Orfanato: The Story of Lost Children
Presented by Guillermo del Toro, this film followed similar footstep in its magical quality as a thriller/horror. Beautifully shot, devoid of cheap scares and set against a flowing score, this film can easily fit among the legion of great horror.
The film started off slow and leisurely, with the unmistakable undercurrent of wrongness - like an accident, or, in this case, a tragedy, waiting to happen. It was rightly described as a blend of reality and fantasy, where each and every progression of the plot can be adequately explained.
I particularly enjoyed the sequence with the seance - it was the most solid proof that one sees what one believes - does the seance really have strange powers? Or was it just an elaborate trick?
The mental state of the protagonist was described through its deterioration during her mourning. The tension was so excruciating that reality and imagination was blurred and, as one character said to another, "believe, and you will see".
The film worked partly because it strung together elements which are almost readily mythical - an orphanage, an old house, an orphan who grew up, others who stumbled and vanished in the course of time, the questionable bond between adopted child and parents, a new home, the passage of time... The list goes on, but they add up to the whole atmosphere of the film - something at once strange and familiar, known and surprising.
And of course, the ending invoked such a mixed feeling that I wasn't sure if I should be happy or depressed, but nonetheless, I was elated that they did not fail the film by giving it a lame ending.
The film started off slow and leisurely, with the unmistakable undercurrent of wrongness - like an accident, or, in this case, a tragedy, waiting to happen. It was rightly described as a blend of reality and fantasy, where each and every progression of the plot can be adequately explained.
I particularly enjoyed the sequence with the seance - it was the most solid proof that one sees what one believes - does the seance really have strange powers? Or was it just an elaborate trick?
The mental state of the protagonist was described through its deterioration during her mourning. The tension was so excruciating that reality and imagination was blurred and, as one character said to another, "believe, and you will see".
The film worked partly because it strung together elements which are almost readily mythical - an orphanage, an old house, an orphan who grew up, others who stumbled and vanished in the course of time, the questionable bond between adopted child and parents, a new home, the passage of time... The list goes on, but they add up to the whole atmosphere of the film - something at once strange and familiar, known and surprising.
And of course, the ending invoked such a mixed feeling that I wasn't sure if I should be happy or depressed, but nonetheless, I was elated that they did not fail the film by giving it a lame ending.