Guillermo del Toro: “Making films is eating a shitty sandwich”

Guillermo del Toro sticks to his art form, regardless of the “assholes” in Hollywood.

The Oscar winner called out the film industry for being “oriented to grind shit and destroy your art” during the Annecy animation festival (via The Hollywood Reporter). Del Toro revealed that five of his projects have been rejected by the studios in the past two months.

“They still tell me no,” said the “Nightmare Alley” director. “In the last two months they said no to five of my projects. So it doesn’t go away. Making movies is eating a shit sandwich. There’s always shit, just sometimes you get a little more bread with yours.

He added: “The productivity rate against your efforts will remain frustratingly difficult and frustratingly long. And you will always meet assholes. But trust the stories you want to tell and wait for someone to buy them.”

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Del Toro also said he will focus primarily on animated feature films following his stop-motion adaptation of “Pinocchio” and the upcoming “Buried Giant,” based on the novel by Kazuo Ishiguro. Both movies are from Netflix.

“There are a couple more live-action movies I want to do, but not many,” del Toro said. “After that, I just want to do animation. That’s the plan.”

The “Shape of Water” director continued, “Animation to me is the purest art form, and it was kidnapped by a group of thugs. We have to save it. (And) I think we can make a Trojan horse a lot of good stuff in the animation world. I believe you can make an adult fantasy drama with stop-motion and move people emotionally. I think stop-motion can be intravenous, it can go straight to your emotions in a way that no other medium can.

Del Toro previously told IndieWire’s Eric Kohn in November 2022 that the experience in “Pinocchio” had led him to rethink his past films in terms of animated potential.

“I want to focus much more on animation. It’s much more my speed,” del Toro said. “Could you do an animated version of ‘The Shape of Water?’” He wondered before answering his own question. “I do not believe. Could you do a version of “Pan’s Labyrinth”? Maybe, I think so.