I didn’t only love Alamo drafthouse cinema for the Rick and Morty event. (See Rick Mobile Haul-Katy, TX.) I love this place for everything they do♥ Let’s break down this special screening experience into 4 parts before 2018 hits us like a wrecking ball.
The poster:
In the forever glorious SoCal, you would notice the giant self-sponsored billboard poster next to Tsujita-Udon ii. That was my first encounter with James Jean.
However, I lied. He and I went way back to the day when I lay my eyes on the cover of Fables, an adult fantasy series from Vertigo.
“James Jean is a Taiwanese American visual artist, known for both his commercial work and fine art gallery work." #Taiwanesepride
He also designed and illustrated the posters for other two blockbusters of 2017 Mother! and Blade Runner 2049. Team Guillermo del Tor has most certainly aimed for the win when they grabbed James Jean for the artwork. Look at this poster! It’s a gorgeous mess. The planning team behind Alamo Drafthouse Cinema’s events was smart to do a grayscale afternoon tea menu design based on that original movie poster. Although I thought a green-colored menu card would serve a much stronger connection and fit better to the movie than any other color.
The menu:
I very much enjoyed all 3 tea they served. It did grow my curiosity on why and how they decided the tea serving order. However, the food was the main deal. You could clearly see each dish from the three-course meal came from the movie which in the end became the easter egg of the event. I couldn’t help but feel moved by the thought they put into building this menu. I wish I could steal the recipe from their chef. The food was good, and I grantee you no lie.
It started off with Surf & Turf sided with Deviled Eggs.
The eggs in The Shape of Water serve as the essential icebreaking tool for Elisa to win the gill man’s trust. It is the beginning of everything. It is also the first sign language word the gill man learned by putting its index finger next to its middle finger and forming a cross by tapping them. I was amazed by the flavorful seasoning from the Deviled Eggs. Perhaps I was a little too impressed that I wish they gave us more of those mouthwatering eggs:D That’s how we grow to love the eggs like the gill man does.
Surf &Turf was mentioned in the movie when Dr. Robert Hoffstetler/Demitri was having a conversation in his place with this Russian comrades. I was overly worried about how much dairy they put into the salmon mousse that I only tasted the multigrain toast and the crispy prosciutto ham. If the server had given me a little more time to encourage myself for the wild card mousse before he took the plates away, I might have had a chance to write about it. No comments on this one. Sorry lads!
Every hero needs his/her sidekick, aka the best friend. Elisa, not the ice queen, has an awesome gay friend, Giles, the kind of gay friend girls would like to have. Giles secretly liked the server who works at the family-owned restaurant. Despite the awful-tasting key lime pies, he would still pay and visit the restaurant for the sake of seeing his dream boy. I love the scene when the audience had a glimpse of a fridge full of unfinished key lime pies. That was an act of love hidden and buried in pies. The last course of the meal came the Lime & Corn Flake Pie. It was a fine balance of savory and sweet that left me satisfying.
The short film before The Shape of Water:
As one of the many partners Alamo Drafthouse Cinema has, Birth.Movie.Death., a Texas-based movie media, contributed a great historical rundown of all the Creature from the Black Lagoon inspired films.
Meet the Creature-The history of the Gill-man in Movies and TV
Guillermo del Toro has been obsessed with the gill man since he first watched the movie. We get to peek into his idea of a fish man in the 2 Hellboy movies, but that fish man was Abe Sapien; he’s no gill man and he never will be.
The movie:
Guillermo del Toro, for many years, remains as my personal favorite director for reasons that people probably wouldn’t understand. You are not going to find another director who’d fearlessly stand for his aesthetic and never back down or ever compromise for the less. When he said he wanted Pan’s Labyrinth to be in Spanish, Ofelia hablo español. When he said he wanted his version of Creature from the Black Lagoon, we have The Shape of Water. The green-colored theme of the movie was phenomenal. He is the magician of colors who sinks you to his fantasy world, his cold war America, his 1962. You think you are on land but the green pulls you into the water. This is a very Guillermo del Toro-style fairy tale for the adults who seek someone to love them for their imperfections. It is an absolutely mesmerizing piece that I’d watch it again:D
Sköll in the Wonderland 