The 2018 Academy Awards for Best Picture featured a remarkably strong and diverse group of nominees, including films like Call Me By Your Name, Ladybird, Dunkirk, Phantom Thread, The Post, Darkest Hour, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, and Get Out. With so many excellent films and varying genres, predicting a winner was difficult. Ultimately, Guillermo del Toro’s film took home the Oscar, a result that surprised many industry experts.
Guillermo del Toro’s critically acclaimed fantasy film is popular on HBO Max right now, and as awards season begins, it’s a great time to revisit this 2017 romance. The movie’s success went beyond just winning awards; with a 92% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a 7.3 score on IMDb, it challenged traditional ideas about what makes a ‘serious’ film.
What Oscar Worthy Looked Like Before The Shape of Water
“Oscar bait” is a common, often critical, term used during awards season. It refers to films supposedly made to appeal to Academy voters and win Best Picture. Historically, the Academy has often preferred grand historical dramas, realistic biographical films, and movies tackling serious social issues.
Historically, movies hoping to be considered important or artistic often steered clear of genres like high fantasy or horror. These types of films were largely ignored by established critics and industry leaders, and were usually only recognized for their technical achievements, such as special effects or makeup, rather than their storytelling or artistic merit.
Even hugely successful and innovative films often weren’t seen as serious Oscar contenders. The Academy voters tended to be older and prefer traditional, realistic stories. They generally favored feel-good films about British royalty or historical biographies.
Winning Best Picture at the Oscars often followed a very predictable pattern. A film almost had to receive a nomination from the Screen Actors Guild (now the Actors Awards) to have a real chance. The whole awards season felt limited, favoring traditional and safe filmmaking choices.
As a film lover, I always felt like a lot of those awards-focused or ‘important’ movies were miles away from the fun, wild side of cinema. They often felt…clinical. Everything was so carefully lit, the conversations were always proper, and the music just told you how to feel, leaving no room for your own interpretation. It seemed like playing it safe became the surest way to win an award, which honestly, felt a little disheartening.
Around the mid-2010s, the Academy Awards faced strong public criticism for a serious lack of diversity among its nominees. This led to widespread protests that pushed the Academy to acknowledge and address the issue. As a result, they began a major effort to quickly increase the number of voters, inviting thousands of new members from diverse backgrounds and countries into the traditionally exclusive voting group.
A surge of new, younger, and internationally diverse voices fundamentally changed who controlled the awards, breaking up the long-standing, unified voting group. This new global audience was eager for stories that spanned different genres and came from around the world.
Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water Was a Game Changer
Guillermo del Toro is celebrated for his distinctive and imaginative filmmaking style. Films like Crimson Peak and Hellboy showcase his blend of fairy tale and horror elements, creating immersive worlds for his characters. Releasing his Cold War-era love story with a monster twist during a busy awards season was a bold move.
The director created a stunning and unsettling film. The world he built felt both lavish and incredibly dangerous, immediately grabbing your attention and refusing to let go. Visually, the movie is striking, using rich teal and decaying amber colors to create a unique atmosphere.
Hidden beneath Baltimore, a government bunker reveals a world of decay. Rusty pipes and damp concrete fill the space, mirroring a forgotten corporate landscape. The camera moves as if through water, creating a dreamlike feeling of being underwater and highlighting the severe water damage that’s slowly consuming every room.
Sally Hawkins delivers a captivating performance as Elisa, conveying all her emotions without uttering a single word. She relies on expressive sign language, subtle sounds like breathing, and incredibly powerful eyes to connect with the audience. The film’s sound design emphasizes quiet details – the squeak of rubber and the swish of water – drawing viewers into Elisa’s silent world and demanding close attention.
Octavia Spencer and Richard Jenkins join the cast as the protagonist’s steadfast best friends. They portray a Black housekeeper and a gay artist, both struggling to navigate a very prejudiced time. The story draws viewers to sympathize with those who are marginalized, and these characters create a loving, supportive family of their own as they stand up against a powerful and intimidating military force.
Michael Shannon delivers a terrifying performance as Colonel Strickland, a sharply dressed but deeply unsettling figure. He embodies the worst kind of controlling and suspicious power, physically manifesting his anxiety through sweat and a menacing cattle prod. The film cleverly positions the real villain not as the monster, but as the man in charge, offering a sharp commentary on authority disguised as a classic monster movie.
This story turns the classic fairy tale formula on its head. It’s more than just a simple romance between someone wealthy and someone poor. The film honestly portrays physical attraction and adult relationships, avoiding cheap jokes. It explores mature themes with a magical quality that surprisingly overcomes any skepticism.
The film portrayed relationships beyond typical boundaries and female desire with respect and beauty, recognizing them as natural parts of the human experience. A particularly stunning scene shows the main character deliberately flooding her bathroom to create a peaceful, underwater space. Overall, the movie felt like a heartfelt tribute to those who are often marginalized. Giving this film recognition marked a change for an organization usually focused on celebrating conventional love stories.
Weird Winners Like The Shape of Water are Here to Stay
The biggest win at the Academy Awards wasn’t a fluke. It fundamentally changed how studios approach awards season. For the first time, executives understood they could invest in original, creative stories and still have a shot at winning. The film’s success proved that movies don’t need to be predictable, overly lavish, or huge in scope to earn critical acclaim.
Only two years after its release, Parasite dramatically burst onto the scene and won the biggest award of the night. Director Bong Joon-ho achieved a historic win with this film, which powerfully explores class differences through a thrilling and darkly humorous take on the home-invasion genre.
There’s a direct link between the emotional impact of that sea creature film and the sharp social criticism in the acclaimed Korean movie. That particular scene signaled a turning point, proving that international films were finally gaining widespread recognition. Movies like those stopped being seen as small, independent projects and started receiving the attention they deserved.
They began consistently dominating the top awards for directing and writing, and shaping how we all talked about pop culture. Viewers happily watched with subtitles because the stories were deeply compelling and felt very personal. Award show voters finally understood that overlooking international films meant missing out on truly great filmmaking.
The excitement reached its highest point during the awards show. Everything Everywhere All at Once was a huge winner, taking home multiple acting awards – Michelle Yeoh for Best Actress, Ke Huy Quan for Best Supporting Actor, and Jamie Lee Curtis for Best Supporting Actress – and featuring a predominantly Chinese-ethnic cast. The film’s success – a wildly energetic martial arts comedy winning the top prize – signaled that traditional expectations in Hollywood are changing.
It’s clear a big change is happening when you look at this year’s winter awards contenders. Guillermo del Toro is once again a major player, thanks to his large-scale, streaming-funded film. The fact that a traditional monster story is leading the pack suggests this change is here to stay.
The success of the film clearly shows the director hasn’t lost his unique and imaginative style. It’s being talked about alongside other popular genre films this year, such as the vampire thriller Sinners and the sci-fi comedy Bugonia. The film industry now widely recognizes that horror, science fiction, and intense themes can be genuinely artistic, and Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water played a significant role in proving that.
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2026-03-04 14:08