Pan’s Labyrinth

Opening shots show time running backwards as
Ofelia lays dying. Camera moves from vertical to
horizontal view as we shift into the story world.

Cars and military vehicles move across landscape still ravaged
by civil war. Just before the Civil War, the Spanish constitution
was anti-church; Franco’s fascists, on the other hand, were
supporters of (and supported by) the Catholic church.

Historical Context
One of the pivotal events of the 20th Century, the
Spanish Civil War of 1936–39 could be seen as a test-
bed for the global war that followed. While ostensibly a
civil war, it attracted radicals from around the world.

The Two Sides
★ Republicans ✤ Nationalists
★ Included moderate liberals, ✤ Anti-communist, anti-
communists, & anarchists. separatist
★ Supported by Soviet Union, ✤ Wealthy landowners,
Mexico, Socialist movement monarchists, authoritarian
and International Brigades fascists
★ Also supported by Basque ✤ Supported by Nazi
and Catalonian separatists, Germany, Fascist Italy,
because of vague promises Roman Catholic Clergy,
of independence... and Portugal.

International Brigades
• Communists and Trade Unionists in
the main – all volunteers.
• Around 30,000 troops from 53
nations fought on the Republican side
• Volunteers included George Orwell
and Ernest Hemingway.
• Survivors of the war felt a sense of
betrayal for the rest of their lives, and
were often seen as “prematurely anti-
fascist.”

Franco
• Though not originally the lead
general, Franco’s involvement was
pivotal.
• He ruled Spain as Dictator from 1936
till his death in 1975.
• He received assistance during the
Spanish Civil War from Hitler and
Mussolini, and provided some help to
them during WW2.
• When he died, US President Nixon
described him as “a loyal friend and
ally”!

MI6 involvement
• The British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS aka MI6),
anti-communist to the core, helped Franco by flying
him from the Canary Islands to Morocco in 1936.
• Kim Philby, notorious communist spy and later a
head of a Section in SIS, was reporting the war for the
London Times. He even received a medal from Franco
when he was wounded by a mortar round.
• The Russians ordered Philby to assassinate Franco,
but he wasn’t brave enough to go through it.

After a coalition of Socialists and Separatists had gained control
of the Spanish Republican government, General Francisco
Franco and other generals launched a coup. They achieved
immediate success (shown in grey), with Franco’s invasion
from Spanish Morocco and an uprising in the North.
Source: http://www2.bc.edu/~heineman/maps/SpCW.html

The Republican army were badly trained, and Franco
made rapid gains. Nevertheless, Franco’s rebels were
unable to capture Madrid and after six months of
heavy fighting had failed to defeat the Basques.

Even by October 1937, there had been little change. With air
support from Hitler, and ground troops from Mussolini, the
Nationalists had captured the Basque country, but remained
stuck outside the major population centres of Barcelona and
the capital Madrid.

By May 1938, there had been 200,000 deaths but
little gain. Franco’s fascist army was being helped by
overseas fascist governments, and after the siege of
Valencia, managed to split the Republican forces by
fighting their way through to the coast.

By 1938-39, events in Central and Northern Europe were taking
attention away from Spain. With all eyes on Hitler and the
build-up to World War 2, Franco’s army finally captured
Barcelona and Catalonia. As Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia in
March 1939, Franco marched into Madrid. The Republicans
surrendered. Spain was forgotten.

A Wounded Nation
• Atrocities were committed by both sides during
the war.
• Beyond the fighting, around 38,000 people were
executed by the Republicans; around 150,000
were executed by the Nationalists — 50,000 of
them after the war.
• Those executed included leftist school teachers!

The Blitz
• Aerial bombing of cities by the
Nationalists, using German and
Italian planes, was the first
example of Hitler’s Blitzkrieg
warfare: direct attacks on
civilians.
• The bombing of Guernica in
April 1937 was the most
notorious attack.
• Hitler later used the technique
in his attacks on Britain.

