Today I conclude my 3 of 3 from tuesdays trip, with Pan's Labyrinth.
I have been hesitant to rent this one because its only available in Spanish. I've seen it on quite a few top whatever lists, but you have to ask yourself, do I really feel like reading subtitles for 2 hours?
That's a toss up right there. I mean, its a great movie, but that's certainly a pain in the ass. Mr. del Toro, English is the language of the world, get with the program...
I don't think he's listening..
Ok, I'll get on with the actual review. It's a good movie. Maybe even a great movie. It's a typical Spanish fairy tale. Where in, the girl has 3 tasks to complete to receive a award. I'd never heard of this, but apparently its a common theme there.
It centers around a young girl, and her life. I don't want to spoil it for you, but her life sucks. She has an asshole nazi-ish step dad. He's a captain in the military, and they live in a small outpost in the woods. Its 1944, and her step dad's army is fighting a group of people from the woods. Not really sure what the war is, or why they are fighting, they don't really go into it. I've actually gone more into it with this paragraph than they do in the movie.
I won't go into the story of what happens. I've said too much already! It's a movie that you watch then you try to figure at wtf just happened. You will do more thinking about this movie than you did while you watched. ...Is it trying to interpret the afterlife?.. ...Is it a little girls dream?... ...Is it just a fairy tale for fairy tale's sake?...
It's all of these, but none of these. I dunno, its friggin weird.
I wish I could help you out more, but I just can't. You really have to watch it, and figure it out for yourself. You could ask 5 different people what happened and probably get 5 different answers. The only thing everyone would agree on is that it is a good movie. Weird huh?
Score time. I'll give the story 6.2 points on its own. Its a great story. The special effects don't give you the feel of overly done like alot of other new movies. I'll give them a 2.5.
It was overly gory, I'm giving that -1.7. It was too much. And I'll give the step dad's performance 1 point. He's was such a dick. Brb, gotta open the calculator.
Back.. that's a 8 / 10 for Pan's Labyrinth.