"Guillermo del Toro is such a revered artist and an adored man that his status as a cheerleader of filmmaking craftspeople and hands-on artisans, his adulation for the art form itself, and his fight to keep it alive against the headwinds of artistry-crushing change might seem to overshadow the actual work. A genius who's not another brilliant asshole? A filmmaker who's generous with his time and attention and emotion? That's rare."
"Who thought we needed another "Pinocchio" movie until del Toro turned the Italian fable into a stop-motion marvel, a film that prioritized actual human art-making over AI, CGI, and even that other I, IP, for its own sake? His version of "Frankenstein," a big, juicy, glossy, expensive mounting of the Mary Shelley classic novel for Netflix, lacks the voiciness, the edge, the perverse streak of del Toro's great run of films from the '90s and into the early aughts, from "Cronos" and "Mimic" to "The Devil's Backbone""
Guillermo del Toro combines reverence for hands-on artisanship with advocacy for filmmaking craftspeople and a commitment to preserving art against mechanizing forces. The filmmaker balances generosity and emotional openness with a rare refusal to become a caustic auteur. Recent projects show mixed results: a near-successful remake of an obscure noir, the acclaimed stop-motion Pinocchio that foregrounds human art-making over AI and CGI, and a glossy Netflix Frankenstein that lacks the voiciness and perverse edge of his 1990s–2000s work. The career is defined by fairytale sensibilities that emphasize love, primal needs, and storybook endings amid occasional nihilistic flashes.
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