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Pan's Labyrinth: Difference between revisions
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Original Spanish title: ''El laberinto del fauno''.
Imagine ''[[Alice in Wonderland]]'' [[X Meets Y|meeting]] ''[[The Boy in The Striped Pyjamas]]'', then joined by ''[[The Wind That Shakes the Barley]]'' with a sizable portion of [[The Brothers Grimm (
You'll get...
''[[Pan's Labyrinth]]'', a dark, modern-day fairy tale, complete with [[The Fair Folk|fairies]], [[Secret Test of Character|Secret Tests Of Character]], and
It's set in 1944, just after the [[Spanish Civil War]] (a favorite period for Mexico-born [[
Ofelia and her mother are taken to a villa in the mountains near an old labyrinth (the titular Faun's one) to be near Captain Vidal for the birth while he hunts down rebels. She is quickly [[Broken Masquerade|taken into]] a [[Changeling Fantasy]] about how she is [[Rags to Royalty|secretly princess]] of the underworld fairy kingdom, lost to humanity for many ages. The Faun and his labyrinth were one of many made by her father, the King of the Underworld, as gateways in the hope she would return.
As [[Magical Girl Queenliness Test|she undergoes trials to prove her soul is uncorrupted]] by [[Humans Are
Warning, this film is a [[Tear Jerker]]. A ''profoundly disturbing'' [[Tear Jerker]], as well as a great source of horror. For those of you who [[R-Rated Opening|missed the R rating]] ...[[What Do You Mean It's Not for Kids?|this fairy tale is very definitely not for children]].
It is notable that many [[
{{tropelist}}
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* [[Anyone Can Die]]: By the end of the film {{spoiler|nearly every established character is dead, including the protagonist.}}
* [[Astral Checkerboard Decor]]
* [[A Tragedy of Impulsiveness]]: If Ofelia had not eaten those two grapes, the fairies' deaths could have been avoided, in addition to a lot of other bad things.▼
* [[Audible Sharpness]]: During the shaving scene and during the scene with the eyeless man, first a key, then the knife
* [[Badass]]: The film has plenty of them, but there's a surprising one when {{spoiler|Mercedes proves the kitchen knife [[Never Bring a Knife
{{quote|
** Captain Vidal may be an asshole, but the man stitches his own face and walks off the fact that he's been stabbed, and later, drugged.
* [[Berserk Button]]: If one is to {{spoiler|hurt children}}, one will provoke a level of wrath one would not expect to see from [[Action Girl|Mercedes]].
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* [[Brick Joke]]: The lottery ticket.
* [[Broken Masquerade]]
* [[By the Eyes of
* [[Changeling Fantasy]] an early scene even emphasizes that Ofelia is Left Handed, a feature of changelings from folklore.
* [[Chekhov's Gun]]: The knife Mercedes rolls up in her dress after cutting potatoes. {{spoiler|Cue another [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]].}}
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** {{spoiler|And the chalk.}}
* [[Child Eater]]: The Pale Man. This is made very clear just from looking at his lair, which includes among other things his collection of children's shoes.
** [[Word of God]] says that the Pale Man was visually inspired by a movie poster (from the ''[[Phantasm (Film)|Phantasm]]'' film) of a woman with hands in front of her eyes, partially transparent so that the eyes were still visible. And the rest of the creature was supposed to resemble a morbidly obese man who had lost his fat and muscle mass during the endless years of sitting paralyzed in front of the cursed banquet, according to
* [[Clock King]]: Captain Vidal
* [[Co-Dragons]]: Garcés and Serrano to Vidal.
* [[Cold-Blooded Torture]]: Captain Vidal likes to do this on his captives, most of the time to extract information, but [[You Have Failed Me...|other]] [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness|times]] [[For the Evulz|not]].
* [[Coup De Grace]]
* [[Crapsack Only
* [[Dark Is Not Evil]]: The various {{spoiler|faeries and the Faun}}. It's humans you should watch out for. On the other hand, there's also the Pale Man.
* [[Death
* [[Denied Food
* [[Determinator]]: Captain Vidal. {{spoiler|''It takes him a full 5 seconds to die from a headshot!''}} This is also after he is nearly gutted, stabbed repeated times, and drugged.
** {{spoiler|It could be said that it was actually not the headshot that finished him off, but the insight that his precious name and bloodline would be erased from history, forever.}}
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* [[Establishing Character Moment]]: For Vidal - "It's the right hand." And if that didn't convince you, him stomping two {{spoiler|(innocent, as it turns out later)}} suspected rebels' faces in and then repeatedly shooting them, hopefully will.
* [[Everyone Has Standards]]: The faun [[What the Hell, Hero?|pretty much loses his shit]] when he finds out Ophelia got his two fairy buddies eaten by the Pale Man.
