Only recently, he was the talk of the town as the two-time Academy Award-winner for Best Director and Best Picture. I’m talking, of course, about Guillermo del Toro and the success of his latest screen effort “The Shape of Water” (2017), winning a total of four Oscars out of a staggering thirteen nominations and grossing world-wide approximately $200,000,000 while the film had cost a merely $20,000,000 to make.

After making movies for about thirty years, Mr. del Toro (b. 1964, Mexico) didn’t get his big break until he made “Cronos” (1993), winning nine Ariel Awards (the Mexican equivalent of the Oscars), and five years later he made his debut as a Hollywood filmmaker with “Mimic” starring Mira Sorvino. Switching from genre to mainstream features, both in Mexico and the U.S., he’s an all-rounder as a makeup artist, screenwriter, director, and producer.

As one of Mexico’s top talented filmmakers, along with other Oscar-winning filmmakers from his home country he worked with in the past, Alfonso Cuarón (“Gravity,” 2013) and Alejandro G. Iñárritu (“Birdman,’ 2014; “The Revenant,” 2015), Mr. del Toro was the guest of honor at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival a few weeks ago where I talked to him during a roundtable interview. My impression? He’s an incredibly fascinating man who knows what it takes to make a film, and realizes all the more there’s a life after film.

Mr. del Toro, how would you describe your life as a filmmaker?

I love to make the movies that I’ve been doing, and I would love to explore—if anything—noir; I’ve always been a fan of that. Film is a vocation, and it’s always been sincere, true, and earnest, and it will continue to be that. I know the voices in Europe, Latin America and North America can be very plural and interesting in director-driven projects. Everybody that I ever worked with as a producer has always been interesting to me, and I like watching their films.

Why is the genre of fantastic cinema so important to you?

Because on a very personal and spiritual level, it has made me who I am. That’s it. The way people found Jesus, I found the creature of Frankenstein—when I was a child, when I was a teenager, when I became an adult, when I became a senior citizen [laughs], every moment of my life the genre of fantastic film has been elementary for me. It’s the one thing that allows me to interpret the work that makes it worth it. You can discuss absolute values in the genre in a way that is parabolic—they are parables. The parable, the fairy tale, and the horror tale are very related, and they are in many ways to me tools of spiritual awakening in my own biography.

Are there any films you can think of right now that you admire?

“Ed Wood” [1994]. That’s a film I could never do. It’s so profound and so powerful; it’s absolutely amazing. The reason why I admire it so much is simply because I couldn’t do it. I guess maybe it’s because to us Latin Americans, there’s a will to accept the fantastic as part of everyday life. That’s very natural to us, considering our culture. If you watch my movies, the supernatural or the extraordinary exists side by side with very ordinary situations. So that’s a natural vocation because I’m Mexican, I’m from Latin America. And when you are Mexican, you are the other, you know. I once was stopped in Beverly Hills by a traffic cop for forty-five minutes. That was in 1995, I think. I was driving a little car that I rented, a very bad car, and I was on my way to a producer. So I got stopped, they checked my papers, and asked, ‘You are from Mexico; I don’t see what are you doing here in Beverly Hills.’ I said, ‘I’m on my way to meet a producer.’ ‘A producer? In this car?’ They kept me there for almost an hour. When you have different roots, you see the world in a different way.

What would you consider your most personal film so far?

There are a few movies that I have done when I said, ‘This is the last movie I make.’ I put everything I had in it. “Il espinazo del diablo” [a.k.a. “The Devil’s Backbone,” 2001] is one of them, “The Shape of Water” [2017] too. When I made them, I thought, ‘Okay, I’m gonna do this, I want to make sure everything is there, and that’s it.’ And curiously, those are movies that I connect with very strongly. And I always tried something different, like “Il espinazo del diablo” is very different from my early movies. Each one is a summation of where I am at that point. The themes seem to coincide, those are markers in what to you is a filmography, but to me, it’s a biography. Every couple of years, a movie of mine comes out, and you may think, ‘Okay, I’ll watch it.’ And you watch it for two hours. Then you think what you think about it, you write what you write, and you move on with your life. While I stay with my life because this is my life. I make another movie, and I spend a few years of my life on it—each film I do, it’s like going through wedding photos or going to a baptism or a funeral; they’re all a part of my biography. They’re very personal. So the way I live my life is very different from the way you watch it. But the fortunate thing for me, is that the people who really connect with what I do, connect at that intimate level. They can feel that those movies are extremely important for me. They are! They really are a matter of life and death; they’re that serious. A filmmaker spends three years of his life for a Google search of three seconds or for an entry on IMDB.

