“Only monsters have the answer to all mysteries”: Del Toro

Pfilmmaker Guillermo del Toro announces the next premiere of Frankenstein (2025) is the culmination of a dream that began at the age of seven in his native Guadalajara. As explained in the catalog of La Biennale di Venezia – where it received 13 minutes of applause after its premiere, sharing the fourth place of the most applauded in the history of the festival: 24 minutes, Rajab’s voice; 17.5 minutes, The next room; 14 minutes, Blondeand 13 minutes, The brutalist–, it was at that age when he first saw the version of Frankensteinfilmed by James Whale in 1931, with Boris Karloff as the protagonist.

“This film concludes a search that began as a child. When I first saw that Whale film, I felt the jolt of recognition at that crucial moment: Gothic horror became my church and Boris Karloff my messiah. Mary Shelley’s masterpiece is full of questions that burn intensely in my soul: existential, tender, wild and damned, that only a young mind allows itself and that only adults and “Institutions believe they can respond,” the filmmaker added.

Furthermore, the “Mexican and, therefore, extremely emotional” director – as he defined himself in the press conference after the presentation in Venice – spoke about the implications of these creatures and their enigmas for his filmography: “For me, only monsters have the answer to all mysteries. They are the mystery. So Frankenstein It is a blessed undertaking, fueled by reverence and love for both mystery and monsters. The grandfather of them all – a story of a lost son and a prodigal father – Lazarus and Job in dialogue with a single creator and in search of all the answers. Just like we all do.”

Del Toro, winner of the Oscar for Best Director for The shape of water (2018), spent three decades trying to bring the story to the screen. In interview with The Worldsaid that one of the lessons that the production of Frankenstein is that now he does not believe that anything “is predestined.”

“A movie and a story that says that only monsters play God could not be more timely at this precise moment,” the doctor stressed. for the sake of honor by UNAM to the Spanish newspaper, and added: “But the most relevant thing for me is that if I had made it when I was less than 40 years old, I would have made it about my father and I. I would have been the son and the entire film would have been made by a son, instead of making the film as it really deserves: that of a father who decided to stop being a son and become a father,” Del Toro said.

“That was the challenge. My children were already born and I still behaved like my father’s son. I have been making films for 30 years and in all this time I have learned that things happen when they have to happen. I do not believe in destiny or in anything that is predestined. There is wisdom in accepting the irremediable,” he stated.

According to statements by the filmmaker, collected by The Countrythe story told in the novel and its film is tremendously current, because as he explained at the press conference in Venice: “We live in a time of terror and intimidation. The answer for me is love and forgiveness. The central question of the novel is what makes us human. We have no more urgent task than to continue being so, at a time when everything pushes us towards polarization. The film tries to show our right to imperfection, to understand ourselves as beings humans in the most oppressive circumstances. “I’m not scared of artificial intelligence, but of natural stupidity.”

The university community will have the opportunity to watch the film before its premiere on Netflix: It will be screened at the Cinematografia del Chopo (October 24 and 31) and in the renovated Julio Bracho Room of the University Cultural Center (CCU) (from October 23 to 26, October 30 and 31 and from November 7 to 9), with 4k laser projection and Dolby 7.1 sound. The schedules can be consulted on the Filmoteca UNAM website (www.filmoteca.unam.mx) and tickets can be purchased directly at the theater box office or from Wednesday, October 22.

Both join the alternative exhibition circuit in which the film will be presented, including 15 venues in Mexico City and screenings in the State of Mexico, Aguascalientes, Baja California, Chiapas, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Colima, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Hidalgo, Jalisco, Michoacán, Morelos, Nayarit, Nuevo León, Oaxaca, Tabasco, Puebla, Querétaro, San Luis Potosí, Sinaloa, Sonora, Tamaulipas, Tlaxcala, Veracruz, Yucatán and Zacatecas.

Those who attend the CCU will also be able to enjoy an exhibition dedicated to the Frankenstein universe in the lobby, which will be open to the public until December 2025.