Guillermo Del Toro Adapting The Best Fantasy Novel Into A Movie
Guillermo Del Toro is adapting The Buried Giant, an award-winning 2015 novel, for Netflix as a stop-motion animated feature film.
When a critically acclaimed director like Guillermo del Toro makes a masterful movie that gets nominated for an Oscar for your streaming platform, you sign that man on for another movie. This is exactly what Netflix wisely decided to do. According to Deadline, the streaming giant is teaming up with del Toro for a stop-motion adaptation of the Kazuo Ishiguro novel The Buried Giant.
Del Toro is set to direct and produce the adaptation of The Buried Giant while also co-writing the script with Dennis Kelly. ShadowMachine, the stop-motion production studio that worked on Pinocchio, will be working with del Toro again for the film. It makes sense, considering Pinocchio is up for Best Animated Feature at the Academy Awards and racked up 50 million views in its first 28 days for Netflix.
The Buried Giant is a best-selling fantasy novel by Kazuo Ishiguro, released in 2015. The novel follows an elderly Briton couple named Axl and Beatrice who lives in a post-Arthurian England where no one can retain their long-term memories. The novel follows the couple as they journey to find their son, who they haven’t seen for a long time and who they don’t remember very well.
The Buried Giant seems like exactly the type of fantasy story that Guillermo del Toro can excel at telling. His Pinocchio movie was easily the best adaptation of that story, especially compared to the other two Pinocchio movies released the same year. It’ll be fascinating to see this movie come together, especially considering it will also be made with the labor-intensive and rarely-seen stop-motion process.
Hopefully, with Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio and now The Buried Giant being shot in stop-motion, del Toro can bring about a bit of a stop-motion renaissance. Although it’s a beautiful form of animation, there aren’t too many studios willing to invest in a process that takes a lot of time and money. These films certainly still get made, with films like last year’s Wendall & Wild, the Aardman animation films, and several Tim Burton films being notable examples.
There aren’t any casting details for The Buried Giant at this time, but with Guillermo del Toro at the helm, it seems likely it’ll be a pretty stacked ensemble. His Pinocchio film brought stars like Ewan McGregor, Ron Perlman, Cate Blanchett, Christoph Waltz, Tilda Swinton, and more along for the ride. Hopefully, we’ll find out who del Toro is casting sooner than later.
While we wait for The Buried Giant, there is plenty of great content from Guillermo del Toro to check out on Netflix. Along with Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, the streaming platform released the original anthology series Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities last year. The series is perfect for horror fans, as a different horror auteur helms each episode.
Del Toro also reportedly has a Frankenstein movie in the works, so look forward to that. We’ll also keep you updated on any news about The Buried Giant. Stay tuned to learn about all of Guillermo del Toro’s upcoming projects.