You have made movies about history and politics, mixing historical facts with fairy tales and elements of the fantastic film genre. Why do you choose this particular approach? For the sake of art?

History is told by the winners, isn’t it? If you ask the Aztecs and the Spanish how the conquest went, you’ll get two completely different tales. Because what is called conquest historically can be a destructive genocide for the other side. History is fiction and fantasy that we all accept, and they’re the truth until we change them. And we change so much, all the imaginary lines that we agreed upon, like geography or currency. What is the paper in your wallet worth? Is it worth 20 euros? No, but we agree in a fantasy that it’s worth 20 euros. When I cross between Belgium and the Netherlands, I don’t feel a bump on the road or in my car. We agree that we’re in the Netherlands. It’s a fantasy world that adults agree upon, which is not necessarily any more outlandish than what’s agreed by children or in fairy tales. That’s why I would invite historians to have a coffee with me. I will not remove Greek myths from their discourse, and they can’t remove history from my discourse. It’s not theirs to take from me, and it’s not mine to take away from them at all. Getting back to my films, the most important artistic act is to use the abstract to illuminate the concrete. That is the purpose of art. It’s not to invade reality through fantasy but to reinterpret reality in the most absolute discursive terms through fantasy. That’s something I would tell the historians over a coffee [laughs]. I vocationally say art is what affects you and changes you spiritually through music, audiovisual, painting, and therefore I find art where art finds me. I have no distinction between low and high art. To listen to Orfeo and Euridice’s ‘Dance of the Blessed Spirits’ is as beautiful as listening to The Sex Pistols’ ‘Never Mind the Bollocks,’ depending on what you need as a nutritional component of your spiritual life at that particular moment. So if you ask me, does every film, every art that connects with me, does it immediately affect me? I’m humble, no matter its origin, so I am influenced by soundtracks, video games, opera, set design, or by a beautiful engraving. And I think if you’re endlessly curious and you allow yourself to imagine that we all live in a world where caviar and champagne are the highest forms of food, two months in that diet you will hate caviar, you will hate champagne. But if you allow yourself to have a waffle in the morning, Chinese food in the afternoon, and the next day you have a great pasta, it’s fantastic. And I think culturally we should give ourselves the same latitude: art finds you, but you also have to seek in different places. And when I find it, it happens I don’t know what it means until I know what it meant back then and what it means by now.

Are there any characters in your films that you are attracted to?

I’m attracted to all of them. I’ve seen all of them. I know all of them. We all are heroes and a pain in the butt in the twenty-four hours of a day. It’s only a component of how much of the day you are a hero or a proper human being. When I wrote the character of the bad guy [played by Michael Shannon] in “The Shape of Water,” I also wrote him as the loneliest and saddest character in the movie. And when people tell me, ‘The character of Elisa [Sally Hawkins] is a lonely woman,’ that’s not the way I wrote her, I actually wrote her to be the only character who is not lonely. She loves Giles [Richard Jenkins], she loves Zelda [Octavia Spencer], they talk about her, but she’s okay with it, and she cooks a little egg in the morning. They don’t see her properly, but the creature is happy to see her every day, and he sees her for who she is, even though she’s incomplete. That to me the best description of love: someone who looks at you, the things you do right, the things you do wrong, and he’s okay with it. When you are a father, and you have children of your own, there is no drug in the world that is stronger than when you come home, and you have a four-year-old running to meet you at the front door. That’s as high as you can get because you are the world. And that is a pure form of love. So when you write your characters, you really have to understand them. And even though I dwell in a genre that most people think should be a casual genre, that it’s of no importance or it’s something trivial, for me, it’s the most important genre in my life.

Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival, Brussels (Belgium)
April 12, 2018

“The Shape of Water” (2017, trailer)

FILMS

EL CORAZÓN DE LA NOCHE, a.k.a. THE HEART OF THE NIGHT (1984) DIR Jaime Humberto Hermosillo PROD Héctor López SCR Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, José de la Colina PROD ASSISTANT Guillermo del Toro CAM Gabriel Figueroa MUS Joaquín Gutiérrez Heras CAST Pedro Armendáriz Jr., Jorge Balzaretti, Marcela Camacho, Graciela Lara, Manuel Ojeda, Martha Navarro, Ana Ofelia Murgía

DOÑA HERLINDA Y SU HIJO, a.k.a. DONA HERLINDA AND HER SON (1985) DIR Jaime Humberto Hermosillo PROD Manuel Barbachano Ponce EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro SCR Jaime Humberto Hermosillo (novel by Jorge López Páez) CAM Miguel Ehrenberg ED Luis Kelly CAST Arturo Meza, Marco Treviño, Guadalupe Del Toro, Letícia Lupercio, Josefina González, Lucha Villa

OBDULIA (1987) DIR Juan Antonio de la Riva ASSISTANT DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Mercedes Escamilla SCR Arturo Villaseñor CAM Leoncio Villarias ED Luis Kelly MUS Antonio Avitia CAST Véronica Perfecto, Fabiola Araiza, Angelica Guerrero, Ignacio Guadalupe, Donato Castañeda, Andrés Olivares

MENTIRAS PIADOSAS, a.k.a. LOVE LIES (1989) DIR Arturo Ripstein PROD Tita Lombardo SCR Paz Alicia Garciadiego CAM Ángel Goded ED Carlos Puente MUS Lucia Álvarez SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro CAST Alonso Echánove, Delia Casanova, Ernesto Yáñez, Luisa Hertas, Fernando Palavicini, Osami Kawano

GOITIA, UN DIOS PARA SÍ MISMO (1989) DIR Diego López Rivera PROD Miguel Camacho, Julio Derbez Del Pino, Federico Farfán, Enrique Vargas Torres SCR Diego López Rivera, Juan Carlos Ruiz, Javier Sicilia, Enrique Vargas Torres, Raúl Zermeño, Jorge Gonzáles de León CAM Arturo de la Rosa, Jorge Suárez ED Sigfrido García SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro, Humberto Escamilla CAST José Carlos Ruiz, Fernando Balzaretti, Ana Ofelia Murgía, María Teresa Pecanins, Patricia Reyes Spíndola

MORIR EN EL GOLFO (1990) DIR – PROD Alejandro Pelayo SCR Alejandro Pelayo, Víctor Hugo Rascón Banda (novel by Héctor Aguilar Camín) CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Óscar Figueroa MUS Marcial Alejandro, José Elorza SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro STORYBOARDS Guillermo del Toro CAST Blanca Guerra, Enrique Rocha, Alejandro Parodi, Carlos Cardán, Emilio Echevarría, Ana Ofelia Murguía

CABEZA DE VACA (1991) DIR Nicolás Echevarría PROD Jorge Sánchez, Julio Solórzano Foppa, Rafael Cruz SCR Nicolás Echevarría, Guillermo Sheridan (novel by Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca) CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Rafael Castanedo MUS Mario Lavista SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro CAST Juan Diego, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Roberto Sosa, Carlos Castañón, Gerardo Villarreal, Roberto Cobo, José Flores

BANDIDOS, a.k.a. BANDITS (1991) DIR – PROD Luis Estrada SCR Luis Estrada, Jaime Sampietro CAM Emmanuel Lubezki ED Luis Estrada, Juan Carlos Martín MUS Santiago Ojeda SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro CAST Gabriela Roel, Pedro Armendáriz Jr., Jorge Russek, Eduardo Toussaint, Jorge Poza, Alan Gutiérrez, Daniel Jiménez Cacho

MI QUERIDO TOM MIX, a.k.a. MY DEAR TOM MIX (1992) DIR Carlos García Agraz PROD Jorge Sánchez SCR Consuelo Garrido CAM Rodrigo García ED Tlacateotl Mata MUS Alberto Núñez Palacios SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro CAST Carmen Beato, Lourdes Carrillo, Eduardo Casals, Luis Castro, Carlos Chávez, Gonzalo Curiel, Patricia Dellano

