Pan’s Labyrinth – When Disobedience Is A Duty

Pan’s Labyrinth (2006) is, according to many, the filmmaker’s Guillermo del Toro ‘s best work. This movie represents how much he loves imagination. The film was also very successful. It won several awards, including three Oscars for best cinematography, best scenography and best makeup and hair.

The film takes place in one of the toughest periods in Spanish history: 1944, in the time after the Spanish Civil War. There was a lot of hunger and famine during this time. Thus, it was difficult to imagine, create or believe in fairy tales. International isolation, submission to a single ideology (fascism), and misery ruled the daily lives of large sections of the Spanish population.

Pan’s Labyrinth presents two different stories that end up being mixed up. The fact that the stories are going on at the same time is clear from the beginning of the film. While a narrator’s voice introduces us to a story about a princess who lived a long time ago in the underworld, we read subtitles that place us in the post-war period in Spain. At the same time, we hear a melody that makes us think of the purest imagination.

Ofelia, Pan’s Labyrinth its midpoint

Ofelia is the crossroads between the two stories. From the hardest parts of reality, submission to a regime and the guerrillas in the resistance movement, Pan’s labyrinth transports us to this little girl’s most innocent fantasies.

Del Toro manages to fascinate us with his aesthetic perception and his portrayal of the underworld. In this film there is a lot of both fantasy and reality, adventure and misery, but above all, disobedience.

Why Ofelia?

The name “Ofelia” immediately makes us think of Shakespeare, and especially Hamlet. In Hamlet, Ofelia is the daughter of Polonius and the sister of Laertes. She is also Prince Hamlet’s fiancée. Ofelia goes mad after her father’s death, because Hamlet killed him by accident. Her madness makes her a childish, innocent and tragic character.

Ofelia’s death, which is never shown on stage, is told through Gertrude, Hamlet’s mother. Many critics consider it one of the most poetic deaths of all time. Ofelia is a woman destroyed by love.

She has inspired countless romantic paintings because she represents femininity, innocence, love and death. The story of her death is almost magical.

Shakespeare’s Ofelia seems submissive and obedient in a world of men. But when she sinks into madness, this submission begins to disappear. We associate Ofelia’s death with something mysterious.

The choice of name in Pan’s labyrinth is not random. Rather, del Toro chose these names so that viewers would think of Shakespeare’s character. In the same way we can see certain similarities between Carmen, Ofelia’s mother and Queen Gertrude. They are both widows who end up marrying villains. Carmen married Captain Vidal, a soldier. He undertakes operations with the aim of erasing all traces of the Republican resistance force.

Femininity in Pan’s Labyrinth

In Pan’s labyrinth , women do not have very favorable positions. Carmen represents the values of traditional women. She submits to men. Mercedes, head of Captain Vidal’s household, challenges these values. Although it seems that she is loyal to the captain, the truth is that she is actually trying to help the resistance movement behind everyone else’s back. Ofelia lives a story that is parallel to Mercedes’. She is the heroine of her own story, as she is responsible for bringing prosperity to the underworld.

One could argue that del Toro tried to portray the patriarchy as something negative. In doing so, he instead promoted femininity. In the underworld there is no sun. Only the moon shines there. This symbol is full of feminine connotations due to the moon’s relation to the menstrual cycle and motherhood. In the human world, on the other hand, the princess is blinded by the sun so that she forgets everything about her past. The sun represents masculinity, and in this film it has negative connotations.

The mandrake root is also a prominent symbol in the film. This is a plant with roots that are very similar to a human figure. Ofelia uses the root to help her mother through the birth of her little brother. She places it in a bowl of milk, which represents motherhood.

Captain Vidal is the great villain in this story, and stands as a symbol of all the patriarchal values. Ofelia represents his opposition. There are two stories in two worlds. In this sense, the underworld represents a girl’s innocence and femininity. The real world, on the other hand, is hostile. This is where one finds the pain of war. This real world is associated with masculinity.

Symbolism

During the beginning of the agricultural period in human history, some tribes, like the true peoples, saw the underworld as a place associated with the transition between life and death. In other words, it was a magical place. Many of their stories tell of girls who travel to the underworld and experience various things that transform them from girls to women. They lose their innocence and change forever.

In the underworld, it is common for animal characters to be portrayed with human characteristics. There are also challenges, temptations, and usually a guide that is not always completely reliable. These stories are didactic and parabolic. We can see all this in Pan’s labyrinth .

The fauna represents natural things. He is a link between the two worlds. But, he is also not a completely reliable character. The labyrinth is a symbol of the search for truth, but it also represents danger. The tree and the blood are connected with life, and the pale man represents oppression and power from the real world. Time seems to be tied to Vidal, as he is always concerned with having control of his watch. We can link this to the god Chronos.

Number 3 appears throughout the film (Ofelia’s three challenges, three fairies, etc.). This number represents divinity in classical mythology. In Christianity, it is associated with the Holy Trinity. This is how del Toro builds a universe that is perfect and divine.

The message of the film

As in all myths and fables, it is a message to draw from Pan’s labyrinth. Del Toro wanted to create a reality where there is only one way of thinking. It is a reality where disobedience becomes a duty.

This is where characters like Mercedes, the doctor and the resistance movement play their part. Despite the oppression, they decide to disobey. Disobedience has two sides. It leads to mistakes being made, for example when Ofelia falls for the temptation to taste one of the fruits on the pale man’s table, but it also leads to good things when she does not listen to the fairies.

The characters represent a reality. However, there are no neutral characters: they are all either good or evil. Del Toro has a subjective attitude. He is not objective. And he is clearly on the side of the resistance movement, he supports all the characters who stand up to the oppression and who are disobedient.

When the film ends, we are left without a final explanation. Was Ofelia’s adventure real? Or was it just a product of her imagination, to escape the gloomy reality?