Guillermo del Toro names his favourite horror film of all time
While Guillermo del Toro is primarily known for his work in the horror genre, his films such as Cronos, The Devil’s Backbone and even Hellboy all stray from the modern conventions of horror. That is because del Toro is more interested in the human relationships within his narratives and the beauty they possess.
As for his favourite horror film of all time, del Toro greatly admires George Franju’s 1960 picture Eyes Without a Face. The film centres on a plastic surgeon who is set on giving his daughter a face transplant, which has been damaged by a car accident.
Discussing his admiration for Franju, del Toro said, “His first film was a documentary about a slaughterhouse called Le Sang des betes (Blood of the Beasts). Therefore he is a man who pulls no punches when it comes to graphic stuff. And yet he’s a guy who is also capable of capturing a poetic, feminine, tragic essence in his central character.”
As stated above, del Toro is more concerned with the human emotions that can be expressed in the horror genre. Discussing Alida Valli’s character, he said, “It’s like an undead Audrey Hepburn character that inspired me a lot, by the contrast of beauty and brutality, that I favour and love. And at the centre of all the horrible things that happen, there are immense acts of love by her father.”
Perhaps del Toro informed us of his own artistic vision when he discussed how Eyes Without a Face moved him in a unique way. “When the reason for brutality is genuine, it makes that brutality all the more disturbing,” he said. “It contains some of the most poetic images the horror genre has ever given us in a very oblique way.”
Del Toro was certainly inspired by Franju’s film, particularly in his 1992 picture Cronos. “I did a little homage on Cronos,” he said, “When the undead Jesus Gris calls the house and his wife picks up, and he cannot talk because he is dead, and he hangs up, and that’s taken exactly from Eyes Without a Face.”
He then drilled the point home about the exact kind of horror films that he admires: “At the core of every horror film that I have ever loved, there’s a point in it. I’m not a guy that wants headbanging gore. I’m not a guy that’s into it for the thrills and the sex and the blood. I’m into it because, at the core of the films I love, there has to be a beauty for the beast to make sense.”
