Guillermo del Toro to Receive BFI Fellowship

“Frankenstein” director Guillermo del Toro is set to receive a BFI Fellowship, the film organization’s highest honor.

The award will celebrate del Toro’s “extraordinary contribution to film and the distinctive artistry that runs through his work across animation and live action, and as a Mexican filmmaker, in both Spanish and English,” according to a press release. “Fusing dark horror and gothic fantasy, drawing on folklore, fairytales, literature, sci-fi, religion and comic books, del Toro creates lavish fantastical cinematic worlds and characters, often monsters and creatures, of deep emotional complexity.”

Del Toro, who won the Oscar for best picture and director for 2017’s “The Shape of Water,” will be honored with the fellowship at the annual BFI Chair’s dinner in May 2026. He will take part in a public career conversation at the BFI Southbank and will be celebrated with a retrospective of his films, in addition to programming his own film season at the BFI at a later date. A series of masterclasses will also be given by del Toro to aspiring filmmakers in the BFI Academy, a remastered 4K version of his 1992 debut “Cronos” will be rereleased by the BFI and he will make a visit to the BFI National Archive.

“This is the honor of a lifetime and a thrilling moment in a storyteller’s life: to join a rarefied pantheon and to be recognized by the BFI,” del Toro said in a statement. “I have been greatly influenced by British film and have enjoyed a long and fruitful collaboration with great talent on both sides of the camera going back decades. I thank everyone at the BFI for this great distinction. I will endeavor myself to work hard to prove myself worthy of their faith in me.”

Added BFI chair Jay Hunt: “Guillermo del Toro is an extraordinary filmmaker with a long relationship with the BFI who has consistently championed British talent.  His collaborations here speak to the strength of our wider screen industries and the skilled people who power them.  His body of work is instantly recognisable as boldly imaginative and fantastical. In awarding a BFI Fellowship to Guillermo del Toro, we recognize his remarkable contribution to cinema and the inspiration and magic he has brought to filmmakers and audiences here and around the world.” 

Del Toro joins the ranks of previous BFI Fellowship honorees including Christopher Nolan, Tom Cruise, Spike Lee, Tilda Swinton, Martin Scorsese, Orson Welles, Elizabeth Taylor and more.