Pan's Labyrinth

Pan’s Labyrinth, by Guillermo del Toro, is a movie about a young girl, Ofelia, who is moving with her mother to the Spanish countryside. Ofelia’s mother recently married Captain Vidal, an officer in the Spanish Civil War. The movie parallels Ofelia’s fairy tail, with a war story as well.

Ofelia’s fairy tale shows her destiny to save her brother and return to her mother and father. The fairy tale, however, has many twists and turns. Ofelia completes three tasks that all have biblical references. One of the main references is gluttony. Both times when Ofelia offers the rocks to the frog and decides to take grapes, adverse affects happen. The frog ends up dying and Ofelia narrowly escapes the Pale Man, while also putting her quest in jeopardy with the faun. The fruit also eludes to the forbidden fruit that Adam and Eve took from the garden. In the last task, when the brother is supposed to be offered up, it seemed similar to when God told Abraham to kill his son. All of these biblical references I think help humanize different characters and add to a theme of redemption. Although Ofelia’s sometimes jeopardizes her story in the war (fights with her mother and the Captain) and the fairy tale (taking the grapes) she is always given a second chance and forgiven in the end. Although she has to experience death to reach her happiest moments, her sacrifice redeems all of her mistakes.

An interesting scene in the film is when Ofelia is in the Pale Man’s layer. When she gets to the hole in the wall she dismisses one of the fairies and goes for the other lock. She finds the sword anyways and continues to go over and eat the fruit. I always thought it was peculiar that she did this. Maybe it was to show her humanization of over riding external advice, but it seems unresolved.

I really enjoyed this movie and thought that the animation along with real scenery from the country side of Spain added a special touch to the overall movie. The intertwined stories that eventually collide with each other creates suspense as well as surprise. In order to add a deeper level to this film I feel that the adult aspects were necessary to convey a strong meaning.