Mia Goth Opens Up About Her Fear and Awe Filming Guillermo del Toro’s FRANKENSTEIN
It’s taken over five decades for Guillermo del Toro to bring his dream project, Frankenstein, to life, a film that has lived in his imagination since he was seven years old.
Now, after years of anticipation, the filmmaker’s long-gestating vision is finally coming to the big screen, thanks to Netflix, and it seems like this is going to be the director’s most personal story del Toro has ever told.
At the Hollywood premiere, del Toro reflected on why Frankenstein matters now more than ever. “To me, [the message] is to reconnect emotionally to the idea of the power of forgiveness and acceptance — which is absolutely … a very scarce material right now,” he told Variety.
“It’s not a blockbuster — a preconceived notion. It’s not a franchise. It’s something that it speaks very directly and autobiographically, unfortunately to me and many in the past.”
The filmmaker’s fascination with misunderstood monsters has always been at the heart of his storytelling, from The Shape of Water to Pinocchio and Nightmare Alley. Composer Alexandre Desplat described del Toro’s latest creation as an extension of that idea.
“It’s all about respect and love the other,” he said. “In Greek, you say ‘xenophilia,’ which means ‘love the stranger.’ Because when you love the stranger, the stranger loves you. It makes a big difference.”
Jacob Elordi, who plays the monster, shared that the film holds a powerful sense of hope. “I think it demands hope,” he said. “I think this film demands that we’re hopeful, and it demands that we are emotional and that we see the beauty.”
For Mia Goth, stepping into the role of Elizabeth Lavenza was as thrilling as it was terrifying. “I’ve never been so scared stepping into a movie. I really haven’t,” Goth admitted.
“It was a lot for me, and I was always in my head. I kept thinking to myself, ‘Guillermo del Toro is making Frankenstein, the movie you’ve always wanted him to make, and I get to be a part of that.’ And I was so scared that I was going to be the one bad thing in it, and I would ruin it.”
Eventually, Goth found her way through the nerves and self-doubt. “I decided to feel that moment when you open your eyes, you have that calm and just a little bit more wisdom. That’s where Elizabeth was.”
Oscar Isaac, who portrays Dr. Frankenstein, said del Toro encouraged his cast to make the story deeply personal. “He very quickly said this: ‘You cannot fail. I made this bespoke for you.’
“He approached it the same way that Mary approached writing Frankenstein, which is making it a completely personal expression of what their experience has been, and it’s what he asked us to do as well. So as long as we were doing that in an honest, passionate way, there was no failing and there was no obligation.”
Rounding out the cast is Felix Kammerer, who plays Victor’s brother. His journey to the project was unexpected — beginning with an encounter in a bathroom at the Oscars.
“I went to the bathroom, and he approached me, and he just pulled me aside, ‘When are we going to work together, kid?’ And then I told him my agency and how to reach out, and I thought, ‘He’s never going to call,’” Kammerer recalled. “Two weeks later, my agent calls, and she says, ‘So Guillermo del Toro wants to talk to you.’”
According to producer Scott Stuber, Frankenstein was del Toro’s “white whale”, the story he’s longed to tell but never felt ready to tackle until now. “This was the right time. We tried a couple times earlier, but [del Toro’s] like, ‘This was the right time for me to understand the themes and mythology and what I want to tell of the story.’”
After decades of dreaming and crafting, Frankenstein is finally here and opened in select theaters on October 17 and begins streaming on Netflix on November 7.