Have you ever felt that someone is watching you? If not, you will surely experience the feeling when you finish watching Guillermo Del Toro's latest neo-noir psychological thriller movie "Nightmare Alley."

The screenplay, adapted by the director, together with Kim Morgan, from William Lindsay Gresham's 1946-dated pulp novel of the same name, is also inspired by the 1947 film adaptation of the book. The movie revolves around the protagonist Stanton Carlisle (Bradley Cooper), who stands out with his manipulation skills in a circus and later allies with an even more dangerous psychiatrist, femme fatale Lilith Ritter (Cate Blanchett). The hit parade movie consisting of stars such as Rooney Mara, Willem Dafoe, Toni Collette and Richard Jenkins mainly handles the theme of human nature's inclination to commit sin through Stanton's ambition to chase the American Dream.

The magical universe, which is usually a signature of Toro's films, is not here this time. Instead, the realistic atmosphere of 19th-century American carnivals and their freaks, which Toro has been interested in for a long time, are presented to the audience with a colorful visual feast amid the dust of carnival tents. The enjoyment of the unworldly and monstrous has always been a theme that is often featured in American popular culture and Toro chose to bring another perspective to the motif.

On the other hand, freaks are primordial creatures from the very beginning of time as a reference to the Judeo-Christian tradition that Eve was placed in Adam’s rib. It is also known that Athena’s birth took place in Zeus’ head. Prodigies always existed in religion and myths. However, these occurrences trickled out from the tales and shaped into flesh and blood with the notice of eccentric-born people by medical advances. Conjoined twins, the bearded ladies and many unusual bodies took their place in the world. Nevertheless, they were once regarded as monsters depending on God’s design, divine wrath or nature’s abundance.

Let's touch upon the concept of being watched and how it functions as a leitmotif throughout the movie. "Nightmare Alley," which is embedded with deep symbolism from beginning to the end, tells the audience to keep their eyes open. The director places a great responsibility on the audience within the framework of metaphorical references to watching, urging the spectators to pay careful attention – because nothing is a random occurrence in the world of Toro.

The real issue is that our protagonist, Stanton, feels himself being watched in some parts of the movie. At the beginning of the story, the audience gets to know our protagonist: He kills someone, whom we later learn he was his father, buries the body under the wooden floor and sets the house on fire. Then he comes across a carnival, where everyone is accepted without question.

In the following scenes of the movie, we encounter many frames that are full of eyes. These eyes accord with the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg – who discomfortingly watches the Valley of Ashes in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby." It is a reference to the haunting of the past as well as the God who sees it all. Also throughout Stanton's journey in the dark "alleys" of life, there are often people who warn him that he can't escape from God and he will be watched everywhere.

At the same time, there is a lot of foreshadowing that the audience witnesses as the story proceeds, especially in places when following the plot is not enough. The first one of them is that Stanton enters an attraction in the circus that is called the "House of the Damnation." We understand Stanton is not pure as the driven snow. Similarly, he encounters a mirror with the words "Look at yourself, sinner" written on it, yet is incapable of performing the "seeing" action that is dictated by Toro. Although seeing is symbolized so deeply, our main character is a "blind" man who has lost his moral compass in pursuit of the American Dream and cannot "see" the necessary warnings. He lies, murders and cheats out of ambition and pride. He is a character who razes "seeing is believing" positivism to the ground.

On the other hand, the eye motif is a reference to Enoch's third eye. Enoch was a man who was born blind and then was healed by God.

Kept in a jar of formaldehyde by Clem Hoately (Wiliem Defoe), who runs the carnival's freak show, there is a body of a newborn baby with three eyes. The giant third eye of the baby in the middle of his forehead functions as a crucial motif. It is so scary and haunting that Clem remarks that the "eye follows you around like 'em portraits.'" In that sense, Stanton's first encounter with this eye is at the beginning of his career before he goes bad. First an idle, then carnival worker, a famous mentalist before he falls to the ground reveals how his ambition led him to sins. Also, Enoch's third eye is another symbol of Stan's so-called powers of reading the people as a mentalist. During his blindfold acts, the image of the third eye, single, golden, is repeatedly depicted.

It is a movie also largely about human psychology and psychoanalysis. Characters overshadowed by father figures and often suppressed are one of the distinguishing features of Guillermo del Toro's cinematic world. In "Nightmare Alley," too, the psychological foundations of the key characters of the movie are based on father figures. We don't know what Stanton's father did to him yet it's not hard to guess that there are traces of his father – most probably a man who constantly engages in morally questionable acts – in the psychological development of his character.

Although the symbolism, motifs and foreshadowing are quite successful in completing the plot like puzzle pieces, the 150-minute screening can break the audience off from the story as it becomes repetitive at some points. Including the acting, the successful visuals and the 1930s realistic reflection of carnivals offer poetry in motion that can be watched on a rainy day with its dark scenes.

Believe or not, the real enemies are not monsters in Toro's world. It's the people who are the main villains that gradually succumbed to their weaknesses due to their greedy ambitions.