The Treat: Guillermo del Toro
The Treatment
KCRW
4.6 • 656 Ratings
🗓️ 9 February 2026
⏱️ 5 minutes
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Summary
Guillermo del Toro’s films often show the beauty even in their, at times, gothic horror. His latest is the Oscar nominated adaptation of Frankenstein, which is up for nine awards next month, including Best Picture. For del Toro’s treat, he celebrates the late director Ken Russell. Russell’s work often stoked controversy and was even censored, but as del Toro notes, it was also filled with dazzling beauty and craft.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to The Treat. I'm Elvis Mitchell. In adapting material we think we know, like Pinocchio, |
| 0:07.6 | or his latest Frankenstein, writer, director, Guillermo del Toro, has discovered new and wild |
| 0:14.5 | colorations in the familiar. His treat is a filmmaker who took works people thought they know, |
| 0:26.6 | and exploded notions about these subjects with an original and highly energetic approach. Hi, I'm Guillermo del Tor and this is The Treat. |
| 0:33.6 | And I want to talk about an un-song or not song song-enough hero of mine, which is Ken Russell. |
| 0:42.4 | His Majesty's triumph again. |
| 0:48.2 | Ken Russell is one of the most savage messiahs of film, and particularly of importance |
| 0:55.1 | is one of the few films |
| 0:57.3 | that are censored in the 21st century. |
| 1:00.6 | Shh. |
| 1:01.3 | Exactly. |
| 1:02.3 | See, look, there he is. |
| 1:05.4 | There's a man well worth going to Elph, all right? |
| 1:13.0 | You know, when you have savage pieces of filmmaking, |
| 1:16.2 | transgressive pieces of filmmaking like, you know, |
| 1:19.0 | that are just gory or grotesque. |
| 1:22.9 | He's filmed the devils, |
| 1:24.1 | which is exquisitely turgid and crazy and unbridled, |
| 1:29.3 | it's still censored by the studio. |
| 1:31.8 | Warner Brothers will not release it on any physical media, |
| 1:35.6 | and certainly has never released the full cut of Russell, |
| 1:40.3 | and those who witness it never forget. |
... |
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