CRONOS (1993) DIR – SCR Guillermo del Toro PROD Arthur Gorson, Bertha Navarro CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Raúl Dávalos MUS Javier Álvarez CAST Federico Luppi, Ron Perlman,  Claudio Brook, Margarita Isabel, Tamara Shanath, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Guillermo del Toro

DOLLAR MAMBO (1993) DIR Paul Leduc PROD Arturo Whaley SCR Paul Leduc, José Joaquín Blanco, Héctor Ortega, Juan Tovar, Pedro Rivera CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Guillermo S. Maldonado MUS Eugenio Toussaint SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro CAST Dolores Pedro, Roberto Sosa, Raúl Medina, Litico Rodriguez, Tito Vasconcelos, Eduardo López Rojas, Kandido Uranga

ALGUNAS NUBES (1995) DIR Carlos García Agraz PROD Ignacio Sada SCR Paco Ignacio Taibo II (also novel) CAM Xavier Grobet ED Carlos García Agraz, Fernando Barrera MUS Alejandro Giacomán SPECIAL MAKEUP EFFECTS Guillermo del Toro CAST Sergio Goyri, Claudia Fernández, Lorenzo de Rodas, Patricio Castillo, Damián Alcázar, Pedro Altamirano, René Pereyra

MIMIC (1997) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Ole Bornedal, B.J. Rack, Bob Weinstein SCR Guillermo del Toro, Matthew Robbins (screen story by Guillermo del Toro, Matthew Robbins; short story ‘Mimic’ by Donald A. Wolheim) CAM Dan Laustsen ED Peter Devaney Flanagan, Patrick Lussier MUS Marco Beltrami CAST Mira Sorvino, Jeremy Northam, Josh Brolin, Charles S. Durron, Giancarlo Giannini, F. Murray Abraham, Alexander Goodwin

UN EMBRUJO, a.k.a. UNDER A SPELL (1998) DIR Carlos Carrera PROD Guillermo del Toro, Bertha Navarro SCR Carlos Carrera, Martín Salinas, Marcel Sisniega CAM Rodrigo Prieto ED Sigfrido Barjau, Peter Devaney Flanagan MUS José María Vitier CAST Blanca Guerra, Mario Zaragoza, Daniel Acuña, Luis Fernando Peña, Ricardo Rentería, Luisa Huertas

BULLFIGHTER (2000) DIR Rune Bendixen PROD L.M. Kit Carson, Majken Gilmartin, Cynthia Hargrave SCR Rune Bendixen, Majken Gilmartin (adaptation by L.M. Kit Carson, Hunter Carson; story by Rune Bendixen) CAM Rohn Schmidt ED Kathryn Himoff MUS Vince Clarke CAST Olivier Martinez, Michelle Forbes, Assumpta Serna, Domenica Cameron-Scorsese, Michael Parks, Jared Harris, Willem Dafoe, Guillermo del Toro, L.M. Kit Carson, Hunter Carson

AMORES PERROS (2000) DIR – PROD Alejandro G. Iñárritu SCR Guillermo Arriaga CAM Rodrigo Prieto ED Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Luis Carballar, Fernando Pérez Unda ED ADVISOR Guillermo del Toro MUS Gustavo Santaolalla CAST Emilio Echevarría, Gael García Bernal, Goya Toledo, Álvaro Guerrero, Vanessa Bauche, Jorge Salinas, Marco Pérez, Rodrigo Murray, Humberto Busto

EL ESPINAZO DEL DIABLO, a.k.a. THE DEVIL’S BACKBONE (2001) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Augustín Almodóvar, Bertha Navarro EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Pedro Almodóvar SCR Guillermo del Toro, David Muñoz, Antonio Trashorras CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Luis de la Madrid MUS Javier Navarrete CAST Marisa Paredes, Eduardo Noriega, Federico Luppi, Fernando Tielve, Íñigo Garcés, Irene Visedo

ASESINO EN SERIO, a.k.a. I MURDER SERIOUSLY and SERIOUS KILLER (2002) DIR Antonio Urrutia PROD Bertha Navarro EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Federico González Compeán, Juan Dakas SCR Javier Valdés, Carlos Puig (novel by Javier Valdés) CAM Serguei Saldívar Tanaka ED Pablo Blanco MUS Federico Banosso CAST Jesús Ochoa, Santiago Segura, Ivonne Montero, Gabriela Roel, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Rafael Inclán