* [[Everything's Better
* [[Eyeless Face]] (combined with [[Eyes Do Not Belong There]]): The Pale Man has his eyes ''in his hands''. Gah!
** They're on his plate first... And then he puts them in the empty sockets in his hands... ''Gah!'' indeed...
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* [[Famous Last Words]]: {{spoiler|Captain Vidal}} appears to have given much, much thought to his last words. {{spoiler|Only to have it brutally yet satisfyingly subverted: "He will not even know your name."}}
** {{spoiler|Doctor Ferreiro's last words could be considered to fit under this trope as well.}}
* [[Fantasy
* [[Fauns and Satyrs]]
* [[Faux Fluency]]: Doug Jones, the Faun, actually learned his lines ''and'' Ofelia's lines in phonetic Spanish, despite speaking none of the language. His voice was dubbed over anyway ... but ''still!''
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* [[Follow the White Rabbit]]: On the way to her new home, she follows a big bug to find a pagan-esque statue in the woods, later she follows the same bug to find the large stone structure in the labyrinth by her house, and the Faun.
* [[Food Chains]]: Don't eat the food on the table means, ''don't eat the food on the table.'' (Though, since it was wartime, it was likely that Ofelia hadn't eaten or seen fresh fruit in a long while. And she had been sent to bed without supper, so was more hungry than usual)
** Also, you know, the [[What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic|fruit
* [[Forbidden Fruit]]
* [[Foregone Conclusion]]: The film opens with Ofelia, lying on the ground, with {{spoiler|[[Blood From the Mouth]] -- or, in this case, her nose.}}
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* [[Hero of Another Story]]: Pedro, the leader of the rebels.
* [[Humanoid Abomination]]: The Pale Man.
* [[Humans Are
* [[I Cannot Self-Terminate]]: Vidal orders Dr. Ferraro to treat the wounds of a rebel he is torturing so that he can be tortured some more. The man begs Dr. Ferraro to kill him, and Ferraro obliges by giving a lethal injection.
* [[I Have Many Names]]: The Faun.
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* [[La Résistance]] - the rebels of course
** Overlaps somewhat with [[The Remnant]], since by the time the movie takes place (1944) the Republicans had already lost the war, and there were only a few isolated pockets of resistance remaining.
* [[Let's Get Dangerous]]: Mercedes at first comes off as a fairly meek woman, {{spoiler|even if she is [[The Mole]]}}, and she considers herself a coward. Then, {{spoiler|when she's been captured and is facing [[Cold-Blooded Torture]] [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|she whips out a knife and gives Vidal a
* [[Living Labyrinth]]
* [[Lost in Translation]]: When the Captain welcomes Ofelia and the pregnant Carmen to the villa, he says ''"Bienvenidos"'' to them, the Spanish form of "welcome" that one would use in addressing multiple people when at least one is male (you'd say "Bienvenidas" to two women). This would instantly telegraph to a Spanish-speaking audience whom he ''really'' cares about (especially since the baby's sex is still unknown).
** Considering the Captain's character, it's likely meant to give the impression that he's sure the baby is a boy. In his mind, he's convinced he's too strong to have made anything but a boy. At least, that's the impression this troper got.
{{quote|
'''Vidal:''' Don't fuck with me. }}
** The Faun (and later the Fairy court) use the vosotros (2nd person plural) form when
* [[The Lost Woods]]
* [[Magical Girl Queenliness Test]]
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* [[Meaningful Name]]: Girls named [[Hamlet|Ofelia]] don't tend to have happy endings.
* [[Milky White Eyes]]: The Faun has these when Ofelia first meets him, though as the movie progresses they become more normal. Whether this is of any significance isn't stated, although it's notable that the Faun seems to de-age in other ways as the film nears the climax, signaling his growing power.
* [[Never Say "Die"]]: Also, never say "pregnant."
** Although Ofelia's "sick with baby" comment is such an apt expression under the circumstances.
* [[Never Trust a Trailer]]: The trailers used for the US release 1) Gave no clue that the actual film was in Spanish, and 2) made it look like a ''[[Narnia]]''-type family fantasy. FAMILY FANTASY. REALLY.
** Driven home on the [[Covers Always Lie|cover of the DVD]], which promises that the movie is "on the same altar of [[High Fantasy]] as ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'' trilogy", and throws another mention of ''The Lord of the Rings'' on the back of the cover, obviously trying to make whoever buys it believe that the movie is going to be just like it. If anything it's more of an [[Urban Fantasy]].
* [[Offscreen Teleportation]]
* [[The Ophelia]]▼
* [[Our Fairies Are Different]]: They disguise themselves as insects.
* [[Plucky Girl]]: Ofelia.
* [[Point That Somewhere Else]]: It doesn't actually work. Captain Vidal aims his pistol at a wounded revolutionary, who weakly pushes it away once, twice, then rests his hand over the barrel. Vidal shoots him in the head, through his hand.
