Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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91 of 96 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Into the labyrinth, 25 Feb 2007
If anyone wants to know where the dark, creepy fairy tales of old went, here's a hint: Guillermo del Toro is doing a pretty good job with the fairy tales for adults.
"Pan's Labyrinth" ("El Laberinto del Fauno") is a sequel of sorts to "The Devil's Backbone," a magical realism film about the Spanish Civil War. But this movie takes us deeper into a world that is half real, half ominous fairy tale, with a unique and imaginative story and some really excellent acting -- in short, a triumph.
Time and place: 1944, Spain. Ofelia (Ivana Baquero) and her very pregnant mother travel to meet her new stepfather, the brutal and murderous Captain Vidal (Sergi López). Ofelia loathes her new stepfather, but is transfixed by the eerie forests around them -- and one night she is visited by a fairy, and encounters a giant faun who tells her that she is Princess Moanna of the netherworld, and must return there.
To do so, he tells her that she must do three things, and gives her a strange book. Ofelia menages first task, but is frightened out of her wits by the second task, which involves a hideous monster with eyes in its hands. Even worse, her mother's pregnancy is getting more dangerous. As the guerillas and the fascists clash, Ofelia faces being trapped outside the netherworld forever...
Fairy tales have become cleaned-up and cutesy over time, so that children can read them without nightmares. But del Toro knows that the best fairy tales are the eerie, bizarre ones for adults, that are connected somehow to the real world. That is what makes "Pan's Labyrinth" so brilliantly dark and heartfelt.
Del Toro obviously crafted this with care, directing it in a dreamlike style and brilliant visuals. The eerie atmosphere of Ofelia's wanderings -- the delicate yet menacing faun, the chalk doors, the monuments, and the pasty nightmare with eyes in its palms -- is both a contrast and a parallel with the everyday world, which Ofelia hopes to escape.
At first, it seems like the post-Civil War and fairy tale stories don't mesh, until you see that the "real world" story is Ofelia's motivation to escape from all the fear, pain and sorrow. But Del Toro's biggest triumph is an ending that is beautifully bittersweet, and which turns out to hinge on Ofelia's newborn brother.
But del Toro's biggest triumph is in the instant connection we feel to Ofelia, with her love of the fantastical and her desire to go somewhere "safe." Baquero is absolutely wonderful in this, as a girl who isn't entirely of this world -- in her heart, she belongs somewhere beyond. And López is the ideal villain -- you spend the whole movie wanting to see him gruesomely killed.
Half "Mirrormask" and half gritty war story, "Pan's Labyrinth" is one of the best fantasy stories in years -- dark, passionate and beautifully made. Definitely a great movie.
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91 of 97 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Plunge into a dark but impressive fantasy journey, 11 Feb 2007
The idea of a child escaping from the misery of the oppressive, adult world into a fantasy land of fairy tales, monsters and legends is as old as storytelling. The success of the Harry Potter series and the recent cinema remake of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is testament to the desire of all ages to escape from the humdrum into fantastical worlds. Even Lord of the Rings sees the Hobbits take on a heroic quest away from their normal lives. Cinema in an age of exquisite computer graphics is perfectly suited to giving visual representation to the imaginations of even the most vivid and creative of souls.
And few people would have as creative or daring an imagination as the director behind Pan's Labyrinth (El Laberinto del Fauno) Guillermo Del Toro. The vicious backdrop to the fantasy is the fisling, futile end of the Spanish Civil War. With Franco's forces victorious across Spain, the Republican forces are forced into remote areas, in to the forests and into hiding. The heroine of the story is Ofelia (Baquero), whose mother is heavily pregnant with the son of her step-father, the wicked Commandant grittily played by López.
