Guillermo Del Toro's Frankenstein - Cast, Plot, And More Info

The upcoming movie I am most excited about, bar none, is Guillermo del Toro's "Frankenstein." One of my favorite timeless stories told by one of my favorite artists? Sign me up!

It's the film that del Toro's career has been building towards. The man loves monster movies and gothic literature like no one else. His empathy is always most reserved for the outsider, whether Hellboy, the fish man from "The Shape of Water," or the socialist rebels in Franco's Spain. These flourishes trace back to his childhood infatuation with "Frankenstein," the book and movies alike; take a look at his living room.

Del Toro, who considers Frankenstein and his monster one of fiction's few "universal" characters, has been teasing this adaptation for years. He implied it was on the horizon while speaking to ComingSoon.net in 2008 (he obviously got sidetracked in the meantime). During a 2022 sitdown with Mike Flanagan (creator of "The Fall of the House of Usher"), del Toro argued that "Frankenstein" is the one book every horror fan has to read; "The beauty of 'Frankenstein' is that it's written by somebody that is in her late teens and the questions it asks are relatable in the same way that Milton is relatable to every existential question but done with a lot more emotion. And if you read it at 15 and then you read it at 40, it's a different book." His affinity for Shelley's writing gets curiouser and curiouser; how will a mature artist with the imagination of a child handle a story created by a teenager?

Flanagan closes the conversation by asking if the world will see del Toro's "Frankenstein." We now know the answer is yes. Unlike plenty of other pitched projects of del Toro's, this one has climbed out of development hell. When can we expect it?

Guillermo del Toro's "Frankenstein" does not yet have a release date. It is currently in pre-production. Back in April 2023, del Toro reported he was scouting locations for filming in Edinburgh, Scotland (home of the Frankenstein pub, which he came across).

Production Weekly indicates the film is currently on track to begin shooting in February 2024, which del Toro corroborated during an interview with Collider. News about the release date will surely trickle out as production makes strides. This is pure speculation, but based on this timeline, a late 2024 or 2025 release date sounds plausible.

A promising sign is that the film has locked down a promising cast. News of the film broke via Deadline coupled with the announcement of three stars: Andrew Garfield ("Under the Banner of Heaven," "The Amazing Spider-Man"), Oscar Isaac ("Scenes From A Marriage", "Ex Machina"), and Mia Goth ("X," "Pearl").

It's unclear which roles that the three have been chosen for. Most guesses seem to be that Isaac will play Dr. Victor Frankenstein and, in turn, Garfield will play his creation. It could easily be the other way around, though. Deadline's original report speculates that Goth is playing Elizabeth, Victor's love interest. Maybe she'll be rocking the Bride of Frankenstein's hair instead.

Del Toro revealed to Collider in October 2023 that Christoph Waltz is also attached. Of the four, Waltz is the only del Toro alum — he played the villainous Count Volpe in "Pinocchio."

The exact details have yet to be revealed, but come on — it's "Frankenstein." Everyone knows this story, of a young genius who tries to create life and pays the price of an absentee parent when his creation becomes monstrous inside and out. There's been permutations on the story (especially as different re-tellers' sympathies lies more with Victor or "Adam"), but you don't reinvent the wheel — or do you?

In 2008, del Toro described his "Frankenstein" to ComingSoon.net as such:

"I'm not doing 'Mary Shelly's Frankenstein.' I'm doing an adventure story that involves the creature. I cannot say much, but it's not the central creation story, I'm not worried about that."

That said, it's plausible that his pitch has changed in the intervening 15 years. Indeed, Producer Miles J. Dale described del Toro's "Frankenstein" as a father-son story, hinting at the creation angle:

"In the last couple of films, certainly with 'Nightmare Alley' and then with 'Pinocchio,' we've dealt with the whole father-son relationship. And Guillermo and I both lost our fathers in the last few years. When you have a strong father figure, it's a big part of our lives. This version of 'Frankenstein' very much goes down that thematic road. So, I feel like this is the third film in Guillermo's father trilogy."

Who do you think? Unlike his recent TV project, "Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities," the eponymous filmmaker will be sitting in the director's chair on "Frankenstein."

Born in Mexico, del Toro has worked his way up from indie genre cinema to the mainstream without ever losing his personal touch. "The Shape of Water," his 2017 love letter to "Creature from the Black Lagoon," took home Best Picture and Best Director at the 90th Academy Awards.

He's traversed the superhero genre as well, directing "Blade II" and the "Hellboy" duology, and helmed the kaiju/mecha mash-up "Pacific Rim" in 2013. "Crimson Peak" might be his spookiest movie, but for me, his most powerful films are his Spanish language ones — "The Devil's Backbone" and "Pan's Labyrinth," both set in Francoist Spain and melding the terror of fairy tales and fascism.

His latest work includes 2021's "Nightmare Alley," which brought art deco and striking color to William Lindsay Gresham's 1946 noir novel, and the stop-motion "Pinocchio" in 2022. Pinocchio is another of del Toro's childhood fables; he admitted it and "Frankenstein" are kind of "the same story." How fitting that he's telling his versions of them back to back.

Del Toro will be writing the script for "Frankenstein" himself. Producers include the aforementioned Dale and del Toro's other frequent producing partner Gary Ungar, who produced "Pinocchio" and "The Cabinet of Curiosities." Both Dale and Ungar also produced the FX vampire series "The Strain" (co-created by del Toro and Chuck Hogan, based on novels written by them). "Frankenstein" is being produced by Netflix and will presumably distributed by them as well. Del Toro has worked with Netflix before on "Pinocchio" and "The Cabinet of Curiosities." It's too early to know if "Frankenstein" will also get the limited theatrical release that some Netflix movies enjoy or only be viewable on the company's eponymous streaming platform.