Guillermo del Toro Talks Ghosts, What’s Next After ‘Crimson Peak,’ ‘Pacific Rim 2’ Status
By The Movie God
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Wednesday, September 30th, 2015 at 10:00 am
If you told me Guillermo del Toro was making a live-action My Little Pony movie (don’t go getting any ideas, Hollywood), I’d be excited about it. Anything he does, I’m down for a watch. But while this is true, if you really want to get me pumped up tell me that del Toro is working on a smaller film next. I’ve very much enjoyed his bigger Hollywood flicks like the Hellboy movies, Pacific Rim, and Blade II, but it’s his smaller movies like The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth that really get me giddy.
In a lengthy piece on the director it’s revealed that his next project, after the upcoming gothic horror Crimson Peak, will in fact be one of these smaller movies. In addition to this, del Toro also talked ghostly encounters that have led to his fascination with the paranormal, the status of Pacific Rim 2, and more. Read what he had to say below.
Unfortunately at the moment no details have been shared about what del Toro’s next movie might be exactly, only that it’s an independently financed and the director is keeping it kept a well-guarded secret. In the article on del Toro, however, it’s said that he’s unlikely to make a movie without some sort of monster in it, because as he says “I need an element of horrible beauty in most of the movies I make.”
And if he were to step away from familiar ground, he shares where he might venture:
“It would probably be about World War II or a crime noir. I’m not easily scared in real life, but I’m scared of crime and politicians.”
So just that information alone offers some ideas to ponder. I and many others cannot wait to see what it turns out to be. But for now, we must be patient as Crimson Peak approaches, another movies fans of his work are excited about and don’t have to wait much longer for at all. That movie arrives in theaters on October 16th.
Speaking of Crimson Peak, which is described as a gothic romance horror and ghost story, del Toro has a fascination with the paranormal that has deep roots in his life. His fascination with ghosts, which were also a significant part of his 2001 feature The Devil’s Backbone, began at a young age for him personally and even before that with his mother, who had an experience that actually inspired the opening scene of Peak. When del Toro was 12 years old he heard the voice of his late uncle while occupying the room that once belonged to his deceased relative, something that understandably scared him greatly. But it was an experience that also fueled a growing fire, leading him to go so far as to request any room that’s said to be haunted at a hotel he’s staying at.
Usually staying in a potentially haunted room results in nothing happening at all. But sometimes something does happen, such as when he stayed at the Waitomo Caves Hotel in New Zealand while scouting locations for The Hobbit back before he had to depart that franchise and Peter Jackson ultimately took the reins once again. They stayed at the hotel during the off-season and basically had it all to themselves, setting up this delightful little experience for del Toro:
“They opened it just for us, and I took the haunted room. I was in my room watching “˜The Wire’ on DVD, and I heard a murder happening right in the room. It was a woman screaming and a man sobbing, and it was so scary. It lasted for 15 or 20 minutes.
I got paralyzed. I put on my earphones and watched “˜The Wire’ all night until the sun came out.”
So now when you see the ghosts of del Toro’s films, you have an idea where some of them came from.
Another topic covered was one of del Toro’s much bigger movies, Pacific Rim 2. Things are not going so well for the sequel these days, but the director reaffirms what he’s said in the past, that the project is not dead yet:
“As far as I’m concerned, it’s not cancelled, just postponed. Right now, we have to put a budget and screenplay together, present it to Universal and Legendary, and they will make a decision.”
I would absolutely be excited to see a Pacific Rim sequel get made one day, but as far as the big Hollywood movie projects of his go, the only one that would equal the level of excitement his smaller movies create would of course be his take on H.P. Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness. Sadly we know the chances of that movie ever happening grow smaller with each terrified movie studio that runs away from it…though it’s not entirely dead (only mostly dead) just yet.
This is just a sampling of the various Guillermo del Toro-related goodies touched on in the feature about him, which was published by Variety. Heading over and reading the entire thing is well worth your time if you’re a fan of his work.
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