Guillermo del Toro met his spiritual Norwegian brother, Roar Uthaug, for a meaty conversation hosted by Netflix about the inspiration behind the creatures of “Frankenstein” and “Troll.” In the video, the two filmmakers share stories and discuss how they came up with the famous creatures driving their respective epic work.
“Frankenstein,” a wild reimagining of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel which world premiered at Venice to a long standing ovation, launched on Netflix Nov. 7. The film stars Oscar Isaac as Victor, a crazed scientist who sets out to conquer death and brings to life a Creature, played by Jacob Elordi, who joined the movie a few weeks before the start of production.
In his chat with Uthaug, del Toro talked about the race against the clock to get the elaborate design for the creature ready on time after the actor who had been initially cast left the project due to a scheduling issue. “We took almost a year in reaching the final design. We had sculpted it for one actor, and it took a long time. And then that actor left the project, and we had only four or five weeks to resculpt everything,” del Toro said. The filmmaker admitted he was “not afraid” because he has “extensive background on makeup effects and visual effects and animation. “When people say, ‘Oh, it can’t be done, it’s too difficult… I know it can be done. I could do it! So we were not scared at all, and we took it,” he reminisced.
Del Toro also said he felt a “lot of kinship between ‘Hellboy 2’ and ‘Troll 2.’” “There’s strands and themes and preoccupations and even devices that I thought we may be long lost brothers or something,” he quipped, referring to the place of creatures in their films and the way they are being mistreated by humans.
Uthaug, whose “Troll 2” is launching on Netflix on Dec. 1, talked about the inspiration for the film which is inspired by Norwegian folklore and a famous painter Theodor Kittelsen. “He had made a drawing called ‘Troll at the Karl Johan Street,’ which is the main street of Oslo, and there’s a troll walking down there in the early 1900s. And I thought, what would happen if a troll walked down that street today? And how would the government and the army and everybody react to that? So it’s really Kittelsen’s drawing that was the genesis of the idea,” said the filmmaker. Speaking of ambition and scale, Uthaug told del Toro that he “grew up with American movies.” “I love those big blockbusters, and I’ve always been interested in VFX and special effects,” he said, but he’s also managed to weave some Norwegian elements, from “the folklore, the setting and characters.” “I think we have a different attitude towards how we describe the characters in Europe than maybe in the U.S.,” he said. The first “Troll” movie was a smash hit on Netflix when it came out in 2022. It became the most popular non-English language film of all time on the streamer and pulled a record 103 million views in its first 91 days.
Here’s the full conversation:
Guillermo del Toro: When people say to me, What is Mexican about your films? I say, Me. And I think the same could be said of you. You have a very American flair or flow, rhythm, character, introductions. It’s very playfully genre. And you have an unmistakable identity that has to do with where you come from. Would you agree on that?
Uthaug: I think that’s what I’ve been trying to do with the troll movies, mix the American genre and, like you said, the flow, but make it very Norwegian, the folklore and the setting and characters. I think we have a different attitude towards how we describe the characters in Europe than maybe in the US.
Del Toro: Normally, an American film resists the intrusion of the magical or the supernatural. Then finally, they have to reluctantly say, Well, this is real. But in your movies, there is a sense of coexistence between the fantastic and human that is effortless.
Courtesy of Netflix © 2024
Courtesy of Netflix
Uthaug: In Norway, we grow up with this folklore and fairy tales like the lullabies we sing to our children are about trolls. It’s a very big part of our culture. And souvenir shops, there are trolls, trolls, trolls everywhere.
Del Toro: So this is the only marketing that started before the movie.
Uthaug: Yes, It’s been going on for 100 years, and I’m now just trying to tap into it.
We have a Norwegian artist called Kittelsen. He had made a drawing called Troll at the Karl Johan Street, which is the main street of Oslo. And there’s a troll walking down there in the early 1900s. And I thought, what would happen if a troll walked down that street today? And how would the government and the army and everybody react to that? So it’s really Kittelsen’s drawing that was the genesis of the idea.
