Lord of the Onion Rings

Rating: 5/10 (13 September 2008)

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You can't seem to turn a corner these days without hearing about Guillermo del Toro's imagination. "From the imagination of..." is the tagline of choice used to sell all things GDT and while his movies are usually set in mythical worlds with fantastic characters, are they really all that imaginative or simply reinvented retellings of other, far more imaginative yarns?
From the prologue through to the end credits, GDT's latest offering, Hellboy II: The Golden Army seems to be a mixed bag of fantasy, all of which we've seen before: one part Tolkien, one part Gilliam, one part George Lucas and one part Ridley Scott. Like Lucas, GDT seems more interested in showing off his imagination than he is interested in telling an engaging story. Some scenes in HB2 play out like the Cantina sequence in Star Wars, others feel like plagiarized out takes from The Lord of the Rings, the production design looks to be borrowed from Brazil, Alien and Blade Runner. So what do I make of GDT's imagination? I'd say it's very inspired as opposed to very original.
Pan's Labyrinth, although superior to HB2, also wears its influences a little bit too literally. With so much going on, PL is practically indistinguishable from the work of Lewis Carroll, Jim Henson and the Brothers Grimm. While there is little doubt Del Toro is a technically astute and visually compelling director, his brand of storytelling palatable and easy to digest, it really is a stretch to consider his work original, or truly imaginative. Whether you dissect Cronos, The Devil's Backbone or even more commercial outings such as Mimic or Blade II, Del Toro's work can best be described as a kid in a cinematic candy store, picking, choosing and recycling the work of his many influences. This isn't an entirely bad thing, and Del Toro (not unlike Quentin Tarantino) can always hide behind the time honored adage "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." Flattering or not, GDT proves with Hellboy 2, there is no substitute for the real thing.