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Pan's Labyrinth Essay

776 Words4 Pages

Pan’s Labyrinth is a very distinct and unusual yet captivating film which uses fantasy but also dramatic imagery to tell the story both Ofelia and Spain while under fascist rule. Pan’s Labyrinth provides a linkage between harsh realities of war and its aftermath which affects all character however, the twist of Pan’s Labyrinth film involves fantasy to restrain the seriousness of the actually story. The exploration of harsh realities of war and its aftermath with fantasy is a prevalent linkage throughout the film; the constant infusion of the real world and the fantasy. Guillermo del Toro connects scenes of horrific reality in Ofelia’s new life with equally frightening scenes in Ofelia’s fantasy, which she tried to use as a mechanism to escape or cope with her mother’s illness and step-father’s cruelty. The linkage between reality and fantasy in Pan Labyrinth is to evoke the feeling that things are never just ‘black and white’ or as simple as it seems, there is always more beyond the mere eyesight; the fairies and mythical creatures of the fantasy aspect of the film gives the viewer a feeling of escape. Fantasy is used to somewhat downplay the harshness of reality in the movie which is war. Ofelia chooses not to endure the brutality of her wicked step-father, Captain Vidal serving Franco’s harsh …show more content…

The reason fantasy and reality are so different in this movie is to show how fantasy is viewed as better than that of reality. In a fantasy world anything can happen, mostly good while in reality bad things mostly happen more often and struggles seem harder to overcome, Ofelia chooses to overcome her struggles in the fantasy world, which makes the viewer prefer fantasy to realty especially as Ofelia is able to live in the end in the fantasy

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