Del Toro gets Hollywood star, urges immigrants to reject fear
Guillermo del Toro is known for creating surreal worlds filled with fantastical monsters in movies such as ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ and ‘The Shape of Water’
Mexican director Guillermo del Toro was honoured on Aug. 6 with a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, where he urged fellow immigrants to reject fear and division in the US.
Thedoubleoscar-winningfilmmaker,54,isknown for creating surreal worlds filled with fantastical monsters in movies such as “Pan’s Labyrinth” and “The Shape of Water.”
Speaking in the atermath of the El Paso mass shootings, he told the crowd that “great fear” was being used to divide people, but “those divisions are complete fantasies.” “When people say, ‘You dwell in fantasy,’ I say, ‘I don’t. Politicians do, churches do, I don’t. I deal with facts of the soul and the stories.’” He added: “Do not believe the lies they tell about us. Believe in the stories you have inside and believe that we all can make a difference.”
Del Toro let Mexico in 1998 ater his father was kidnapped for a $1 million ransom that he only managed to pay with the help of fellow director James Cameron. He is now known as one of the “three amigos” of Mexican film along with fellow Oscar-winning directors Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (“Birdman,” “The Revenant”) and Alfonso Cuaron (“Gravity”).
He told the crowd how searching Tinseltown’s sidewalk in the 1970s for the stars of horror legends Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney and Alfred Hitchcock had inspired him in creating his famed horror universes.
“What I felt with those stars is there were people that were as weird as me and they were here, so that gave me hope,” he said.
“This star is for you, all of you that feel weird to come over and sit for a moment.”
“Star Wars” filmmaker JJ Abrams and singer Lana Del Rey atended the ceremony. Del Ray provides a song for “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark,” a horror film produced by Del Toro out this week.
Guillermo del Toro, a Mexican filmmaker, author, actor, and former special effects makeup artist, throughout his career, he has shited between personal, lower-budget Spanish language films, such as “Cronos” and “The Devil’s Backbone,” and Hollywood tentpoles, including “Mimic,” “Blade II”, “Hellboy,” “Hellboy II: The Golden Army” and “Pacific Rim”. He also directed the gothic romance film “Crimson Peak”. As a producer, he worked on the films “The Orphanage,” “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark,” “The Hobbit” film series, “Mama,” “The Book of Life,” and “Pacific Rim: Uprising”.
With “Chuck Hogan,” he co-authored “The Strain” trilogy of novels, later adapted into a comicbook series and a live-action television series. With Dreamworks Animation, he created the Netflix animated series “Trollhunters” and “3Below,” the first two installments of the “Tales of Arcadia trilogy,” based on the 2015 novel he co-wrote with Daniel Kraus. Working with Dreamworks, he also executive produced “Kung Fu Panda 2,” “Puss in Boots,” “Rise of the Guardians,” and “Kung Fu Panda 3”.