(no subject)
Saw Pan's Labyrinth the other day, and it was completely not what I was expecting. Someone told me it was about a little girl in wartime Europe, so the first thing my mind jumps to is 'Oh, another Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe' re-make. Heh heh heh, stupid me didn't pay any attention that it was rated R. And for good reason.
For a movie theater release, I wasn't expecting that it be in subtitles (though happily so), for it to be quite so graphic or mature as the main character was a child and the main premise was her imaginative adventures, or for it to be so... well, rambling. Very rambling in nature.
The 'monsters' were very good, the wartime scenes very excellent, suspenseful, and disgusting, and the characters very well chosen for their rolls. And thank all heavens above, the little girl wasn't blonde or dimpled. Just rather dim and strangely willful for a girl that doesn't talk much.
I think the movie could have used a hell of a lot more magic. That's what the movie was advertised as, and I didn't get my boyfriend's money's worth. I wanted at least one more major magical character like Pan and the Pale Man, the toad doesn't count and neither do the fairies. The magical world around her just seemed so underdeveloped, especially when the 'real world' was so graphically and emphatically _there_. That place, as the last portal left in the entire world, should have been crawling with shit.
And now that I think about it, that little girl was so... well, she seemed out of it and bored. More like she was wandering around just to spend some time, not escaping into her imagination to escape the horrors of war. All she knew was the horrors of her step-father and her mother's illness. If they wanted to make that aspect clear, they should have done something more like The Never-Ending Story and made her hide more or more suspenseful... god, I don't know. It was just, very dull about her and her world. And so straight-forward with everything else.
I love Pan very, very much, that dear little pedophile. His face-dome is especially appealing. I like that he looks so much like a goat, and less like a man. It's sexy.
What else is there to say except that I would recommend it on a rental, but not for a ticket price. Oh, and I've never seen a man's face smashed in before with a wine bottle.
P.S. I really very greatly dislike all those utterly emo copy-kids, mostly girls apparently, who are all doing the Pale Man my-eyes-are-on-my-hands-and-I-look-at-you thing. What the fuck are you doing? It's not cool, it just makes you look like a dumbass. You really wanna be a skin-hanging, wrinkly, baby-eating freak of nature? Is that the next heroine chic? It's okay to hit the Marilyn Manson bottle hard, just, the pot is not letting you be creative in the right way. If you're gonna get high and copy stuff you see, I want some fluorescent colors and huge bowling shoes. And floppy hats, oh the floppy hats. At least then we can all be in on the joke.
I give Pan's Labyrinth 3 stars for gore and voodoo in Spain. And hawt satyrs.
For a movie theater release, I wasn't expecting that it be in subtitles (though happily so), for it to be quite so graphic or mature as the main character was a child and the main premise was her imaginative adventures, or for it to be so... well, rambling. Very rambling in nature.
The 'monsters' were very good, the wartime scenes very excellent, suspenseful, and disgusting, and the characters very well chosen for their rolls. And thank all heavens above, the little girl wasn't blonde or dimpled. Just rather dim and strangely willful for a girl that doesn't talk much.
I think the movie could have used a hell of a lot more magic. That's what the movie was advertised as, and I didn't get my boyfriend's money's worth. I wanted at least one more major magical character like Pan and the Pale Man, the toad doesn't count and neither do the fairies. The magical world around her just seemed so underdeveloped, especially when the 'real world' was so graphically and emphatically _there_. That place, as the last portal left in the entire world, should have been crawling with shit.
And now that I think about it, that little girl was so... well, she seemed out of it and bored. More like she was wandering around just to spend some time, not escaping into her imagination to escape the horrors of war. All she knew was the horrors of her step-father and her mother's illness. If they wanted to make that aspect clear, they should have done something more like The Never-Ending Story and made her hide more or more suspenseful... god, I don't know. It was just, very dull about her and her world. And so straight-forward with everything else.
I love Pan very, very much, that dear little pedophile. His face-dome is especially appealing. I like that he looks so much like a goat, and less like a man. It's sexy.
What else is there to say except that I would recommend it on a rental, but not for a ticket price. Oh, and I've never seen a man's face smashed in before with a wine bottle.
P.S. I really very greatly dislike all those utterly emo copy-kids, mostly girls apparently, who are all doing the Pale Man my-eyes-are-on-my-hands-and-I-look-at-you thing. What the fuck are you doing? It's not cool, it just makes you look like a dumbass. You really wanna be a skin-hanging, wrinkly, baby-eating freak of nature? Is that the next heroine chic? It's okay to hit the Marilyn Manson bottle hard, just, the pot is not letting you be creative in the right way. If you're gonna get high and copy stuff you see, I want some fluorescent colors and huge bowling shoes. And floppy hats, oh the floppy hats. At least then we can all be in on the joke.
I give Pan's Labyrinth 3 stars for gore and voodoo in Spain. And hawt satyrs.