BLADE II (2002) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Peter Frankfurt, Wesley Snipes, Patrick J. Palmer SCR David S. Goyer (characters created by Marv Wolfman, Gene Colan) CAM Gabriel Beristain ED Peter Amundson MUS Marco Beltrami CAST Wesley Snipes, Kris Kristofferson, Ron Perlman, Leonor Varela, Norman Reedus, Thomas Kretschmann

CRÓNICAS, a.k.a. CHRONICLES (2004) DIR – SCR Sebastián Cordero PROD Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón, Bertha Navarro, Jorge Vergara, Isabel Dávalos CAM Enrique Chediak ED Luis Carballar, Iván Mora Monzano MUS Antonio Pinto CAST John Leguizamo, Alfred Molina, Peki Andido, Jamie Estrada, Henry Layana, Gloria Leiton

HELLBOY (2004) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Mike Richardson, Lawrence Gordon, Lloyd Levin SCR Guillermo del Toro (screen story by Guillermo del Toro, Peter Briggs; comic books by Mike Mignola) CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Peter Amundson MUS Marco Beltrami FIGHT CHOREOGRAPHER Guillermo del Toro CAST Ron Perlman, John Hurt, Doug Jones, Selma Blair, Rupert Evans, Karel Roden, Jeffrey Tambor, Guillermo del Toro, Mike Mignola

PAN’S LABYRINTH (2006) DIR – SCR Guillermo del Toro PROD Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón, Bertha Navarro, Frida Torresblanco CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Bernat Vilaplana MUS Javier Navarrete CAST Ivana Baquero, Ariadna Gil, Sergi López, Maribel Verdú, Doug Jones, Álex Angulo, Manolo Solo, César Vea

EL ORFANATO, a.k.a. THE ORPHANAGE (2007) DIR J.A. Bayona PROD Álvaro Augustin, Joaquín Padró, Mar Targarona EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro SCR Sergio G. Sánchez CAM Oscar Faura ED Elena Ruiz MUS Fernando Velázquez CAST Belén Rueda, Fernando Cayo, Roger Príncep, Óscar Casas, Geraldine Chaplin

COSAS INSIGNIFICANTES, a.k.a. INSIGNIFICANT THINGS (2008) DIR – SCR Andrea Martínez Crowther PROD Guillermo del Toro, Bertha Navarro, Luis de Val CAM Josep M. Civit ED Ángel Hernández Zoido MUS Leonardo Heiblum, Jacobo Lieberman CAST Bárbara Mori, Fernando Luján, Carmelo Gómez, Lucía Jiménez, Paulina Gaitán

HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY (2008) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Lawrence Gordon, Mike Richardson, Lloyd Levin SCR Guillermo del Toro (story by Guillermo del Toro, Mike Mignola; comic book by Mike Mignola) CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Bernat Vilaplana MUS Danny Elfman CAST Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones, John Alexander, James Dodd, John Hurt, Seth MacFarlane, Jeffrey Tambor

WHILE SHE WAS OUT (2008) DIR Susan Montford PROD Susan Montford, Kirk Shaw, Don Murphy, Ali Abouomar, Mary Aloe EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Kim Basinger, Christian Arnold-Beutel, Michael A. DiManno, Samuel H. Frankel, Christian Halsey Solomon, Tim McGrath, R. Scott Reid, David Roessell, Don Starr, Daniel J.B. Taylor SCR Susan Montford (short story by Edward Bryant) CAM Steve Gainer ED William M. Anderson MUS Paul Haslinger CAST Kim Basinger, Lukas Haas, Craig Sheffer, Jamie Starr, Leonard Wu, Luis Chávez, Luke Gair, Erika-Shaye Gair

RUDO Y CURSI (2008) DIR – SCR Carlos Cuarón PROD Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón, Frida Torresblanco CAM Adam Kimmel ED Alex Rodríguez MUS Leoncio Lara, Felipe Perez Santiago CAST Gael García Bernal, Diego Luna, Guillermo Francella, Dolores Heredia, Adriana Paz, Jessica Mas, Salvador Zerboni, Tania Esmeralda Aguilar

