"Pan's Labyrinth"--holy shit. Amazing.

[WindRavenX]

I don't think I've ever been that taken by a movie before.

I don't even know where to begin discussing--would someone like to start this one off?

And to top tonight off, my friend is bringing some dank headies by :smoke:

So someone--start a discussion with me about this *fantastic* movie!

[jpgray]

1. Liked it lots!

The brutality of the captain was a bit over-the-top, but very imaginative and interesting, and the little girl actress did an amazing job.

[WindRavenX]

2. wasn't he supposed to though? I mean, he was basically...

...a typical "evil step-parent" archtype from fairy tales--and the Grimm brothers were just as bad with the brutality.

But yeah...some of it was hard to watch.

[ghostsofgiants]

5. Not to mention that he WAS a Fascist general during the Spanish Civil War...

Not exactly known to be great people, haha.

[WindRavenX]

7. lol

Yeah...man, what a sick, sick, sick character.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

3. I think that to me, the issue of whether the fantasy elements are "real" is moot.

Both ways of looking at it are perfectly valid, and you can see it different ways thinking about it from one day to the next.

This is my most higly recommended movie of the ones that are currently showing, at least that I have seen.

The girl who plays the main character is incredible.

[WindRavenX]

4. I think so too

To me, I understood the film more in terms of she was creating the fantasy elements in order to escape from her hellish world. But another interpretation is just as powerful and valid.

Fantastic, fantastic movie. I adored the Faun character.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

8. I think that is the "main" interpretation also. But in a sense, even if this were the case,

if that world, and the serious tests she had to endure and pass, were "real" to her, then in a way, that world and those tests were as real, if not MORE so, than the one that we live in.

It sort of raises issues like "Brazil" or 1984 a bit, in that way.

I agree that the Captain was very much like an Evil Stepfather from a Grimm fairytale, he WAS in fact an evil stepfather, LOL. Perhaps the storybook-like scenario in which she found herself in real life (with the rebels being like good fairies or elves out in the woods, interesting symbolism that they make nature and the outdoors their home and base) set up the framework for the other fairytale that she created.

[ghostsofgiants]

6. Such a good film.

Seek out The Devil's Backbone as well. Probably not quite as good, but still another great Del Toro film.