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Pan’s LabyrinthFebruary 5th, 2007 by criticFREE Newsletter Photos Restaurant Reviews Buy Links |
Pan’s Labyrinth
Just got blindsided by this great movie!
Don’t believe me, see what the rest of the free world says here.
Trying to get out to see the Departed, and got vetoed into a movie I wasn’t even aware of. Pan’s Labyrinth or El Laberinto del Fauno is a English subtitled movie in spanish, that despite this fact has somehow up for 4 Academy Awards I believe?
If your looking to take this one in it is Showing at the Concord AMC Theater here
Concord Show Times From Charlotte.com
I must first say the the Oscars are a joke ever since Lord of The Rings won 12 in one year, which proves they are all about marketing or that the cast of LOTR was the ones voting. I do acknowledge LOTR to have been a good movie, but to have won this many awards proves the Oscars to be a popularity and marketing contest.
Well this movie was such a great surprise, one that no moviegoers get anymore. The fact that I knew nothing other than the genre of the movie was “fantasy”, and that the movie had be said to be “very violent”, made the surprise so much better.
Not knowing all the best lines from spammy commercials made me want the story to go on for 4 hours, as it was all 100% fresh to me.
The movie is like a Timothy Burton film, something along the lines of LOTR, Harry Potter or perhaps Jim Carrey’s Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events is the best comparison.
BUT, and I cant stress this enough, this is not a kid’s film, it is rated R with good reason. The fact that this film allowed an R rating to stay on it proves it to be a non polluted non corrupted film.
Had this been produced in Hollywood, they surely would have removed a few violent scenes and gotten this down to PG13 and then marketed it as a dark fantasy film for kids. This is dark fantasy, but no kids under 15 should be at this one.
I did think it was overblow the amount of violence people claimed it showed, as it wasnt really that much, and in reality was a very light “R” rating. The violence shown was 2-3 scenes of someone taking a beating, or a bloodless bullet to the head. Ther was alot of blood shown, but nothing that would bring nightmares, it was all “wartime” style gore, and no “horror style gore”.
This movie was a very one of a kind blend of two genres that didnt belong together. This was a fantasy childrens movie trapped inside of a war film. This blend is a pefect anology for the films concept which was of a child wishing for this fantasy while she is stuck in a violent place and time in her real life. One represents an escape from the other.
I saw many comparisons to Narnia, or personal reviews saying it was “no Narnia” which I thought to be incredibly insulting to this film. Not in Narnia’s wildest dreams could it even be worthy of showing its trailer before Pan’s Labyrinth.
For Narnia represented one of the biggest dissappointments I have ever seen. Narnia was so much a childrens film it bordered on Barney Videos. Narnia was a kids movie that rode the shirttals of Harry Potter and LOTR, while Pan’s Labyrinth follows the footsteps of Edward Scissorhands. This film is one of a kind, very enjoyable, unique and one of the few things in the theaters worth the insane $9 ticket price.
This film did not get nominated for best Actor, Movie or Director, and is settling for the secondary Art Direction and Original Screenplay awards. It is a sad shame that agents pushing their product seem to keep getting big names and “stars” pushed to the stage while true artform and actual acting (not models pretending to act) is left unawarded.
Little Miss Sunshine has a good chance of walking out with the best movie award this year, and it was a good movie. I have seen both of these, and Pan’s Labyrinth is 10 times the film in many ways.
I am NOT a guy who puffs out his chest and pretends that “artsy” stuff is better in anyway, but this time it really is, this one time the best movie of the year was a tiny bit “artsy fartsy”, had subtitles and did not star Brad Pitt. (smell my sarcasm)