RABIA, a.k.a. RAGE (2009) DIR Sebastián Cordero PROD Guillermo del Toro, Bertha Navarro, Álvaro Augustin, Eneko Lizarraga, Rodrigo Guerrero SCR Sebastián Cordero (novel by Sergio Bizzio) CAM Enrique Chediak ED David Gallart MUS Lucio Godoy CAST Martina García, Gustavo Sánchez Parra, Tanya De Roberto, Karlos Aurrekoetxea, Yon González, Javier Tolosa, Concha Velasco

SPLICE (2009) DIR Vincenzo Natali PROD Steven Hoban EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Susan Montford, Don Murphy, Joel Silver, Christopher Riandee, Yves Chevalier, Sidonie Dumas SCR Vincenzo Natali, Antoinette Terry Bryant, Doug Taylor (story by Vincenzo Natali, Antoinette Terry Bryant) CAM Tetsuo Nagata ED Michele Conroy MUS Cyrille Aufort CAST Adrien Brody, Sarah Polley, Delphine Chanéac, Brandon McGibbon, Simona Maicanescu, David Hewlett, Abigail Chu

DON’T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK (2010) DIR Troy Nixey PROD Guillermo del Toro, Mark Johnson SCR Guillermo del Toro, Matthew Robbins (teleplay of TV movie DON’T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK [1973] by Nigel McKeand) CAM Oliver Stapleton ED Jill Bilcock MUS Marco Beltrami, Buck Sanders CAST Katie Holmes, Guy Pearce, Bailee Madison, Jack Thompson Guillermo del Toro

MEGAMIND (2010, animated) DIR Tom McGrath PROD Lara Breay, Denise Nolan Cascino CREATIVE PROD Guillermo del Toro SCR Alan Schoolcraft, Brent Simons ED Mike Andrews MUS Hans Zimmer, Lorne Balfe CREATIVE CONSULTANT Guillermo del Toro CAST (voice only) Will Ferrell, Jonah Hill, Brad Pitt, Tina Fey, David Cross, Ben Stiller, Justin Theroux, Jessica Schulte, Tom McGrath, J.K. Simmons

BIUTIFUL (2010) DIR Alejandro G. Iñárritu PROD Fernando Bovaira, Jon Kilik ASSOC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón SCR Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Armando Bo, Nicolás Giacobone (story by Alejandro G. Iñárritu) CAM Rodrigo Prieto ED Stephen Mirrione MUS Gustavo Santaolalla CAST Javier Bardem, Maricel Ávarez, Hanaa Bouchaib, Guillermo Estralla, Eduard Fernández, Cheikh Ndiaye

LOS OJOS DE JULIA, a.k.a. JULIA’S EYES (2010) DIR Guillem Morales PROD Guillermo del Toro, Juan Carlos Caro, Joaquín Padró, Mar Targarona SCR Guillem Mirales, Oriol Paulo CAM Oscar Faura ED Joan Manel Vilaseca MUS Fernando Velázquez CAST Belén Rueba, Lluís Homar, Pablo Derqui, Francesc Orella, Joan Dalmau, Julia Gutiérrez Caba, Boris Ruiz

PUSS IN BOOTS (2011, animated) DIR Chris Miller PROD Joe M. Aguilar, Latifa Ouaou EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Andrew Adamson, Michelle Raimo SCR Tom Wheeler (story by Tom Wheeler, Brian Lynch, William Davies; story ‘Puss in Boots’ by Charles Perrault) CAM Gil Zimmerman ED Erika Dapkewicz MUS Henry Jackman CAST (voice only) Antonio Banderas, Salma Hayek, Zach Galafianakis, Bill Bob Thornton, Amy Sedaris, Constance Marie, Guillermo del Toro, Tom McGrath

KUNG FU PANDA 2 (2011, animated) DIR Jennifer Yuh Nelson PROD Melissa Cobb SCR Jonathan Aibel, Glenn Berger ED Maryann Brandon, Clare De Chenu MUS Hans Zimmer, John Powell CREATIVE CONSULTANT Guillermo del Toro CAST (voice only) Jack Black, Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Gary Oldman, Jackie Chan, Seth Rogen, Lucy Liu, David Cross, Jean-Claude Van Damme

