Pans Labyrinth

Guillermo del Toro's fable of the battle with imaginary and real monsters, presented in exquisite images, is a feminist extension of his surreal horror tale El espinazo del diablo (2001) and - despite all the fairytale-like romanticism - a lucid analysis of fascism in the guise of a fantasy film. After the end of the Spanish Civil War, Ofélia's mother marries a Franco officer who continues his campaign of extermination against the remaining resistance fighters in 1944. The interweaving of fantastic and “real” motifs is virtuoso: while Ofélia has to fulfill three tasks according to an old legend (and face night creatures such as a man-eater without eyes), the fascist blindly believes in the success of his violent execution methods. The two storylines come together in an inevitably tragic way, but del Toro is committed to utopia: in terms of myth as well as politics. (C.H.)

Image: Austrian Film Museum