Director Guillermo Del Toro has hailed Sally Hawkins as an “extraordinary” talent at a premiere for their upcoming movie.

The film-maker, who was nominated for two Oscars for Pan’s Labryinth, worked with the British star on The Shape Of Water, also featuring Michael Shannon and Octavia Spencer.

Del Toro, 53, praised the range of characters Hawkins can play as they showcased the film in Los Angeles on Wednesday.

“Sally is extraordinary and she has one of the most amazing faces in cinema today,” he told the Press Association.

“She can play the ordinary and she can play the quotidian. She can be next to you at the bus stop but she can be almost a princess in a fairytale for troubled times.”

Sally Hawkins
Sally Hawkins stars as a mute woman in The Shape Of Water (Willy Sanjuan/AP)

The director shrugged off speculation that Hawkins is in contention for an Oscar for her performance in his critically-acclaimed film.

“You never know,” he said. “I think that the important thing is to be in the conversation with a movie that is 100% genuine, 100% heartfelt, 100% about emotions – that’s good enough.”

Hawkins, 41, plays a mute janitor who falls for a classified experiment in the movie set in Cold War-era America.

The Shape Of Water will be released in UK cinemas on February 16.