Pan's Labyrinth

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Some aspects of the film Pan’s Labyrinth by Guillermo del Toro are considered to be similar to the aspects of films directed by Terry Gilliam. This style is also known as “Gilliamesque”. Three of these Gilliamesque aspects found in del Toro’s film are surrealism, selfless acts, and a primary character who is an outsider. Pan’s Labyrinth includes many instances and examples of surrealism because the film itself is either fantasy or magical realism. The main character, Ofelia (Ivana Baquero), spends a lot of her time in an old labyrinth, talking to a faun (Doug Jones), following fairies, and completing quests to prove that she is the lost princess Moana in order to be able to return back home to the eternal realm. It is unclear throughout the film whether this alternate reality is actually real, or just something that Ofelia made up in order to escape the horrors of her actual life with her dying mother (Adriadna Gil) and the abusive and extremely cruel captain (Sergi Lopez). These worlds blend together in a way that makes it very difficult for the viewer to discern whether the magic is real or not, creating a surrealistic effect, especially in scenes like in the end when Ofelia is running away from the captain and he almost catches her, but the stones of the labyrinth come apart and let her through to the center when she ran into a dead …show more content…
She doesn’t fit in or feel at home in the captain's house, she has barely anyone who can remotely relate to her at all, she and her mother don’t understand each other, she misses her dead father, and on top of everything else, is the only child in a house in the war torn woods full of adults. Because of these factors, Ofelia spends most of her time either by herself, exploring the woods and reading, or with the fairies and the faun, who may or may not be just a figment of her own