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*** The Falangists had shown no mercy to them, so they obviously weren't inclined to give any back. Also, it's not as if they could take prisoners, and fighting without uniforms as they do is also considered a war crime.
**** Technically {{spoiler|the rebels shooting Captain Vidal at the end after capturing him also was (at least without a trial) - though the viewer is generally sympathetic since he had just shot Ofelia, to add to all his other atrocities}}.
* [[Right Place, Right Time, Wrong Reason]]: {{spoiler|Mercedes makes two big mistakes. First, she tries to escape from the compound the same night that she finds Vidal has grown suspicious of her. Her attempt to flee proves to Vidal that she is, in fact, guilty of helping the rebel forces. Her second mistake is that when she escapes, she stabs Vidal in several non-critical points. As a result, instead of being killed by a subordinate, Vidal staggers out and orders them to capture her instead- guaranteeing that she's in for horrific torture. By complete random coincidence, though, the rebel forces are in the same part of the woods where she is surrounded by Vidal's soldiers. The soldiers are surprised and massacred by the rebels, the result being that the compound now has too few soldiers to adequately defend against a rebel attack.}} Seriously. [[The Chessmaster]] couldn't
** Mercedes {{spoiler|was scheduled to flee with Ofelia anyway}}, so the rebels were waiting for her there for a reason.
* [[Rule of Scary]]
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* [[Schmuck Banquet]]: The Pale Man's cursed feast.
* [[Shoot the Shaggy Dog]]: Almost certainly applies if you can't accept that the magic is real.
* [[Shamed
* [[Shout-Out]]: In the commentary, [[Guillermo
* [[Shut UP, Hannibal]]: Towards the end of the movie...
{{quote|
'''Mercedes:''' No, he won't even know your ''name''.
''{{spoiler|Pedro then [[Pay Evil Unto Evil|shoots Vidal in the face]].}}'' }}
* [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism]]: This movie simultaneously pits the two ends of the scale against each other..
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** He's using the bottom of the bottle, which is usually the thickest part, especially when it comes to wine bottles.
* [[The Southpaw]] - Ofelia, in that it is a subtle sign that she actually is a changeling
* [[Spiritual Successor]]: [[Word of God]] identifies this film as the second in a loosely connected trilogy started by ''[[The
* [[Theme and Variations Soundtrack]]
* [[Theme Tune Cameo]]
* [[Too Dumb to Live]]: Ofelia, in ignoring the warnings of the fairies, during her disastrous face-off against the Pale Man. Though, in following the fairy tale motif, it was ''faerie'' food which is almost always
▲* [[The Ophelia]]
▲* [[Too Dumb to Live]]: Ofelia, in ignoring the warnings of the fairies, during her disastrous face-off against the Pale Man. Though, in following the fairy tale motif, it was ''faerie'' food which is almost always glamoured to make it seem like irresistible, [[Impossibly Delicious Food]].
** That, and it's supposed to show how she doesn't blindly obey orders, unlike Captain Vidal. It was just unfortunate that this was done via a test that anyone [[Genre Savvy]] with fairy tales could recognize.
** It's also worth noting that immediately before, she only found the right hiding place by following her own will and not listening to the fairies.
** YMMV. Ofelia likes fairy tales, and the movie is set up like one. In some fairy tales (but not all), the main character will fail to listen to advice, or do something they were told specifically not to
* [[To the Pain]]▼
* [[Torture Always Works]]: Vidal seems to think so, but it's ultimately subverted.
▲* [[To the Pain]]
▲* [[A Tragedy of Impulsiveness]]: If Ofelia had not eaten those two grapes, the fairies' deaths could have been avoided, in addition to a lot of other bad things.
* [[Unperson]]: {{spoiler|Mercedes tells Vidal his son will not even know his name.}}
* [[Vader Breath]]: The Pale Man.
* [[Vomit Indiscretion Shot]]: When the giant toad pukes up its insides.▼
* [[What the Hell, Hero?]]: Ofelia and the grapes.
** As noted under [[Too Dumb to Live]], Ofelia is just acting like a character in a fairy tale.
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* [[Wouldn't Hurt a Child]]: {{spoiler|The Faun, although he's pretty effective at playacting otherwise.}}
* [[Wrong Genre Savvy]]: Almost all the real-world characters, but Carmen (Ofelia's mother) most of all.
▲* [[Vomit Indiscretion Shot]]: When the giant toad pukes up its insides.
* [[You Watch Too Much X]]: According to her [[Wrong Genre Savvy]] mother Carmen, Ofelia reads too many fairy tales.
** Or maybe ''[[Genre Savvy|Right Genre Savvy]] mother'', we never find out for sure...
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[[Category:Hugo Award]]
[[Category:Cafe FX]]
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[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
[[Category:Films of the 2000s]]
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