Del Toro: It’s very funny. It may be because I’m me and you are you, but I felt a lot of kinship between “Hellboy 2” and “Troll 2.” There’s strands and themes and preoccupations and even devices that I thought we may be long lost brothers or something. Designing a creature is not about so much what it represents, but what it embodies and how is that going to change the story. I want to know who I am. In the case of “Frankenstein,” he’s a newly formed human being. He’s not a repaired cadaver or a resurrected bunch of pieces. He’s a newly created Adam, almost biblically given birth to, because he needs to start like a baby and be mistreated by Victor in order to understand cruelty and then eventually forgiveness. That the interesting thing with the trolls is they are unfairly treated by the humans. I think the audience partially agrees with the trolls.
Courtesy of Netflix © 2024
Courtesy of Netflix
Uthaug: I enjoy your movies as well because the creatures, they’re never pure evil. There’s some humanity or some emotions to them. You’re not looking down at your creatures.
Del Toro: I look down on the humans. I think it’s the same in the retelling of Frankenstein. Victor is in any way the protagonist and the antagonist of the movie. He’s the bad guy and the good guy at the same time. People divide the world in art house filmmaking and very skillful technical filmmaking and the capacity to blend makeup effects or visual effects, digital creation, atmospheres, and so forth. They’re separate. But in your case, you seem to have a great handle from both. How did you get that technical proficiency and ability?
Uthaug: I grew up with American movies, and I love those big blockbusters, and I’ve always been interested in VFX and special effects. So I think it’s the love for that, and I guess combined with a Nordic mentality that blends those two together. In your later movies, you’ve been working with creatures where you have the creatures on set.
Del Toro: The only creatures I don’t have on set are either the ones that are too small or too big. But I prefer to give the actor something real.
Uthaug: I would love that. But of course, the trolls are so huge. We have a small drone with a red light blinking 50 meters up in the air, and we can control it so the actors can react to that. We show them concept art to make them understand how it’s going to look. We also Previsualize a lot of those sequences to know what shots we’re going to use and also to make sure that they understand the hand is coming, the tail is swinging around. We try to get as much before we shoot planned out so that they know what to react to it.
Del Toro: Do you do animation studies of the movement of the trolls before you shoot or only for each plate?
Uthaug: We do it in the design process of the trolls. We work with a concept artist and also the animators to get both the look right, but also the weight when they walk, like how they walk. We try to measure one step for a troll will take this many meters of the location so we can plan that out.
Del Toro: Tell me a little bit about the design process for the creature. Did you base it on one illustrator? Did you took multiple sources for the creation of the final troll?
Uthaug: Some of it is Kittelsen’s work. He’s the Norwegian artist who made the trolls how we perceive them, but also inspired other troll artwork.
Del Toro: Your design is a lot more realistic.
Uthaug: For the villain, we wanted to make him feel more of a predator. So then we looked at wolves, made his face a bit more triangular. And the hero troll is rounder and kinder. And as they’re supposed to come from Norwegian nature, we looked at rock surfaces and the ground of the forest.
Del Toro: What about the eyes?
Uthaug: The hero troll, he has more human eyes. But an important part of the trolls is that they always have pretty big noses and big eyes. How did you come up with the Frankenstein picture?
Del Toro: We knew if this guy (Victor) has been thinking about it for 20 years, he’s going to do something beautiful. He’s not going to do a station wagon. He’s going to make a Lamborghini. So we thought about what was available in the 1800s in terms of design and access to anatomical points. We thought we would follow the lines of anatomy, and in the head, we would follow the lines of a science called phrenology, which is the study of the parts of the head that create the will and the personality. It was very involved then. There are round scars and diagonal scars that represent that because we thought, well, where would he access the heart? It’s functional, but in terms of esthetic, the different colors of skin is important because it gives that idea that many men form this creature.
Uthaug: How long did it take you?
Del Toro: Well, we took almost a year in reaching the final design. We had sculpted it for one actor, and it took a long time. And then that actor left the project, and we had only four or five weeks to resculpt everything. But I was not afraid. I said, We’re going to do it. I have extensive background on makeup effects and visual effects and animation. When people say, Oh, it can be done, it’s too difficult… I know it can be done. I could do it! So we were not scared at all, and we took it.