RISE OF THE GUARDIANS (2012, animated) DIR Peter Ramsey PROD Nancy Bernstein, Christina Steinberg EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Michael Siegel, William Joyce SCR David Lindsay-Abaire (book by William Joyce) ED Joyce Arrastia MUS Alexandre Desplat CAST (voice only) Hugh Jackman, Alec Baldwin, Jude Law, Isla Fisher, Dakota Goyo, Khamani Griffin, Kamil McFadden, Peter Ramsey

THE HOBBIT: AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY (2012) DIR Peter Jackson PROD Peter Jackson, Carolynne Cunningham, Fran Walsh, Zane Weiner SCR Guillermo del Toro, Peter Jackson, Philippa Boyens, Fran Walsh CAM Andrew Lesnie ED Jabez Olssen MUS Howard Shore PROJECT CONSULTANT Guillermo del Toro CAST Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Elijah Wood, Richard Armitage, Ken Scott, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, Ian Holm, Graham McTavish, William Kircher, Benedict Cumberbatch, Peter Jackson

EL SANTOS VS LA TETONA MENDOZA, a.k.a. THE WILD ADVENTURES OF EL SANTOS (2012, animated) DIR Alejandro Lozano, Andrés Couturier, Álvaro Curiel PROD Jose C. Garcia de Letona, Lynn Fainchtein, Fernando de Fuentes, Francisco Arriagada SCR Augusto Mendoza (characters created by Jose Ignacio Solorzano, Trino) CAM Chuy Chávez, Ricardo Deneke ED Camilo Abadía MUS Camilo Froideval CAST (voice only) Daniel Giménez Cacho, Héctor Jiménez, José María Yazpik, Regina Orozco, Joaquín Cosio, Cecilia Suárez, Guillermo del Toro

PACIFIC RIM (2013) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Guillermo del Toro, Jon Jashni, Thomas Tull, Mary Parent SCR Guillermo del Toro, Travis Beacham (story by Travis Beacham) CAM Guillermo Navarro ED Peter Amundson, John Gilroy MUS Ramin Djawadi CAST Charlie Hunnam, Diego Klattenhoff, Ron Perlman, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Burn Gorman

EDGE OF TOMORROW (2013) DIR Doug Liman PROD Jason Hoffs, Gregory Jacobs, Tom Lassally, Jeffrey Silver, Erwin Stoff SCR Christopher McQuarrie, John-Henry Butterworth, Jez Butterworth (novel ‘All You Need Is Kill’ by Hiroshi Sakurazaka) CAM Dion Beebe ED James Herbert, Laura Jennings MUS Christophe Beck SPECIAL VISUAL CONSULTANT Guillermo del Toro CAST Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt, Bill Paxton, Brendan Gleeson, Jonas Armstrong, Tony Way, Kick Gurry, Franz Drameh

MAMA (2013) DIR Andy Muschietti PROD Barbara Muschietti, J. Miles Dale EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro SCR Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti (story by Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, Neil Cross) CAM Antonio Riestra ED Michele Conroy MUS Fernando Velázquez CAST Jessica Chastain, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Megan Charpentier, Isabelle Nélisse, Daniel Kash, Javier Botet, Jane Moffat

THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG (2013) DIR Peter Jackson PROD Peter Jackson, Carolynne Cunningham, Fran Walsh, Zane Weiner SCR Guillermo del Toro, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens (novel by J.R.R. Tolkien) CAM Andrew Lesnie ED Jabez Olssen MUS Howard Shore PROJECT CONSULTANT Guillermo del Toro CAST Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Ken Scott, Graham McTavish, William Kircher, James Nesbitt, Cate Blanchett, Orlando Bloom, Evangeline Lily, Benedict Cumberbath, Stephen Fry, Peter Jackson

THE HOBBIT: THE BATTLE OF THE FIVE ARMIES (2014) DIR Peter Jackson PROD Peter Jackson, Carolynne Cunningham, Fran Walsh, Zane Weiner SCR Guillermo del Toro, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens (novel by J.R.R. Tolkien) CAM Andrew Lesnie ED Jabez Olssen MUS Howard Shore PROJECT CONSULTANT Guillermo del Toro CAST Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Ken Scott, Graham McTavish, William Kircher, James Nesbitt, Cate Blanchett, Orlando Bloom, Evangeline Lily, Christopher Lee, Ian Holm, Benedict Cumberbath, Stephen Fry, Billy Connolly, Peter Jackson

