Saw this over the weekend with CMDCC. Really awesome movie. The story was wonderfully told and the cinematography was just amazing. The soundtrack they used was also heavenly. Definitely a movie you MUST see! I hardly ever give movies a rating of 9. You can listen to the soundtrack at the official site below. Unfortunately, you’re not allowed to skip or go backwards, but I’ve been playing the music for the past 30mins.
Official Site
IMDb: 8.5/10 (11,378 votes)
Yahoo! Movies: The Critics: A- / Yahoo! Users: B+
Rotten Tomatoes: Rating: 96% / Average Rating: 8.5/10
Apple Trailer
Amazon.com Soundtrack
Amazon.com Showtimes
MY RATING: 9/10
Spoilers: (Show)
The movie starts off with a girl and her pregnant mother moving into a war zone because the new husband and the girl’s step father (the captain of the troops stationed there) believes that a son should be born where the father is. The trip was very tiring and hard for the mom and she becomes ill and needs a lot of rest. The movie takes place during the war time (post WW2) where there was a civil war within Spain.
The little girl doesn’t like her new step-father and refuses to call him papa. She also believes in fairy tales and hides away in this alternate reality during this stressful situation. I’m not going to go into the details of her imaginary world, but a faun tells her that she’s the long lost princess of the underworld and her father awaits for her return. However, to prove that she has not lost her soul to humanity, she has to complete a set of tasks.
As this imaginary story goes on, a parallel story of how a bunch of soldiers are hiding in the mountains battling against the main troops. As these 2 stories intertwine, the magic is revealed.
The ending was somewhat depressing, but I guess the family finally reunites. I didn’t exactly get why the brother showed up in her final dream, but I guess some of these are meant to be answered such literally.
One of the questions I was thinking was, who the heck is Pan? After realizing that the title in Spanish is El Laberinto del Fauno, I was thinking… was there a mistranslation? The girl’s name is Ofelia and the creature in the labyrinth has always been referred to as Fauno.
After digging a bit, I found this comment on IMDb:
The story becomes more intense, both outside the labyrinth (where Vidal is busy torturing people) and inside, where Ofelia has to face the Pale Man – a creature that has plucked out its eyes and can only see by placing them in the stigmata on its hands. Around the walls of the room are pictures of people being cast into hell by the Pale Man (From inference or the director’s comments, it is apparent that the Pale Man represents authoritarianism, whether that of the Fascists or the Church). In Pan’s Labyrinth we have a parable about the journey of Spanish society from the 1940s to post-Franco, a magical fairytale of stunning beauty, a story of the struggle and character development of a child on the edge of puberty, and a tense story of battles between Nationalists and Republicans. That they are all welded together seamlessly and precisely in a multi-level narrative is a remarkable achievement and thrilling experience. The sheer artistry recalls Cocteau’s La Belle at la Bête. Del Toro sweeps us into a dreamlike, poetic vision, with a minimum of CGI and a grasp of dialogue that seems almost transcendental.
One of the things that can make or break a movie that makes extensive use of symbols is whether those symbols echo in the collective unconscious, often through time honoured association, or not. Knowledge of mythology or Jungian psychology can make all the difference. Much has been made of the title. Originally ‘El Laberinto del Fauno’, the translation at first appears sloppy, but Del Toro has done his research well. While quipping that it ‘just sounded better’, a little investigation of classical authorities shows Faunus as a form of the ancient god Pan (Lempriere). Pan, the goat-like god that represents a totality of possibilities, together with goat-like stubbornness and independence of thought, is the perfect symbol. In the film he says, “I’ve had so many names… I am the mountain, the forest and the earth. . . . I am a faun. Your most humble servant, Your Highness.” In Greek Mythology, Pan also won the affections of a princess under the form of a goat. The freedom of thought (and sexuality) he advocated, with the rise of Christianity, caused him to be portrayed as the Devil; but we learn his intentions are good, whereas the holy-looking Pale Man offers temptation only as an excuse to rip his victims apart. As an aspect of the creative power, fauns in mythology also symbolise firm aspiration and human intelligence.
You can read up more on Pan at Wikipedia. The symbolism of the Pale Man was also way deeper than I had originally expected.
you know, liam and i watched this movie on friday and it was not what i expected at all! i must have had a selective attention span when i was reading the storyline summary online because all i saw were “fauns” and “fairies” so i thought it would be more fairytale-like. what i saw instead was pretty dark (and a bit scary at times). the movie was a little too gruesome for me. however, you were right about the cinematography and musical score though.. both were very good… just not the kind of movie i was expecting ^__^… did you also see the trailer for that scary movie (dead silence)? i can’t believe there’s so many scary movies coming out….