On the heels of its Venice Film Festival premiere, Fox Searchlight has released the first The Shape of Water clip. The story follows a lonely, mute woman named Elisa (Sally Hawkins) who performs janitorial duties for a top-secret government laboratory. The facility’s greatest asset is its one-of-a-kind inhabitant, a humanoid creature who lives its life entirely underwater. When their paths cross, they each find themselves forever changed, but with grave consequences.

Our own Brian Formo caught the film at Venice, and loved it. He says of the film in his review:

It’s that tightrope of genre film, romance, and societal fears that del Toro walks on and he does it magnificently. There are a few verbal moments that perhaps are a little too on the nose (involving childhood candy as a metaphor and a few sexual references for both Elisa and Strickland), but the visual communication is superb. And for a romance that’s built on visual communication and for a time period where racism, sexism, and homophobia are often coded, that’s what matters most.

This is one of my most-anticipated films of TIFF, and this review and clip have done nothing to diminish my enthusiasm. It looks like del Toro has yet another winner on his hands.

Check out The Shape of Water clip below. The film opens December 8th and also stars Michael Shannon, Octavia Spencer, Richard Jenkins, Michael Stuhlbarg and Doug Jones.

Here’s the official synopsis for The Shape of Water:

From master story teller Guillermo del Toro, comes THE SHAPE OF WATER – an other-worldly fairy tale, set against the backdrop of Cold War era America circa 1963. In the hidden high-security government laboratory where she works, lonely Elisa (Sally Hawkins) is trapped in a life of silence and isolation. Elisa’s life is changed forver when she and co-worker Zelda (Octavia Spencer) discover a secret classified experiment. Rounding out the cast are Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Michael Stuhlbarg and Doug Jones.