The Commandant is posted to a rural area, and charged with rooting out and destroying the rebel forces. He has called for his wife and her daughter to be by his side, as it is proper for a son to be born in the same place as his father. It soon becomes clear that the ruthlessness and cruelty which has allowed the Commandant to forge a successful military career in civil war ravaged Spain is played out in his family life. His wife is firmly under his control, and the whimsical and dreaming step-daughter is terrified into compliance.
Against the backdrop of attacks, brutal army control and oppressive adults, Ofelia reverts to the fairy-tales she loves. She is chastised by her mother for bringing a bulging satchel of books, and soon finds herself in the middle of a real fairytale. She discovers she is the daughter of the king of the underworld, and must undertake three tasks set by the fawn of the title.
The world dreamt by Guillermo Del Toro is fantastical, richly and darkly portrayed and ultimately dreadfully gothic. It is a fairytale hewn from the richest traditions of the Brothers Grimm and the dark forests of a primeval Europe. The fawn is at turns kindly and then devil like in intensity. The tasks Ofelia must undertake are dangerous and bring her into even more fantastic worlds.
The genius of this film is not to allow Ofelia to abandon the real, adult world to pursue the fantasy adventures. Instead the horrible reality of her situation continues to grind on, making her escape into the fantasy even more urgent until it reaches its complete and tragic conclusion.
This is not a light fairytale, or something suitable for children. The Commandants brutality is illustrated in graphic scenes of `justice' meted out to the rebels. He is not shy of torture, and whilst this is not demonstrated as in films like Hostel, the build up is somehow yet more disturbing. The rebels are brutal in turn, and such gore actually saw me hiding behind fingers. At the same time the more horrific characters hewn from Del Toro's imagination, most notably the child-eater, are truly terrifying.
Dark, twisted and ultimately stunning, this film marries the horrific fairy-tale fantasy with the horrors of war to dazzling, stunning effect. This is a tour de force by a film maker who hopefully has many more spectacles left to share.
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116 of 126 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderful DVD set; WARNING SPOILERS!!, 19 Mar 2007
This DVD set is wonderful value, released to tie in with the DVD release of 'Pan's Labyrinth' (2006) it also gathers together two related films from Mexican film-maker Guillermo Del Toro.
'Cronos' (1993) **** is an interesting take on the vampire genre, made on a relatively low budget like the early work of Robert Rodriguez it gives life to a genre sometimes close to parody. 'Cronos' was an extremely stylish work and is worth checking out if unfamiliar with Del Toro's earlier work or you'd like to see a novel take on the genre. In many ways this feels analogous to Poppy Z Brite's literary spin on the vampire cycle, the thoughtful side of vamp films, file alongisde 'The Addiction' and 'Near Dark.'
Del Toro then worked on the problematic 'Mimic' (1997), the experience of which made him want to produce a work that was much more personal, which he had control over. The result was the Almodovar-produced 'The Devil's Backbone' ***** By chance, I was lucky enough to catch an advert for this when at a cinema in Birmingham - the stylish advert (on the DVD) ensured that I watched the film. Set during the Spanish Civil War, 'The Devil's Backbone' is set in an orphanage run by republican/leftist sympathisers Carmen and Casares. A bomb has landed in the orphanage, but has not exploded and the young orphan Carlos arrives, his parents apparently killed by Franco's fascist forces. Upon arrival, Carlos begins to see the ghost of a child (Santi) as well as having to contend with the bullying of his peers. On a wider level, older orphan Jacinto (the great Eduardo Noriega) is using teachers Conchita and Carmen with an eye on the elusive gold hidden in the orphanage. All the while, Franco's forces get closer and Santi's ghost makes itself more apparent...
I thought that 'The Devil's Backbone' was a much better ghost story than 'The Others' or 'The Sixth Sense', despite the fact its focus is primarily on the orphanage and the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War. There are some great twists along the way, plenty of tragedy and some cold examples of the war reminiscent of Klimov's 'Come and See' or Spielberg's 'Schindler's List' (the execution of republicans)- something that would recur in 'Pan's Labyrinth.' The final scene as the children march towards an uncertain future as a ghost watches over them is powerful, the ghost story and the Spanish Civil War coming together, refelecting against each other...
