"The Shape of Water" is filmed by an artist but written by an immature man-child. It's a sort of "Beauty and the Beast" and "Creature From the Black Lagoon" mash up with some themes that Disney would target to an 8-year-old.

During the opening scenes we see a naked female masturbating in a bath tub, which would seem to indicate the movie to follow is targeted towards a mature grown up audience. Instead, we get something on the same intellectual level that can be found in a book that teachers would read to 3rd graders.

I guess the more liberal viewers will be ok with its portrayal of white, straight males as being the real monsters, no matter how clichéd and intellectually boring this has become. For some reason there's a heroic sidekick who seems unnecessarily gay, i.e., it serves no purpose to the plot other than to serve as a contrast to the cruel, uber-hetero alpha male and main antagonist portrayed by Michael Shannon.

There's just enough sex, violence, and language to get an R rating, which would have been fine in a movie with a script that was mature enough to handle it. Its a real shame the script is so puerile because it's beautifully shot and looks great. In the end its hard to imagine this being enjoyable by anyone who reads above a first grade level or has maturity beyond a thirteen-year-old who gets titillated by a naked woman in the bathtub.