Netflix is definitely preparing for an intense Halloween season. The streaming platform recently released a lot of new teaser trailers for different projects, a part of the virtual Geeked Week event, an event to announce news, trailers, and more updates on Netflix productions. And horror fans have a lot to anticipate being released this year, from the first look at Tim Burton's Wednesday series with Jenna Ortega to the teaser trailer of Mike Flanagan's new series, The Midnight Club. Now, Netflix has released a teaser trailer for Guillermo Del Toro's new project. The Cabinet of Curiosities teaser trailer also shows the names of the directors involved in the project and a few actors.
Guillermo Del Toro has a vast fan base with various movies that play with horror elements, such as the horrific character designs of Pan's Labyrinth, The Shape of Water, and the Hellboy movies, the Victorian Gothic movie Crimson Peak, and outright horror narratives with Antlers and Cronos. Cabinet of Curiosities is an anthology series in which each episode will be a different horror story. The series is based on a short story by Del Toro with the same name. Two episodes will be based on stories written by him while the other six will be the works of other amazing directors that are part of the project.
The teaser trailer doesn't explicitly show much about each individual story in the series, but it has exposed the overall feel that the show will have. Here is a deep dive into the teaser and all the directors attached to the project.
Cabinet of Curiosity Teaser Trailer
The teaser trailer instantly reminds viewers of another anthology horror series, now entering season 11: American Horror Story. The teaser is somewhat similar to the American Horror Stories intros, where the feeling of the season is exposed through visuals and the soundtrack, but elements of the story (plot, time period, location, etc.) are not told. The opening shot of a recently filled up grave that moves to the rhythm of breathing, with worms crawling the earth and the top of a skull appearing from the dirt, already sets a very specific tone (for a specific audience) that is only enhanced by the next shots.
The scenarios change quite a bit, from a morgue full of bodies on tables to an ominous house during the night to even what appears to be an altar holding a book with a pentagram drawn in one of the pages; things are about to get scary. There is an apparent connection between the stories and animals and creatures, which is not unheard of when talking about Del Toro's projects, and is actually one of the elements fans love the most about his work. So, even though he is not directing any of the episodes, his creative choices remain present in the series.
Directors of Cabinet of Curiosities
The image shown changes while announcing each director by naming a movie they are known for, hinting what the main tone of each episode would have. The scenes also give the feel of each director, with the subject, coloring, lighting, and camerawork all indicative of their specific aesthetics. The first one was the director of the movie Mandy, Panos Cosmatos. When he is announced, the audience is taken from a corridor to a circular room with red lighting (the director is known for colorful lighting) and an artifact in the middle of the room.
Then, The Empty Man appears on the screen by the director David Prior. A weird ball with multiple blinking lights in the middle of the floor while a poorly-lit person in the back moves. The next movie name that appears is Splice, by Vincenzo Natali (also the director of the horrifying philosophical masterpiece Cube). The sci-fi director and his film's name is shown before a black and white body of a woman wearing white and holding a bouquet of dead flowers. These last two directors, combined with the imagery associated with their names in the teaser, hint that there might be more sci-fi-oriented stories in the series.
The white font of The Babadook stands out from the dark scene of a child walking down the stairs, which couldn't be more appropriate to director Jennifer Kent's work, one of the most brilliant women directing horror today. A gross monster-like hand appears on the screen after the movie The Vigil by Keith Thomas is announced, assuring longtime Del Toro fans that monsters and creatures are a part of the series. The scene changes to the top of a fireplace where a drawing of a house with eyes is shown, and the title Twilight by Catherine Hardwicke appears on the screen. The last director, but certainly not the least, is referenced with a very stylistic and well-lit scene of an expensive house with Christmas decorations and a German shepherd running about; the title of the black and white film A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night by Middle Eastern director Ana Lily Amirpour appears.
Guillermo Del Toro's World Building
Guillermo Del Toro movies are known for their world-building abilities. Even the series' title, Cabinet of Curiosities, which was commonly referred to during the 1700s as a room filled with extraordinary objects, hints at how the show will work structurally: each episode will be an object from a collector's room. From the teaser trailer alone, it is clear that he has once again created a very particular world in which to tell these stories. Inviting so many incredible directors that work with different subject matters and even genres, the Cabinet of Curiosities concept became clear and, at the same time, makes the audience eager to understand more about this world.
Inside a cabinet of curiosities is more diversity of not only objects but what they represent and come from, and the episodes are no different, with directors of varying nationalities, genders, and beliefs. If every director worked with the same subject matter, it would feel tiring after a couple of episodes and there would be no surprise factor, because the audience would know what the story was about before they even started watching it. That is why his decision (like Masters of Horror before him) to find some of the best directors working in horror today was important: because it makes the concept extremely strong while also entertaining a large audience.
Now that the teaser trailer for Cabinet of Curiosities has dropped, fans worldwide are eager to see how Guillermo Del Toro will tell his new story and how the invited directors will make their episodes have their own feel to them. There is no release date yet, but the series should still premiere this year, probably in time for Halloween.