A fairy tale for grown ups, 'Pan's Labyrinth' (or 'El Laberinto del Fauno') is set in the turmoil and violence of early Francoist Spain.
Ofelia, a bright and imaginative girl, moves with her ill and pregnant mother to live with her mother's new husband, the cruel and sadistic Falangist Captain Vidal as he fights the anti-Franco rebels. Ofelia escapes into the nearby forest and the labyrinth it contains, meeting a faun who tells her she is a princess, and must complete three dangerous and gruesome tasks to rejoin her real family in the Underground.
Filled with stunning visuals, strange creatures, and set against the bleak backdrop of civil war, 'Pan's Labyrinth' is heart warming and heart breaking, beautiful and ugly, uplifting and saddening. Writer and director Guillermo del Torro weaves a complex and rich parable that explores loyalty, imagination, death, and triumph.
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