Fairy Politics (Among Other Things)*

*I'll confess right off that I wrote this upon my original viewing of this tremendous film--recycling myself.

Pan's Labyrinth has so many things going on in it that it might be hard to find a starting point and be somewhat brief.

But where to begin? I think I'll just say that it seems, with a few days of pondering and some helpful discussions, that this is a story of the loss of family.

Ofelia's family is broken by the death of her tailor-father (I think? Did this death seem suspicious--like the Captain saw Carmen, wanted her, and had the tailor offed?) who is replaced by the military strong-man. This seems tailor-made (sorry) to fit the Fascist reality of Spain--the authoritarian/paternal/dictator Franco is represented by Captain Vidal.

The fairy tale that Ofelia tells eventually reunites her with her true father and her mother in the underworld.

So many things that my thinking goes off in so many directions. And it reminds me of how I used to read certain books--looking for clues.

* Time: the Captain's "stopped" watch--seems odd and undeveloped as a story or motivator for the actions of Captain Vidal. However, can we imagine that this is perhaps the largest theme in the movie? That time is a construct of man and really comes to be a tyranny? The fairy tale is timeless and (even if however it seems the clock is running down on its viability within the film) mans' singular life is not (and specifically the replacement father/tyrant goes down to death just as the fairy tale is given fresh life).
* Father as tailor. I like trying to give this one symbolic import and trying to connect it to the stitching that the Captain had to do in the movie (after the only real maternal figure in the movie, Mercedes, dominates him--cuts his mouth to stop his lies).
* Mercedes--and speaking of Mercedes--she really is our beginning and ending here--she replaces the tyrant--her family of rebels (common man? men of the earth/forest?) succeeds, seemingly only with her help--she replaces the mother, Carmen (beautiful yet incapacitated--about to give birth to the new Spain) who has abdicated (royal theme?) and given herself to the tyrant. Mercedes protects Ofelia and though she cannot save Ofelia, she does save the "new Spain" and erases the memory of the tyrant father.
*I don't know where to begin with the Faun--but what an amazing creation. One is ambivalent about him (it)--old as time itself; can we trust the Faun?...likely he has his own agenda (as all fairies and demons do).

I'll stop there but there is so much more!