Film
Pan's Labyrinth spins grown-up fairy tale
LOS ANGELES: It has murder,
mutilation, warring armies and a demon who eats humans. And oh,
it's a fairy tale, too.
Fantasy movie Pan's Labyrinth, billed as an "adult fairy tale,"
expands its US run on Friday as one of 2006's best reviewed movies
and a foreign language Oscar hopeful.
Garnering positive critical reviews, it has been playing in four
major US cities including New York and Los Angeles, and this week
moves to an additional 10 including Boston and Seattle then expands
to dozens more on January 19.
The film, written and directed by Mexico's Guillermo del Toro,
tells of a young girl who learns about good and evil from a faun in
the Spanish forest. But if that sounds like a story in a
family-friendly Disney flick, it's not.
The tale takes place in 1944, just a few years after the Spanish
Civil War when the Nazis helped fascist Gen. Francisco Franco win.
Franco, now ruling his country with an iron fist, orders his army
to destroy what remains of the resistance.
FAIRY TALE: Mexican director Guillermo Del Toro's new
film Pan's Labyrinth is one of 2006's best reviewed movies and a
foreign language Oscar hopeful.
"To me, fantasy is a spiritual
occurrence, and for spirituality to be needed by people, you have
to have a base, vile, physical existence," del Toro told
Reuters. "In order for fantasy to flourish, brutality must
exist."
He said that Pan's Labyrinth follows an ancient tradition in which
fairy tales with blood, gore and cruel twists of fate were used to
teach morals to adults.
Del Toro called fascism, which flourished in Europe before World
War Two, the "ultimate horror" because its dictatorial system of
government made uniformity the standard, and it "destroys
individuality, imagination and a sense of self."
In Pan's Labyrinth, the young heroine, named Ofelia, epitomises
imagination and individuality, and she is looking for a sense of
who she is and where she fits into the world.
COOL KID, CRUEL WORLD
The movie opens with Ofelia being taken by her mother and evil
stepfather, Captain Vidal of Franco's army, to an old mill in rural
Spain where she uncovers a labyrinth of twisted hedges leading to
an underground kingdom guarded by a strange faun.
The faun tells Ofelia she is no mere mortal, but rather the
princess of a subterranean realm who long ago ascended to the real
world. To reclaim her rightful place on the throne, Ofelia must
complete three harrowing tasks.
Above ground, Ofelia confronts atrocities committed by Captain
Vidal, and from her experiences, she learns about good and
evil.
"She is in a state of grace, and that is not something you achieve
through a church or army. That is something that allows you to be
who you are. Most children have that by nature, and it gets tainted
by institutions," Del Toro said.
Del Toro, whose work has ranged from low-budget, critical hits like
The Devil's Backbone to big-budget Hollywood flicks such as
Hellboy, has become a master of horror films and special effects.
Pan's Labyrinth mixes beautifully imagined makeup, costumes and set
design of the faun's underground kingdom with accurate depictions
of real world action.
In the past two weeks in limited release, US audiences have
responded by giving the film some of the highest average revenue
per screen at box offices, and critics have chimed in too. The film
scores a 99 percent positive rating on Web site rottentomatoes.com,
which aggregates film reviews.
The movie is Mexico's entry for Oscar consideration, and most
Academy Award watchers believe it has a strong chance at the film
industry's top US honour for a foreign language film given by the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
As important for del Toro, it has been embraced in Spain and in
Mexico. "It makes me feel fantastic," he said. "It's frankly a
point of pride, and a high point of my life."
