Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

lol.. Take my opinion with a grain of salt that is just who I am. I bet Im not the only one in the country that has taken the dvd out soon as they saw it had subtitles. When I sit back and crack open a beer to watch a movie I want to understand it without reading every single damn word for 1 1/2 hours. Also I dont always research movies before I get them. IF I see somthing on Netflix that looks decent or have heard somthing about I just get it. I dont have time to research into every movie I rent why? Because Im a Man. So dont go getting your pantys in a bunch

Scott

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

No worries Scott, just grab a couple more beers and then the subtitles will be blurry anyway and you won't have to read. ....

p.s. Just make sure it's not an imported beer.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

No worries I just drink domestic, and Im not going to watch it anyway

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Knapp! Come back Knapp! Pa's got things for you to do. And Mother wants you. I know she does!



I don't care if you didn't get this, I got it.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

A very telling quote indeed

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

I rented this film this past weekend.

Feeling a little entitled after a hard week of working out, I took a bucket of Breyer's Oreos Ice Cream, sat down on the futon, and started watching.

I've been wanting to see this film since I heard about it. I had an opportunity to do so, but bourbon nights out with friends kind of overruled that.

And I'm glad to have finally seen it. Some magnificent filmmaking going on here. If the film is unapologetic about one thing, it's the gruesome nature of both reality and fantasy.

The captain isn't your typical mustache twirling villain. Well, he couldn't be cause he shaves every morning. He in some ways represents a lot of the evil figures we see in history. The guy seriously believes he is doing the right thing. Didn't like the way he grabs Ofelia's arm during their first meeting, but in the captain's mind it's the right thing to do.

I might've missed this reading through the thread, but I kind of wondered if Mercedes and the Captain had a lover's past. They just share this look between each other that's both slight understanding yet uncomfortable. Otherwise, I thought she did a good job as well. As far as her escaping torture, it just struck me as an amateur (can't find better words for it) who simply didn't finish the job. As a film goer, I've had the privelage of seeing thousands of ways to kill a person. I gave Mercedes the benefit of the doubt seeing as I don't think she's got that killer's knowledge. Quite frankly, I thought she did kill him off. Two stabs to the upper torso and a slice to the mouth ought to at least make somebody bleed to death (and from a medical standpoint infection would be a bitch). I could conjecture that she also didn't want an open casket funeral for him either, but that's just me being silly.

Ofelia was a joy to watch, but one moment nearly ruined the film for me. You guessed right if I was referring to the grapes scene. With my mouth half-filled with Vanilla and Oreos, I was yelling, "WTF are you doing? Run!!!" And it led to quite possibly the most gruesome part of the fantasy segments: seeing fairies being eaten alive by quite possibly one of the scariest monsters I've ever seen. There's just something unflinching violent about seeing cute little creatures (at least I thought they were cute) struggling and squealing to get away only to have their heads and upper bodies get bitten off. And you see every second of it. Dumb, just plain dumb on Ofelia's part. Good job, you got two things killed. Read some arguments for the side of enchantment, but I won't be buying them. She seemed fairly intelligent up until that point. On a side note, the artwork in the dinner hall was gruesome as well: babies getting stabbed and eaten. Definitely not the place to hold a bachelor party even if you are buddies with Bacchus.

I'll probably end up getting this on HD at some point. Great film, and I liked this very much on par with Backbone.

Edit: I got about 1/3 of the way through the ice cream.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

No kidding Dome, in all the movies I've seen that creature may be the most terrifying of them all. Shelob has NOTHING on whateverthehell that thing was.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Yeah, that creature (whom I believe is called "Pale Man") is terrifying, gruesome, etc.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Finally caught up with this one. Nearly bought it blind based on good word of mouth. Luckily I decided on a $1 Redbox rental instead, since I didn't like it nearly as much as most.
I found Ofelia to be an incredible misbehaving brat and that scene was just one of many that enforced that opinion.

I was also disappointed by how little time was spent in the labyrinth considering the film was called "Pan's Labyrinth" (at least in English). The blurb on the box comparing this to the level of fantasy in LOTR is laughable.

Apparently not. My Best Buy has taped a sign to the rack in front of the DVD's stating that it's a Spanish language film. Apparently they had a lot of returns from ignorant/lazy people.

As many here, I also didn't find it plausible that Vidal wasn't further incapaciated by the drugs slipped to him by Ofelia, as well as multiple stab wounds from Mercedes. For a moment, I felt like I was watching "The Terminator" (or a "Friday the 13th" flick).

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

In the supplements, Del Toro points out that one of the themes of the film is obedience vs. disobedience. Just a few seconds earlier in that scene, the fairies direct Ofelia to look through one little door to get the dagger. But she disobeys, using her own instincts and looks in another door, which correctly houses the dagger. I guess that makes her cocky since she decides to disobey the fairies and eat a grape. Not to mention she was starving. She was sent to bed without anything to eat all day.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Don't forget she had been out all day without food and had been sent to bed without supper. On top of that for a child of wartime to see such a spread would have tested the ilk of an adult even.

