Pan's Labyrinth is a special film. Undoubtedly it deserves serious attention, but I don't have the patience to wait for a second viewing. I want to write something now. While the movie is praiseworthy on many levels, it is without doubt a very dark and darkly powerful creation. There are many in my home who will not be watching it...at least not for a while.
The movie ended; I clicked the remote and my two oldest daughters and I sat silently in the darkness. Nobody wanted to be the first to speak.
The awkwardness was strange.
It felt as if we’d witnessed something we weren't meant to. The feeling wasn’t that of guilt as much as embarrassed sadness- like walking in on a friend at a painfully intimate and transparent moment.
Don’t misunderstand. The movie was as amazing as it was disturbing. If brilliance is measured by emotional impact and imagery, the movie was brilliant. Del Toro is a master.
But I’m not sure if the depictions of violence were an example of that skill or of its failure. There were many times that I found myself wanting to look away. That’s a pretty good indicator of obscenity, but in the end… I never did. I wonder if this a commentary on his ability to powerfully ride the aesthetic line or my own jadedness toward violent images?
Thankfully, Del Toro leaves us with little doubt about one thing: violence is ugly and hateful. This unsettling movie has that over its more mainstream siblings. No spiritually compromising allure, here. No vicarious temptation. Just disgusting cruelty and the repulsive bastards who commit it.
The director also went out of his way to leave the central fact of the story unresolved- is Ophelia’s interaction with the faerie real. Do the Faun and his world exist or are they simply the fantasies into which a terrified little girl escapes? There are clues that would point to either option- her name itself, the Captain’s view of Ophelia conversing in the Labyrinth near the end, the sheer factual brutality of the world we all know…the explicit redemption imagery, the parable of the blooming rose, etc.
I believe this is the question of the movie. The ending depends on it. I suspect everyone wants Ophelia's version of reality to be true, but…
The story is set during a period of time that I know little about- the Spanish Civil War. Apparently it was no different from any other war in this respect, it brought out the most bestial in man.
Part of the shock that the film delivers is due to the juxtaposition of Franco’s Spain and the innocence of the young protagonist. Ophelia’s a beautiful little girl motored into a hell of brutal adults. History tells us that the struggle against the evils of Fascist Spain were largely ignored in the West and ended in defeat for the Resistance. The sacrifices of those who dreamed of a different world were for nothing…if temporal victory is how we measure such things.
This is the point that the story made so powerfully to me: Love, community and courageous sacrifice are either poignantly beautiful or sickeningly absurd- depending on the true nature of reality.
The awkwardness was strange.
It felt as if we’d witnessed something we weren't meant to. The feeling wasn’t that of guilt as much as embarrassed sadness- like walking in on a friend at a painfully intimate and transparent moment.
Don’t misunderstand. The movie was as amazing as it was disturbing. If brilliance is measured by emotional impact and imagery, the movie was brilliant. Del Toro is a master.
But I’m not sure if the depictions of violence were an example of that skill or of its failure. There were many times that I found myself wanting to look away. That’s a pretty good indicator of obscenity, but in the end… I never did. I wonder if this a commentary on his ability to powerfully ride the aesthetic line or my own jadedness toward violent images?
Thankfully, Del Toro leaves us with little doubt about one thing: violence is ugly and hateful. This unsettling movie has that over its more mainstream siblings. No spiritually compromising allure, here. No vicarious temptation. Just disgusting cruelty and the repulsive bastards who commit it.
The director also went out of his way to leave the central fact of the story unresolved- is Ophelia’s interaction with the faerie real. Do the Faun and his world exist or are they simply the fantasies into which a terrified little girl escapes? There are clues that would point to either option- her name itself, the Captain’s view of Ophelia conversing in the Labyrinth near the end, the sheer factual brutality of the world we all know…the explicit redemption imagery, the parable of the blooming rose, etc.
I believe this is the question of the movie. The ending depends on it. I suspect everyone wants Ophelia's version of reality to be true, but…
The story is set during a period of time that I know little about- the Spanish Civil War. Apparently it was no different from any other war in this respect, it brought out the most bestial in man.
