Jan 29 2007
El Laberinto Del Fauno (Pan’s Labyrinth)
James and I saw it last Friday night.
Loved it.
Wish I hadn’t read any summary/synopsis of the movie.. it ruined it a little bit for me. The summary always stated something about the girl’s imaginary world, but I think it could have been viewed as “real” events, and I would have done so, if I hadn’t read those and been predisposed to thinking “this is all in her head.”
Other complaint.. “EL LABERINTO DEL FAUNO”
Does anyone else see a mention of “Pan” in there? This obviously says, “The Faun’s Labyrinth” .. and there was no mention of Pan anywhere else in the movie that I could see. The faun was never named as Pan. Isn’t Pan a pretty important mythical character? Am I wrong to feel like I was mislead by the “Pan” in the title? THERE WAS NO PAN! DON’T TRY TO FOOL ME WITH THAT TITLE!
Anyway. For some reason I feel kind of righteously indignant about this translated title.
Oh, but the movie was beautiful. It appealed to the fairy tale lover in me. It felt right, and it was not just the icing of a fairy tale that happens in so many versions. It had real horror and life and death situations (which real fairy tales have), which was mirrored in the physical (“real”) world going on around the girl. It did not leave the taste of sacharin in one’s mouth, as so many modern/updated fairy tales do.
Highly recommended. Hope it wins all the awards it was nominated for.
4 Responses to “El Laberinto Del Fauno (Pan’s Labyrinth)”
Pan was a faun.
We were annoyed by the title translation also. I kept seeing people write about “Pen’s Labyrinth”, so I kept expecting there to be a Penelope or something that could be shortened to “Pen”. We got to the end of the movie, and I had to ask Clayton if I’d missed something, because there wasn’t a Pen in the movie :P.
I really liked it. I’m glad they didn’t ruin the ending the way Disney has ruined the little mermaid story.
Of course they had to rename it to Pan’s Labyrinth, we stupid americans don’t know what a faun is. Just like we didn’t know what a philosopher’s stone was either. In fact, upon hearing the title “Pan’s Labyrinth”, the entire nation wondered just what a frying pan had to do with David Bowie. ^_^
I was annoyed by that, too. But this was a sad realization I came to in 1997 (after I learned to speak Spanish while traveling) (I swam!) … most subtitling alters not a few things. And it leaves out a great deal. Most notably, subtleties. What we need here is some subtle subtitling. I am greatly amused rightnow by the thought of my students in Korea trying to get their minds around pronouncing that, “subtle subtitling.” Oh, the big ol’ circle of ironies of language!
As for the actual movie – um, I read a lot about it, too, but, um, I sort of accepted that as really happening and not just in her imagination. Oops? Am I a crazy fairy-story artist dreamer or a law student, what’s the deal?