Guillermo Del Toro isn’t "interested in scares" when he’s directing.
The 54-year-old filmmaker is gearing up for the release of his new horror movie ‘Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark’ – which he produced and wrote the screen story for – later this month, but has said he usually doesn’t worry too much about "the scares" in his movies, because he opts for telling "fairy-tales" with "horror images".
He said: "As a director, I’m not that interested in scares. I use my movies more like a fairy-tale. I do horror images, but like a fairy-tale. However, as a producer, I’m really interested in the scares with Juan Antonio Bayona in ‘The Orphanage’, and with Andy Muschietti on ‘Mama’, and this."
Guillermo says scares interest him as a producer because he "enjoys watching" scary movies.
He added: "I’m very interested because it’s something that I enjoy watching. In this movie, you need to coax the audience with very elegant camera work and very good set-ups. There’s a high production value, too. Plus, I have lots of empathy with the characters."
‘Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark’ is based on the children’s book of the same name by Alvin Schwartz, and Guillermo says that whilst the film is a horror flick, it’s one the whole family can enjoy.
Speaking to SFX magazine, he said: "When I made the first ‘Hellboy’, I thought, ‘The audience that I really want for this movie is going to me able to tell me what they think 10 years from now.’ I was making that movie for kids and, sure enough, the people that grew up with it are the people who love it the most.
"However, the beauty of this project is the way that it’s a horror movie that can be watched with the family."