Pan's Labyrinth

Let me guess. You saw this and just shit yourself, right?

I recently told somebody that I haven't seen Pan's Labyrinth ... and they scolded me. Harshly. Now that I have indeed seen this movie film, I know why their tongue was so quick to lash out. This flick is gorgeous. Is it a fairy tale? Yes. Is it a war movie? Yes. Like Papp said, this move works on several different levels. I don't know what kind of mythologies and fairy tales that del Toro grew up with, but they would probably scare the shit out of me. I might show this movie to my kids when they turn 17. Maybe. It depends on how many nightmares I want to give them. Hell, my father let me see A Clockwork Orange and The Shining when I was 11 years old, and there is nothing wrong with me! [Wait, just thought about that ... this actually explains a lot. I am fucked up! HA!] Thanks dad.

Anyway, I am a fan of anything Cafe FX - the special effects throughout looked amazing. Violence wise ... fairy/insect wise ... blood and such. Cafe also did a lot of work on Stephen King's The Mist. I love dark, dark movies and color palates because when there is blood, it really POPS. The motions and movements of Faun and Pale Man still creep me out - Doug Jones is a master of miming and movement and he just rocked it. Something I have been mentioning in recent reviews are acts and examples of 'Character Douchebaggery.' The Captain [Vidal] is certainly a douche nozzle, and it almost reaches Col. Hans Landa proportions. Near the end of the flick, with his encounter with a knife, his "smile" reminded me of Jack Nicholson's Joker. I cringed and flipped out and just lost it at that point.

That is how invested I was in the characters and in the story [stories.] del Toro has a masterpiece here - it delighted me, frightened me, and upset me. It made me think. Oh, and can we just talk a second about transitions? Every single time this movie transitioned into another scene I was just in awe. It was done superbly - subtle but amazing. Now I'm humming that lullaby - I just watched the second disc with the special features and he just went into detail about the colors and look of the movie. [I think he knew I was writing this.] See this movie. Reminded me of the movie 'The Fall' - many different levels and layers - the colors themselves tell a story - effective editing and such. They are both great flicks.

I think Ebert said that this is a 'fairy tale for grown ups.' I agree and disagree with that. It tingles my inner child, so could it be a fairy tale for that? It's certainly not just for kids - I have a poor dead Spanish boy with his face broken and nose smashed in from the movie in to agree with me. Some parts yes, others no. All in all, it's an orgy for the senses - it feeds your imagination and creeps you the fuck out. It's brilliant. Just brilliant.