THE BOOK OF LIFE (2014, animated) DIR Jorge R. Guttiérez PROD Guillermo del Toro, Aaron Berger, Carina Schulze, Brad Booker SCR Jorge R. Guttiérez, Doug Langdale ED Ahren Shaw MUS Gustavo Santaolalla CAST (voice only) Diego Luna, Zoe Saldana, Channing Tatum, Ron Perlman, Christina Applegate, Ice Cube, Kate del Castillo, Hector Elizondo, Danny Treyo, Jorge R. Guttiérez, Cheech Marin, Guillermo del Toro

CRIMSON PEAK (2015) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Guillermo del Toro, Thomas Tull, Jon Jashni, Callum Greene SCR Guillermo del Toro, Matthew Robbins CAM Dan Laustsen ED Bernat Vilaplana MUS Fernando Velázquez CAST Jessica Chastain, Mia Wasikowska, Tom Hiddleston, Charlie Hunnam, Jim Beaver, Burn Gorman, Leslie Hope, Doug Jones

LA DELGADA LÍNEA AMARILLA, a.k.a. THE THIN YELLOW LINE (2015) DIR – SCR Celso R. García PROD Guillermo del Toro, Bertha Navarro, Alejandro Springhall CAM Emiliano Villaeuva ED Jorge García MUS Dan Ziotnik CAST Damián Alcázar, Joaquín Cosio, Silverio Palacios, Gustavo Sánchez Parra, Américo Hollander, Fernando Becerril, Tara Parra, Sara Juárez

KUNG FU PANDA 3 (2016, animated) DIR Alessandro Carloni, Jennifer Yuh Nelson PROD Melissa Cobb EXEC PROD Guillermo del Toro, Mike Mitchell, Rui Gang Li, Peikang La SCR Jonathan Aibel, Glenn Berger ED Claire De Chenu MUS Hans Zimmer CAST (voice only) Jack Black, Bryan Cranston, Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, J.K. Simmons, Jackie Chan, Seth Rogen, Lucy Liu, David Cross, Kate Hudson

THE SHAPE OF WATER (2017) DIR Guillermo del Toro PROD Guillermo del Toro, J. Miles Dale SCR Guillermo del Toro, Vanessa Taylor (story by Guillermo del Toro) CAM Dan Laustsen ED Sidney Wolinsky MUS Alexandre Desplat CAST Sally Hawkins, Octavia Spencer, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Michael Stuhlbarg, Doug Jones, David Hewlett, Nick Searcy

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING (2018) DIR Steven S. DeKnight PROD Guillermo del Toro, John Boyega, Femi Oguns, Jon Jashni, Thomas Tull SCR Steven S. DeKnight, Emily Carmichael, T.S. Nowlin, Kira Snyder CAM Dan Mindel ED Zach Staenberg, Dylan Highsmith, Josh Schaeffer MUS Lorne Balfe CAST John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny, Burn Gorman, Charlie Day, Tian Jing, Jin Zhang, Adria Arjona

TV MOVIES

HELLBOY ANIMATED: SWORD OF STORMS (2006, animated) DIR Phil Weinstein PROD Sidney Clifton, Scott D. Greenberg CREATIVE PROD Guillermo del Toro TELEPLAY Matt Wayne, Tad Stones (story by Mike Mignola, Tad Stones; characters created by Mike Mignola) ED John Hoyos, Jeffrey Perlmutter MUS Christopher Drake CAST (voice only) Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones, Peri Gilpin, Dee Bradley Baker, Kim Mai Guest

HELLBOY ANIMATED: BLOOD AND IRON (2007, animated) DIR Tad Stones, Victor Cook CREATIVE PROD Guillermo del Toro TELEPLAY Kevin Hopps (story by Mike Mignola, Tad Stones; comic book ‘Hellboy’ by Mike Mignola) ED Matt Steinauer MUS Christopher Drake CAST (voice only) Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, John Hurt, Doug Jones, Peri Gilpin, J. Grant Albrecht