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Symbolism In Pan's Labyrinth

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Pan’s Labyrinth is one of the most amazing fantasy films. It combines the wonderful fairy tales’ and the cruel fascist history, challenging the audiences’ understanding. Faun and fairies, while the uniform of fascist franco and inhumane behaviour. The existence of these two worlds at the same time is the most fantastic element in this film. An eleven-year-old girl is controlled under the rules from both of her “dream” world and the factual world. However, she does not flinch for the power of fascism and the journey of chasing for her princess, her wisdom and bravery support her to achieve the destination of her life. Although there aren’t any well-known film stars took place in the film, the interesting and wonderful story line is already attractive …show more content…

Ofelia, is like the sunrise in a cold winter day, is like the stream in the dry desert, leads audience away from the dark reality, and has a mysterious identity-the princess of the underground world. As the two story lines develop, there are a large amount of special effects, bloody and violent camera shots used by del Toro, in Ofelia’s task process and the war, showing the director’s acute feeling and talented imagination. He uses symbolism to match the story lines perfectly, to create the symbols in Ofelia’s tasks that as disgusting as the fascist people in the reality, and to expose the abhorrent history of Spain. From the scene that Vidal kills the innocent father and son by his unarmed hand, this inhumane action reveals the Spain potentate’s inhumane power politics. Obviously, del Toro wants to sent us a message that against war, against violence and against power …show more content…

In the reality, Vidal corners the food and control his people, he killed the innocent farmers cruelly, he is absolutely cold-blooded. In the second story line, the toad symbolizes Vidal and the fascist people in Spain at that time, the tree that it lives in symbolizes the suffering Spanish, the toad eat tree bugs and derive nutrient from the tree that just like Vidal corners the food from people, just like the fascists bully common people. Ofelia has to be face to face to the toad and get the key from this ugly disgusting monster’s stomach, just like the guerrilla who have to oppose the powerful fascist politics. So as Ofelia’s second and last task of her journey, del Toro creates a symbol in each task and each of them symbolizes the dark power, the ugliness and the inhumanity of fascism, and Ofelia is like the guerrilla in the factual world who is brave, wise and just. It is amazing that del Toro’s imagination makes his film so compact and

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