Today we got the confirmation that the opening movie for the Sitges Film Festival 2017 will be The Shape of Water (2017). The movie, co-written and directed by Guillermo del Toro, is one of the most expected titles of the year in the genres of fantasy. This won’t be the first time the Mexican director opens the festival, as he did previously in 2006 with El laberinto del fauno (2006) (aka Pan’s Labyrinth). Del Toro’s first visit to the film competition was actually in 1993 when he picked up the Best Screenplay award for Cronos (1993), his debut movie.
The Shape of Water (2017) is located in a disquieting, high-security laboratory, during the Cold War, where an extraordinary connection occurs between two apparently far away worlds. Lonely Elisa’s life, a worker at the laboratory, changes completely when she discovers an experiment classified as secret. The movie is starred by Sally Hawkins, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Doug Jones, Michael Stuhlbarg and Octavia Spencer, and features a soundtrack created by Alexandre Desplat.
This year marks the 50th edition of the Sitges Film Festival, one of the most important horror, science fiction and fantasy festivals in the world. This year the festival will be running from the 5th to the 15th of October. Guillermo del Toro will also be the patron of this year’s festival, which will be dedicated to the figure of Dracula as a tribute to the 25th anniversary of Dracula (1992), directed by Francis Ford Coppola based on the Bram Stoker novel.
Check out the official press note by the Sitges Film Festival here. And warm up your mind for a lovely dose of fantasy with the trailer for The Shape of Water (2017):