Ofelia, a spoiled brat? Can't even fathom how someone could arrive at such a conclusion.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

No one said anything about "spoiled".

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

True - my apologies for embellishing the statement - though to be fair - the use of brat implies spoiled.

In the spirit of fair play I will modify my previous statement -

Ofelia, an incredible misbehaving brat? Can't even fathom how someone could arrive at such a conclusion.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Well, the beauty of these kinds of forums is the inevitability of us just seeing things totally opposite. I, personally, didn't see Ofelia in ANY bad light at all. I saw her as a brave young lady with integrity & character. She was also a young kid. Kids & a few of us grown up kids, sometimes do stupid things for that instant gratification. You and I are not above such behavior....neither was Ofelia.

One of the best films of 2006 and one that I just cannot wait to own in High Definition.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

That is how I saw too, Tim.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

If I post my thoughts on "Children of Men" in that thread, you'll probably want to skip that, then.

I just felt that Ofelia was completely disrespectful of everyone. She would not even reply or acknowledge when spoken to by anyone imploring her to behave or do something to help anyone but herself. She knew how much her mother wanted things to work out with Vidal, but she wasn't even going to make the smallest attempt at that. She completely ruined her new dress and shoes without a second thought about all the trouble her Mother had gone through to obtain them. The Faun emphasized that she would be tempted by the great feast, but could not touch anything, absolutely nothing, yet she starts scarfing down the food at her first opportunity then seems shocked when, surprise!, bad things happen.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

In my experience working with children....they see through Adults quite a bit. I think Ofelia had a strong instinct about the Captain. She was already quite loyal to her biological father.

I can understand Malcolm that if you couldn't identify or buy into Ofelia, the film is lost.

So you didn't like Children of Men either eh?

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

You have got to be kidding me. That behaviour is mild for a child who lost her father (probably violently) and has such a vile fuck trust upon her as a replacement -- that she must call "father" to boot.

Go Ofelia!

--
H

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

I wouldn't say Ofelia was scarfing, she had two grapes, scarfing implies that she ate half the spread, she didn't get that far.
I understand why she did it, but I was still yelling at her not to.
Faun/Pale Man is played by Doug Jones the same guy who did Abe Sapien, great physical actor and creepy as all hell when he's putting the eyeballs into his hands and then raising them up to his face to see.

I didn't mind Ofelia's "brattiness" I chalked it up to being left to do whatever she wanted while her mother worked. I assume where her father died she didn't have much parental supervision.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

Doug Jones is also playing the Silver Surfer in the Fantastic Four sequel that's now in the theaters (though Laurence Fishburne is providing the voice for the Silver Surfer in the film).

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

1. Ofelia eats grapes, then sticks around as the Pale Man wakes up, puts in his eyes, and eats two fairies. If I were the girl, I would have crapped my pants and been running down the hall screaming after the Pale mans first finger twitch. He'd put his hands to his head and see nothing left of me but a big stain on the carpet.

2. Despite lavish production budgets and gruesome prosthetic makeup, everytime someone is shot we see a neon-colored cartoon blood geyser that would have been more fitting a Monty Python sketch.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

I would have taken his eyeballs and thrown them in the fire.

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

I just got around to watching it last night.

To comment on Ofelia's behavior, you have to understand that it sounds like she was taken from all she knew to the middle of nowhere with a man she has no emotional connection with and who doesn't seem to be a warm individual at all. I'm not surprised that she's disobedient.

To be honest, I think her mother's motivations are partially selfish as well, with her comment of "being alone for too long". It is obvious that she got hot and heavy with the Captain, which was probably mostly on her side, and gave her enough attention to get what he wanted, which was a son.


I wouldn't be surprised if they had relations at some point, or even if it was still going on. If so, I have a feeling it was to get into the Captain's good graces so that he could trust her with things. I'm a little surprised that wasn't fleshed out a bit more. I guess at two hours, the movie was long enough.

As for my feelings about the film, I felt the film had a lot to do about faith, and how you interpret the ending would be how you view Ofelia's faith. To me, it isn't much different from how a Christian would view death, that there is something beyond. It is just that her faith was based on faerie tales.

Jason

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

i couldn't find the blu-ray or SD DVD disc review, so i had to jump back into this =D (the search is borked for me).

it's a shame i know, but i finally caught this on Blu-Ray yesterday... unfortunately the DTS-HD MA wasn't put to much use cause i was a wuss! i turned down the volume anytime i feel like somn scary would happen and the movie stayed mute pretty much through the entire film! . yeah i'm a wuss when it comes to gore =). but after i watch it once, i know what will happen and i know it's fake so it's OK after the first time, just like scary movies. so hopefully, i'll revisit the lossless track afterwards.

in a word: awesome. i can't believe i missed this in the cinema!!! del toro is really somn! he needs to do more fantasy for sure. regarding the fairies. do u think the ones @the end are the same ones that were chewed up by pale man?

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

How about Hellboy II & The Hobbit?

Re: Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth: Official Discussion Thread

yup definitely gonna do H2, but i dunno about Hob. i still think PJ should do that, lol that's another thread =P.