It isn't an exaggeration to say that there's no director like Guillermo del Toro. His dark style and fantasy worlds have resulted in some of the best movies. Movies like Hellboy and Pacific Rim were so creatively ambitious and ahead of their time that they even flopped at the box office, but they later resurfaced as beloved cult classics.
While Mimic went through a lot of studio interference, the rest of del Toro's movies are so unmistakably his that even his weakest outings still stood above their contemporaries. With such a rich and impressive body of works, it can be tricky to name del Toro's best movie of all time.
10 Blade II
Blade II may not have much depth, but it's still one of the most unique entries in the superhero genre. Most people expected Blade II to be an artless and derivative sequel to the groundbreaking Blade, but del Toro turned the sequel into a slick and gothic action movie.
Besides arguably being the best display of Wesley Snipes' skills as an action star, Blade II also featured some of the bloodiest and most disturbing takes on cinematic vampires. Blade II is more than a guilty pleasure; it's a modern B-grade vampire movie that put style over substance in the best ways possible.
9 Crimson Peak
Crimson Peak was the perfect movie for del Toro. It was a classic romance set in a gothic mansion that's haunted by the restless dead. Del Toro's Crimson Peak was incredibly gothic and one of the most hauntingly gorgeous movies ever.
At worst, Crimson Peak often let its style overshadow its substance. Though its story was too familiar by the standards of period melodramas and gothic tragedies, Crimson Peak was well-acted and directed and one of the most beautiful stories that del Toro has told.
8 Nightmare Alley
By remaking Nightmare Alley, del Toro indulged himself in film noir's style and history. His interpretation of the late '30s and the criminal underworld that amoral conmen lurked in were sights to behold. Most of all, Nightmare Alley boasted one of del Toro's best and biggest ensemble casts, which included Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, and Willem Dafoe.
At its worst, Nightmare Alley felt derivative and overly familiar. This was largely due to the oft-imitated source material's age, and the fact that the film noir is so ubiquitous today that even its best new iterations barely stand out. Nevertheless, del Toro's incredible direction and passion elevated the remake.
7 Pacific Rim
With Pacific Rim, del Toro did the impossible by bringing anime and tokusatsu entertainment to life in a major Hollywood movie. Pacific Rim was more of an ode to del Toro's childhood interests than a reflection on deeper and more philosophically-charged ideas, and it was better for it.
Pacific Rim was "fun" in its purest form. Everything and everyone in the movie was larger-than-life. The epic fights between the Jaegers and kaiju had to be seen to be believed. Pacific Rim was so deceptively simple that many erroneously thought it could be imitated without del Toro's passion.
6 Hellboy II: The Golden Army
Del Toro has made a couple of sequels that surpassed their already groundbreaking predecessors. Hell Boy II: The Golden Army addressed Hellboy's few but noticeable shortcomings, then exceeded expectations by being one of the most imaginative superhero movies of all time.
The Golden Army finally put Hellboy at the center of his own movie. It also gave him and his B.P.R.D. family the mature yet fun arcs they deserved. The magical worlds they explored were also some of the best realizations of del Toro's limitless imagination and were worth the price of admission alone.
5 Cronos
Guillermo del Toro started his career with an impressive directorial debut that still stands as one of his best movies. Cronos is a great display of del Toro's talents as a director and one of the darkest takes on vampire mythology in film.
Cronos combined its grounded vampires with a compelling story about accepting age and immortality's high price. Cronos lacked the flashier elements of bigger and more well-known vampire movies, but it's still one of the most haunting and human takes on the famous monster.
4 The Devil's Backbone
The Devil's Backbone was one of del Toro's few straightforward horror movies, and it lived up to the high expectations that his name can carry. With its spooky orphanage and ghostly children, The Devil's Backbone may seem a bit too generic. Thankfully, del Toro made it much more than that.
The Devil's Backbone was a commentary on the Spanish Civil War's inhumanity and an atmospheric horror movie. This was one of the first times that audiences saw del Toro's signature themes and styles. Del Toro improved on these moving forward, but he has yet to make a better horror movie than The Devil's Backbone.
3 Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio stood out in a year when three Pinocchio adaptations were released. This isn't just because of its impressive stop-motion animation, but also because it was the most mature. Where 2022's other Pinocchio movies were fairy tales, del Toro's version tackled dark topics like fascism.
Pinocchio retold the very familiar tale of a wooden boy with added fantasy, darkness, and somber reflections on death, failure, and obedience's limits that it felt like an entirely new story. Del Toro's movies are incredible works of art, but Pinocchio is arguably his finest artistic achievement.
2 The Shape Of Water
Love and fantasy were always core parts of del Toro's movies, but they were put front and center in The Shape of Water. The fantastical romance was del Toro's most emotionally-charged and passionate movie yet. More importantly, it was a much-needed appeal for love and humanity in dark times.
The almost scriptless The Shape of Water did its job so well that even viewers who disliked its focal couple - a human woman and an amphibian creature - were engrossed. The movie won del Toro some of the biggest awards of his career, and he deserved every one of them.
1 Pan's Labyrinth
No other movie showed del Toro's love of dark fantasies and personal reflections on authoritarianism's evils the way Pan's Labyrinth did. Pan's Labyrinth was del Toro's most mature and darkest fairy tale, and it really put him on the map. He arguably has yet to surpass it.
Besides an amazing fantasy world, and impressive creature effects, Pan's Labyrinth was a heartbreaking tragedy about losing innocence during great darkness. Pan's Labyrinth won critical acclaim and several accolades, including the Oscar for Best Cinematography. There's a reason why, even after del Toro grew so much as an artist later, people still think he peaked with Pan's Labyrinth.