'The Devil's Backbone' lead me to Orwell's key text 'Homage to Catalonia' and Anthony Beevor's 1982 book 'The Spanish Civil War' - which has been re-worked with new evidence and information as 'The Battle for Spain' (in hardback, paperback due in a few months). It is very interesting to read about this war to provide a wider background to 'Backbone' and 'Pan's Labyrinth', though not essential. I think both these films are more succesful than Ken Loach's 'Land and Freedom.'
Del Toro returned to Hollywood for more mainstream work as he developed what would become 'Pan's Labyrinth', making the slick 'Blade II' (2002) and the undervalued 'Hellboy' (2004). I guess he was probably offered mainstream/franchise vehicles, which he would no doubt been great at, but instead he opted to make 'Pan's Labyrinth' (the booklet here notes the fact he is now working on a sequel to 'Hellboy', a bit like Graham Greene he appears to be balancing "entertainments" with more serious work).
'Pan's Labyrinth'***** is set several years after the Spanish Civil War, located in a military outpost as the partisans camp out in the mountains and woods, a guerrilla force against Franco's victorious forces as World War II continues (a reference to D-Day is made). The central character Ofelia arrives at the outpost with her pregnant mother Carmen, the latter afflicted with health problems and having remarried the cruel Colonel Vidal. As Carmen's pregnancy continues and health problems develop, the staff of the outpost appear to lead secret lives, relating to the partisans and their defeat, meanwhile Ofelia (a compulsive reader of fairytales) becomes obssessed with the labyrinth at the outpost.
It is here that she later meets a fawn called Pan and some faeries, the notion that she might be a Princess returning to her kingdom on a higher plain is there (laid out in the opening sequence). Ofelia has to complete three trials to establish that she is that Princess-turned-human, if succesfully completed, she can go to her utopic kingdom. Ofelia goes through the tests, the second of which feeling like a blend of Jean Cocteau, David Lynch and Hellraiser. The common fairytale trope of the evil Stepfather occurs, one scene where Vidal murders two partisan suspects is stomach churning stuff redolent of the opening murder in 'Irrerversible.'
Things end in tears, it was always going to be that way - betrayal, death and torture reign - is it possible that Ofelia is imagining Pan and the labyrinth to escape the daily horrors of life in Spain then? You wonder about children in the Balkans in the 1990s and Iraq now...A lot of 'Pan's Labyrinth' is a war film, similar in feel to one of the most grim war films, 'Come and See' (Ofelia feels like a relative of the central child in Klimov's masterpiece). The denoument occurs as battle between the fascists and the partisans happens, the world of Pan and the world of Ofelia combining. It depends on what kind of person you are as to how the film ends - is it a cold death, just another corpse among the thousands of others, or is the fantasy world real, or maybe a representation of heaven? The end feels like a higher plain and reminded me of David Lynch and Cocteau's 'Orphee' for some reason (the writings of Jorge Luis Borges and the paintings of Goya have also been cited - this film made me go back and read some Angela Carter and Bruno Bettelheim's 'The Uses of Enchantment').
'Pan's Labyrinth' is a work of genius, definitely Del Toro's masterpiece and both a companion and extension on the earlier 'Devil's Backbone.' It was the best film of 2006 and has won many awards, though not as many as it should have won. A great work of fantasy this should appeal to adults and teenagers, the next step on from Harry Potter and located in one of the dark chapters of history (I would have liked reference to Hitler and Mussolini's involvement in the Spanish Civil War, but this is a film not a documentary). A visually astounding film, 'Pan's Labyrinth' balances special effects perfectly with a thoughtful story and a mass of characters. This DVD set contains a film that everyone should see, as well as Del Toro's earlier works that are slightly overlooked - great value and comes highly recommended...
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