk film from the 1950s, just with more gills.
The story centers on Elisa Esposito. She’s a janitor. She’s mute. She lives above a cinema. Her life is a loop of hard-boiled eggs, ticking clocks, and the rhythmic sound of the bus. Sally Hawkins plays her with this incredible physical intensity where she doesn't need a single line of dialogue to tell you she’s lonely.
Then comes the Asset.
Doug Jones, the man who has spent more time in latex than probably any human alive, plays the Amphibian Man. He’s not a "monster" in the traditional sense; he’s a god from the Amazon who has been dragged into a Baltimore research facility during the Cold War. The conflict isn't about him eating people—though he does snack on a cat, which was a bit much for some viewers—it’s about the soul-crushing bureaucracy of the 1960s trying to poke, prod, and vivisect something it doesn't understand.
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The Cold War Backdrop is the Secret Sauce
If you strip away the romance, The Shape of Water the movie is a biting critique of American "greatness" in the early 60s. Michael Shannon’s character, Richard Strickland, is the personification of this. He’s the guy who buys the Cadillac because the salesman told him it represents success. He’s the guy who thinks he’s "above" the people cleaning his floors.
Del Toro uses the 1962 setting to highlight who gets left behind in the American Dream.
- Elisa is disabled and a woman.
- Her best friend Zelda (Octavia Spencer) is Black and working a thankless job.
- Her neighbor Giles (Richard Jenkins) is a closeted gay artist losing his career to photography.
They are all "invisible" to the men in suits. That’s why they bond with the creature. He’s the ultimate outsider. He doesn't see Elisa as "broken" because she can’t speak; he just sees her. It’s simple. It’s beautiful. It’s also kinda gross if you overthink the biology, but the movie begs you not to do that.
Designing a God: The Creature’s Look
The design of the Amphibian Man took forever. Seriously. Del Toro reportedly spent his own money to fund the design phase for years before the movie even got greenlit. He wanted the creature to have a "leading man" silhouette.
They looked at everything.
Japanese woodblock prints.
Classic Hollywood stars.
Actual fish.
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The result is something that looks tactile. In an era where every blockbuster is drowning in CGI that looks like plastic, The Shape of Water the movie used practical suits. When Elisa touches the creature’s skin, you can almost feel the slime and the scales. It creates a sense of grounded reality that makes the fantastical elements easier to swallow.
The Color Palette
Notice the green? Everything is green or teal. The walls, the water, the uniforms, even the key lime pie that Giles keeps buying. Green represents the future, the mundane, and the "now." Red is the color of life, love, and cinema. Watch the movie again and look for when red appears. It only shows up when Elisa’s world starts to change. It’s a classic visual storytelling trick, but Del Toro executes it with the precision of a surgeon.
The Controversy: Did He Steal the Idea?
You can’t talk about this film without mentioning the lawsuit. The estate of Paul Zindel, who wrote the play Let Me Hear You Whisper, claimed that Del Toro lifted the plot. In Zindel's play, a cleaning lady tries to rescue a dolphin from a lab.
It went to court.
Eventually, the lawsuit was dismissed. The judge basically ruled that while there were similarities, the "heroic janitor saves a sea creature" trope wasn't unique enough to be copyrightable. Plus, Del Toro has always been open about his influences, specifically Creature from the Black Lagoon. He famously wanted the monster and the girl to end up together in the old Universal Monster movies, and since they never did, he just wrote his own version where they do.
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Why the Ending Still Sparks Debates
Is she a mermaid?
That’s the big question. At the start of the film, we see scars on Elisa’s neck. We’re told she was found by the river as an infant. By the time the credits roll, those scars become gills.
Some people think it’s a literal transformation—that she was always one of "his" kind. Others think it’s a metaphor for finding where you belong. Honestly, the movie works better if you don't try to solve it like a math equation. It’s a fairy tale. Fairy tales don't need a DNA test.
The ending works because it’s a total escape. In a world where Strickland and his cattle prod represent the "real" world, Elisa choosing to jump into the canal and live in the water is the ultimate act of rebellion. It’s a rejection of a society that didn't have a place for her.
Actionable Insights for Fans and Cinephiles
If you want to get the most out of your next rewatch or if you're diving into the Del Toro rabbit hole for the first time, here is how to actually engage with the material:
- Watch the "Brother" Films: To really understand the DNA of this movie, you have to watch Pan's Labyrinth and The Devil's Backbone. Del Toro calls them his "Spanish Civil War" trilogy, and while Shape of Water is in English and set in the US, it shares the same obsession with the "monster" being more moral than the "human."
- Study the Sound Design: Pay attention to the water sounds. The foley artists used everything from breathing into bowls of water to wet chamois cloths to create the "voice" of the creature.
- Look for the Religious Imagery: The creature isn't just an animal; he's referred to as a god from the Amazon. The way he heals Giles’ hair and arm is meant to mirror biblical miracles. The film is essentially asking: what if God was a fish and we put him in a tank?
- Explore the Practical Effects: Check out the behind-the-scenes footage of Doug Jones getting into the suit. It took three hours every single day. Understanding the physical toll of that performance makes the chemistry between the two leads even more impressive.
- Read the Novelization: Unlike most movie tie-ins, the novel (co-written by Daniel Kraus) expands on the backstories of the side characters, especially Strickland. It gives you a much darker look into his psyche and why he is so obsessed with "cleaning" everything.
The legacy of the film isn't just the trophies. It’s the fact that it made a weird, specific, "unmarketable" vision into a cultural touchstone. It proved that you can take a B-movie premise and turn it into high art without losing the heart—or the slime.