Part of the shock that the film delivers is due to the juxtaposition of Franco’s Spain and the innocence of the young protagonist. Ophelia’s a beautiful little girl motored into a hell of brutal adults. History tells us that the struggle against the evils of Fascist Spain were largely ignored in the West and ended in defeat for the Resistance. The sacrifices of those who dreamed of a different world were for nothing…if temporal victory is how we measure such things.
This is the point that the story made so powerfully to me: Love, community and courageous sacrifice are either poignantly beautiful or sickeningly absurd- depending on the true nature of reality.
Men and women know in their hearts that things are not the way they ought to be- that another reality is possible, that the story doesn’t end with brute force in control.
Things may look otherwise. Heartless bullies rule, people starve, murders stalk campuses and giant waves wash away entire islands, but there is more to reality than these indisputable facts. We know this…right?
The ugliness of the Fascist's world is plain to all and real. It’s here for all to observe, handle and suffer through. Bashed-in-faces, bullet holes in the head and bright red blood dripping from the limp fingers of a dying child. Can’t doubt or deny any of it… but talking Fauns?
The ugliness of the Fascist's world is plain to all and real. It’s here for all to observe, handle and suffer through. Bashed-in-faces, bullet holes in the head and bright red blood dripping from the limp fingers of a dying child. Can’t doubt or deny any of it… but talking Fauns?
Trouble is that in our story, if talking Faun’s can’t exist then all that's left is bashed-in-faces, bullet holes in the head and bright red blood dripping from the limp fingers of a dying child.
Men and women expect to be treated as if truth, justice and beauty matter- as if loving sacrifice is greater than self-serving power, but unless there is an “Other”- unless there exists a Transcendent Source and Standard- it’s all just make believe.
Men and women expect to be treated as if truth, justice and beauty matter- as if loving sacrifice is greater than self-serving power, but unless there is an “Other”- unless there exists a Transcendent Source and Standard- it’s all just make believe.
Time and Stuff add up to only more time and stuff. There is no meaning to be found there.
There is no hope beyond the silence of a grave.
Whether we help the elderly person across the road or run our steel vehicles over their fragile bodies, we’ll all be dead in the end. There is no difference- not ultimately. Right and Wrong, Goodness and Evil, Beauty and Ugliness are each without reality- figments in the imagination of men and women who can’t face up to the truth.
Either the Faun exists or he does not. Both possibilities are followed to their end in the movie. One leads to a happy ending. The other to despair. But there is a third, as well. No Faun exists, but a world filled only with Fascists is unbearable; so decent folks must be slightly mad- living in a fantasy world of make believe. This is below despairing; it is pitiful.
Either the Faun exists or he does not. Both possibilities are followed to their end in the movie. One leads to a happy ending. The other to despair. But there is a third, as well. No Faun exists, but a world filled only with Fascists is unbearable; so decent folks must be slightly mad- living in a fantasy world of make believe. This is below despairing; it is pitiful.
I think this is what accounted for our awkwardness. It was all so ..."uncovered." Either the Faun existed or he did not.
My daughters and I had unsuspectingly seen the door thrown open to expose the sad neediness and vulnerability of the lives of those who claim that there is no loving Creator- that this sensible world is all there is. Unable to live in the loneliness and despair of their commitments, we saw them “self-medicating” to the airbrushed fantasy of sentimental denial. Like the sad little girl whose life and sacrifice finally meant nothing, they go on talking to the imaginary friends of Compassion, Oughtness and Love while the stronger get what they can, while they can.
Certainly, self-deluded humanity is to be preferred to the consistency of tooth and claw, but better than both is actually sitting down to breakfast with a Faun.
Certainly, self-deluded humanity is to be preferred to the consistency of tooth and claw, but better than both is actually sitting down to breakfast with a Faun.
How relevant to believe in the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the Age to Come. How wonderful to know who is sane and who's living in a world of their own making.
1 comment:
Phil,
Sweet pimp blog digs you got here. Keep up the good work.
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