Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: Pan's Labyrinth ::
by William the Bloody
The setting: 1944. Spain, in the middle of civil war. Ofelia is a young girl and her father recently died, so her mother married an army Captain and is currently in her third term of pregnancy with the Captain's child. The Captain has been stationed in a country farm estate so that his troops can better quell the insurgents who have been using the forest to run supplies to each other. Our story begins as Ofelia and her mother are being driven to the country estate to be with the Captain so that his son can be born near him. Ofelia, still a young girl, does not understand why her wonderful, beautiful mother would marry someone like the Captain who is horrifically cruel, and wishes she and her mother could simply run away from their present circumstances. Ofelia goes out exploring the area one day and follows a mantis into the old stone ruins of a labyrinth. When inside, she meets Faun, who tells her that she may be the long lost princess of the underground realm, and she can once again reclaim he kingdom by performing three tasks before the next full moon. Ofelia is intimidated by Faun, but delighted by this opportunity to extricate herself from her horrible new life.
The Good: If you're like me and millions of others, then you too have heard all of the hype surrounding this film about how good it is, and well, it is. It won three Academy Awards for art direction, cinematography and make up, and it most definitely deserved them. The film is incredibly beautiful to look at. It was also nominated for best score, original screenplay and foreign film, which it did not win, but would have been highly deserving. The score is hauntingly captivating and you'll be cooing that lullaby to your loved ones in no time. The movie makes good use of of some old fairy story cautionary tales (re: don't be greedy) and magic abilities (re: drawing a door with chalk, an oldie but goodie) and interplays them off of each other and the modern war story backdrop in a way that makes it feel completely original. The acting performances by every member of the cast was simply outstanding. The Captain, Mercedes the housekeeper, Carmen Ofelia's mom, and little Ofelia herself, not to mention the magical characters, were all incredible and my hat's off to them and the director for getting such impressive work for an entire cast. If even one of them had not taken the film seriously or been off, the movie would have had a totally different feel so I'm very appreciative that it came across the way that it did.
The Bad: Some of the violence took me off guard. I was aware that this wasn't a kiddie picture, but I was still initially shocked at how far they were taking it at first. Once I realized they weren't pulling any punches (and you'd think that was funny if you saw the film... oh Captain, you violent devil!), I was less surprised by the subsequent violent scenes, but there is still a lot and it's quite graphic. Trailers for a foreign language film are always tricky business, and of course the adverts were all pushing the fantasy aspect, so I had no idea of what I was basically getting into what with the civil war setting and the soldiers and the underground movement and was kind of surprised that the movie was split fifty-fifty between the fantasy and war settings. In other words, there was a little less fantasy in the movie than I expected there was going to be based on what most of the American television adverts showed. I'm not saying this is necessarily bad or that it took away from the film at all, I'm just letting you know to expect that in case you're going in expecting 90% fantasy like Jim Henson's Labyrinth.
Overall, this was a superb film. It's pretty difficult to merge a strong fantasy tale with a very reality based war story, but Pan's Labyrinth managed the marriage between the two seemingly mutually exclusive genres effortlessly. One minute Ofelia is bargaining with a giant toad and the next the Captain is hunting down insurgents in the woods, and yet it feels completely natural. Ofelia's at home situation with the cruel Captain only adds desperation to her effort of completing the mystical tasks set before her. Once again, let me restate how this IS NOT MEANT FOR YOUNG CHILDREN. This is an adult's fairytale and that suits me just fine.
A
