Guillermo del Toro’s new film: fans react to “stunning” first look at Nightmare Alley

The new film arrives this December

Fans have been reacting to the first look images from Guillermo del Toro’s upcoming new film, Nightmare Alley.

The Oscar-winning director behind The Shape of Water is returning with a new film, which he discussed in an interview with Vanity Fair.

“It’s based completely in a reality world,” he told the publication. “There is nothing fantastic. It’s a very different movie from my usual,” he added, saying that the film has no fantasy or supernatural elements.

The film is a remake of the 1947 film of the same name, which is based on a novel by author William Lindsay Gresham. del Toro told Vanity Fair that his screenplay with Kim Morgan has been formed from the page rather than the screen.

He continued: “From the beginning, our interest was to go for the novel, but it’s almost impossible to adapt because it has a very kaleidoscopic, very peculiar voice. You would need a six-hour miniseries and shifting points of view, and this and that. We started from the novel, and didn’t want to do a remake as much as a new adaptation.”

Starring Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Willem Dafoe, Toni Collette, David Strathairn and Rooney Mara, the film is set for a December 2021 release.

After the first-look stills of the cast were revealed by the magazine, fans have been reacting to the images. One fan on social media called the images “stunning” while another added: “cannot wait for this!” A third Twitter user said “can’t wait for this amazing-looking film.”

You can see some more of the reactions here:

Earlier this year, a copyright lawsuit alleging Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water copied a Pulitzer Prize-winning author was dismissed.

The lawsuit – which was originally filed in February 2018 ahead of the Oscar voting deadline – claimed that the film infringed on the work of author Paul Zindel.

Responding to news of the suit’s dismissal, a spokesperson for Searchlight Pictures said at the time: “David Zindel, the son of Paul Zindel, author of Let Me Hear You Whisper, acknowledges, based on confidential information obtained during the litigation process, that his claims of plagiarism are unfounded.”

They added that David “acknowledges Guillermo del Toro as the true creator of The Shape of Water” and that “any similarity between the two works is coincidental”.

The Shape of Water was nominated for 13 Oscars at the 2018 ceremony, taking home four awards including Best Picture and Best Director.