Guernica
Picasso’s painting inspired by the raid on
Guernica

Art inspired by War
Dali: Soft Construction
Miro: Black and Red Series (1938) with Boiled Beans: a
premonition of civil war
(1936)

Aftermath
• After their defeat in 1939, some
Republicans (including Brigadists)
fled across the border to France.
• While some were repatriated to Spain
and executed there, some others were
later rounded up and sent to die in
Nazi concentration camps.
• Meanwhile, some Republican Maquis
continued to wage guerilla warfare
against both Franco’s forces and
French Vichy troops until the 1950s

Resistance
• Martha Gelhorn, The Undefeated:
“ During the German occupation of France, the Spanish
Maquis engineered more than four hundred railway
sabotages, destroyed fifty-eight locomotives, dynamited
thirty-five railway bridges, cut one hundred and fifty
telephone lines, attacked twenty factories, destroying some
factories totally, and sabotaged fifteen coal mines. They
took several thousand German prisoners and - most
miraculous considering their arms - they captured three
tanks. In the south-west part of France where no Allied
armies have ever fought, they liberated more than
seventeen towns.

Maquis
• Actions of Maquis in Franco’s Spain often
went unreported — if referred to at all, they
were called bandoleros.
• After 1944, with the German army was in
retreat from the Allied invasion on D-Day, the
Maquis refocused their attention on Spain.
• In October 1944, between 4,000 and 7,000
Maquis invaded Spain. They were defeated by
40,000 of Franco’s troops.
• During the years of Maquis guerilla warfare,
20,000 people were arrested as collaborators.

Ofelia wanders into the enchanted forest. Golden
light and motes are visible. Forest and mountains
were the areas in which resistance to Franco was
strongest.

Ofelia restores the eye to the statue, and the “fairy” emerges.
(Remember: Freud’s original essay on The Uncanny referred
to Hoffman’s “The Sandman” in which a child’s eyes are
stolen.)

Restoring the eye is the first test passed by Ofelia.
The released insect-fairy is now watching/following
her.

The Captain’s broken, ticking watch is symbolic of his
relationship with his “heroic” father. The soundtrack of the
film is filled with tiny sounds amplified to overwhelming
levels: the clicking of insects, the squeaking of boots, the
ticking of the watch...

Starting off on the wrong foot/hand. Ofelia offers her
“sinister” or “unclean” leftist/Republican hand for
the rightist/fascist Captain to shake. He perceives the
insult.

“The two hands, mirror image but asymmetric;
apparently alike, but different. Incongruent
counterparts, revealing an asymmetry that fosters
hierarchy and inequality, that leads to the hegemony
of the right and the mutilation of the left.”
Kim Knott, The Location of Religion: A Spatial Analysis (Equinox, 2005)

Ofelia clutches books, her fantasy world, in her right
hand. She is observed by Mercedes, who is Ofelia’s
double, having similar colouring and sympathies.

Ofelia follows the fairy to the labyrinth, losing her
books and hat on the way. By losing the books, she
crosses the barrier that separates fantasy from reality.
By losing her hat, she “loses her head” — her reason.
She leaves the disenchanted world behind.

Ofelia picks up the sleeping draught with which she
will later drug the Captain.
The warm lighting in the bedroom contrasts with...

The cold blue lighting outside with the Captain as he
executes two captives who he knows to be innocent of
anything other than hunting rabbits.

The same lighting is used when the insect takes fairy
form — based on the image in Ofelia’s book. The
fairy’s wings are leaves.

The blue lighting of the night-time world warns us of
the dangers faced by Ofelia.

The little girl descending holes (following creatures)
is a deliberate reminder of Alice..., and of other girls
in fantasy realms, such as Lucy in Narnia.

The faun is made of bark and earth, perhaps symbolising
the land of Spain. Director del Toro has said (confusingly,
given the English title of the film) that he is not Pan, but a
more generic faun.

Fauns
• Spirits of untamed woodland,
fauns are traditionally half-human,
half-goat.
• From Latin, fauna refers to animal
life, while flora refers to plant life.
• The first creature encountered by
Lucy in Narnia is a faun, Mr.
Tumnus.
• The faun in Pan’s Labyrinth
symbolises the “undefeated”
Maquis of the forests/mountains.

The beautifully lit bathroom is a place of safety and fantasy
for Ofelia.
Do the three circular windows represent the three tasks (of
increasing difficulty/danger) she has to complete in order to
re-enter the realm of magic? And/or do they refer to worlds
within worlds?

The book presented to Ofelia by the fawn has blank pages
until she looks at it in the enchanted space of the
bathroom. The image of the girl in the book is clearly
Alice crawling into the rabbit hole...

As Ofelia approaches the first task, she is dressed as
Alice – as originally illustrated by Sir John Tenniel

Tenniel’s illustration of the White Rabbit consulting
his watch reminds us of The Captain looking at his
father’s (broken) watch. The first words the Captain
says are, “Fifteen minutes late.”

Keys and locks are also images borrowed from Lewis
Carroll/Tenniel.

