I assume most of you reading this beat me to it. But if you haven't seen this yet, I urge you unreservedly to do so. It is both beautifully devastating and devastatingly beautiful.
Guillermo del Toro would appear to be well on his way to being one of my favorite film fantasy storytellers. I only qualify that because I've not yet seen most of his films, just this and Hellboy.
But I've just brought Devil's Backbone home, so further bulletins if and when they happen.
There's some irony in my liking his films so much. I noticed watching some of the score-only track of Hellboy just how well it worked as a wordless film.
On the director's commentary to ...Labyrinth, del Toro states emphatically that he always tries to tell his stories visually, even going so far as to say that he hates dialogue.
Well. Them's fighting words, where I live. Granted some can overdo it (cough, Kevin Smith, cough), but as a rule, I love great, smart and witty dialogue, from Shakespeare to Sorkin.
Filmmakers that brazenly eschew dialogue in favor of visuals, no matter how imaginative, to my mind tend to make wet-blanket FX fests.
Why then am I so spellbound by del Toro's pictures, when I have no love for such movies as The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith?
I think because though del Toro may not chose to rely upon witty dialogue and the like...he has it in his quiver, as they say. He knows it when he hears it.
The dialogue here is sparse, yes, but (given that I have to assume through the translation) crisp.
OFELIA
My name is Ofelia.
Who are you?
FAUN
Me? I've had so many names...
Old names that only the wind and the trees can pronounce.
I am the mountain, the forest and the earth.
I am...
I am a faun.
Your most humble servant, Your Highness.
BTW, I took these images from the official site for Doug Jones, the actor who played "the Faun" (above) and "Pale Man" (below). In both cases he is with Ivana Baquero as Ofelia.
If you find them as grand as I do, permit me to recommend you go see more of it, especially this perfect but little-used promotional art by Drew Struzan.
Jones is also the active part, though not the voice, of Abe Sapien in the Hellboy films.
Just as while Hellboy is a lovely film simply to look at, it also has some very witty lines: "How big can it be?" "I'll always look this good." In context, even "Oh, crap!" is very funny.
--BTW, how much am I looking forward to Hellboy II? Let me put it this way: More so (much) than Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: A New Beginning.
Films like this and the Lord of the Rings trilogy make me even madder about what directors like Lucas and Andrew Adamson do in the name of storytelling.
(and no, it has not escaped my notice that del Toro is "the likely director of the next two 'Hobbit' movies“)
These films have a sweep to them, sometimes in the way they appear, but always in the way they feel. They show that it is possible to make epic films with extraordinary vistas and still have characters that I care about and dialogue that doesn't make me want to give myself a lobotomy.
Now that's a kind of magic I can believe in.
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