Oscar Isaac and Jacob Elordi are set to attend the Venice Film Festival on Saturday for the world premiere of Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein, marking the start of what is expected to be a major awards season campaign for the film.
Isaac stars as Victor Frankenstein, while Elordi takes on the role of the monster in del Toro’s long-anticipated adaptation of Mary Shelley’s classic novel. “It’s the movie that I’ve been in training for 30 years to do,” del Toro recently told The Associated Press.
Some disruption is possible around the premiere, as an anti-war march is scheduled that evening near the festival, aiming to draw attention to the crisis in Gaza.
Del Toro last attended Venice in 2017 with The Shape of Water, which won the festival’s top prize and later went on to claim the Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director in 2018. Netflix, which has yet to secure a Best Picture Oscar, is betting heavily on Frankenstein. Del Toro’s previous project, Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, earned the streaming giant its first Oscar for Best Animated Film.
Like The Shape of Water, Frankenstein is considered a strong contender for Venice’s top awards, competing against films including Yorgos Lanthimos’s Bugonia, Kathryn Bigelow’s A House of Dynamite, Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice, and Kaouther Ben Hania’s The Voice of Hind Rajab. The winners, chosen by an Alexander Payne-led jury, will be announced on Sept. 6.
Netflix plans to release Frankenstein in theaters on Oct. 17, followed by streaming on Nov. 7.
