Iconically, once cited as Donatella Versace’s favourite new film during her Vogue 73 Questions, The Shape of Water has gone on to become the most talked about film this year and win countless awards including two Golden Globes, plus three more last night at the 2018 BAFTA Awards where it won Best Original Music Award as well as Best Direction by Guillermo Del Torro and Best Production Design.
I had the chance to experience the film last night and I can tell you that it was not only breathtaking but sonically such an adventure which makes sense that streams of Original Motion Picture Soundtrack on Spotify have increased 544%. The score is primarily strings, piano and woodwind based with vocal features echoing the anxious sentiment, curious, mystery, beautiful imagery and heart strings of Elisa throughout the film.
As for the film, I don’t want to give too much away in the detail but it forms a very needed sentiment in the world right now, showing a unity across boundaries that really needed to be brought to life in a philosophical and conceptual sense on the screen as the world has become so literal. He graciously thanked the teenage Mary Shelley as an inspiration last night – saying that we need to bring a “voice to the voiceless, and fabricate monsters” to deal with issues in society “and parables do that”.
Thank you Guillermo and thank you Alexandre Desplat for the soundtrack.