Drink Me?

On her hands and knees beneath the tree Ofelia/Alice
feels oversized. The frog creature is like any number
of creatures encountered by Alice in Wonderland.

At the sumptuous feast (a feast which is doubled by
the feast of the Pale Man in the world beneath), The
Captain belittles Ofelia’s mother.

As Ofelia’s mother leaves the table, all the men stand out
of respect — though this is moments after the Captain’s
put-down. The rank hypocrisy of the fascists is thus
revealed.
Ofelia is denied food at both meals.

Elements in the real world – like the key, the feast –
all have fantasy doubles in the enchanted world.

The mother’s haemorrhaging is foreshadowed by the
magical book.

Touch is a feature of the film: the sinister touch of the
Captain, the fawn touching Ofelia, and Mercedes’ hesitant
comforting of Ofelia. Mercedes represents Ofelia as a
grown woman, who no longer has access to the enchanted
world.

After the real-world feast, Ofelia encounters the feast
of the Pale Man. She has been refused food at the
first (because she ruined her dress and shoes), and is
exhorted not to eat at the second.

At the Mad Hatter’s tea party, Alice is frustrated in
her desire to eat by the insanity around her.

Guillermo del Toro has cited Arthur Rackham’s later
illustrations of Alice in Wonderland as an influence on
the look of the film.

Even sumptuous fresh food hints at death, because it
will always rot in time.

The pale man is uncannily eyeless, and portrayed in the wall
murals as a destroyer of children (like Moloch – the god who
demands great sacrifices, the eater of children.)

Shoes at Krakow
This image of children’s
shoes hints at sacrificed
children – and reminds us
of the imagery of the
holocaust

The fruit appears to be sumptuously over-ripe, with the
grapes reminding us of the Pale Man’s eyeballs. Ofelia’s eyes
are shut as she eats the grape, “blind” to her peril.

Who stole the tarts? Perhaps the most striking image in the
entire film. The bloody holes in the Pale Man’s face
(nostrils) double Ofelia’s from the opening scene, but also
the hole shot in the Captain’s face at the end.

Moloch, eater of souls:
Moloch! Moloch! Nightmare of Moloch! Moloch the
loveless! Mental Moloch! Moloch the heavy
judger of men!
(Allen Ginsberg - Howl, 1955)

The Captain’s self-loathing is made clear in this scene, in
which he cuts the throat of his mirror image – perhaps
because he sees the face of his father.

The faun judges Ofelia harshly, then fades away in
the darkness like the Cheshire Cat in Alice.

The Captain sadistically displays his array of torture
tools. Here, the camera looks up at him in his
position of superiority.

But he has underestimated Mercedes, who quickly
reverses the roles.

The faun returns to give Ofelia “one last chance”.
We’re back with the cold blue lighting as he demands
that Ofelia bring her baby brother to him...

Scenes of body horror, such as the leg amputation
and the sewing of his own mouth wound by the
Captain are visceral.

The Captain’s death is foreshadowed. His head is
surrounded by flames – he is already “in Hell.”

As Ofelia kidnaps her half-brother, the son of a fascist
“pig” we are again reminded of Alice.

The real world starts to look unreal as Ofelia runs to
the labyrinth for the last time.

Cool blue lighting as the faun appears to demand an
unreasonable sacrifice: the blood of an innocent.

Ofelia chooses instead to sacrifice herself – and her
own blood is bright red against the cool blue lighting.

The Captain tries to recreate the death of his own father – but is
perhaps relieved to be denied by Mercedes, who tells him his son
won’t even know his name.
Although Franco and his fascists were to rule Spain for 40 years,
they were quickly forgotten as Spain restored its constitutional
monarchy and democratic government in 1978.

Ofelia’s sacrifice and the full moon open the portal.
The lighting changes from the cool blue to the golden
light of enchantment and safety.

Ofelia finds herself with her “real” family in the enchanted
kingdom. The religious imagery here is unmistakable – as
well as a hint of a restored monarchy.

Final overhead shows those who remain in the
disenchanted world.

Further Research
• There are many different • You could research the
contexts to research with mythological background to
Pan’s Labyrinth: the film, as well as the
historical background.
• It’s clearly a hybrid genre
film – how does it relate to • How does Pan’s Labyrinth fit
different genres? with the context within
which it was made?
• How does it fit in with other
films made by Guillermo del • What was its critical
Toro? reception?
• What different theoretical • How did it do with
approaches can be used in audiences?
understanding this film?