3 Oscars is only half the story.

Rating: 10/10 (30 August 2009)

Guillermo del Toro's foreign film won 3 Oscars for 2006, for Best Achievement in Art Direction, Best Achievement in Cinematography and Best Achievement in Makeup. That is only half the story.
Look at the nominations and you can see why this is an outstanding film and one of the best movies of last year. Pan's Labyrinth was nominated for Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures/Original Score, Best Foreign Language Film of the Year and Best Writing/Original Screenplay (great story by Guillermo del Toro).
Del Toro has indeed created something very special - part war movie, part fantasy, that everyone should see. This is a very 'visual' film that does not rely overly on dialogue. I wish I had seen it in the movie theater. I had none of the why questions. It is much better than the closet tale of Narnia, more compelling and easier easy to watch than Lord of the Rings 2, and yet as political as Schindler's List.
Although the young girl's fantasy world juxtaposes her harsh real world, it is not mere escapism. The movie is too shocking for most kids, and some adults. It is not gory, but it is realistically violent. If you liked V for Vendetta and History of Violence, you will like this movie.
Like V, the real world dilemma of the plot is simple: good versus shocking evil. Face-to-face fascism in a glance. Submission of good and kind souls. The evil that men do. The young girl and her mother are trapped by circumstances. While the promise of the fantasy world is appropriately extraordinary, the fantasy challenges (tests) Pan's heroine faces are more realistic that the outlandish ones in Lord of the Rings. In Rings, each challenge is supposedly impossible to overcome, yet its group of heroes easily wins and not with special gifts that aid them in overcoming their adversary. Besides, the computer generated graphic images (CGI) fills the screen endlessly with fake backgrounds. In Pan's, the heroine succeeds because of her innate goodness, and yet makes tragic mistakes.
Pan's graphics intrude into the stark reality of WWII. In the beginning, CGI offer a glimmer of magic, hope and possibility, which we and the young heroine spy. The tension of the real world drama adds to the movie as the girl moves back and forth between the real world and fantasy land. The tragedy of the real world, and the failings in the fantasy, add suspense, moving the story along and keeping it interesting. In Narnia, there is no interaction between real and fantasy world, the heroes somehow easily conquer and win their fantastic destinies, all in gorgeous and endless CGI packed landscapes.
I normally can't watch the audio commentary; it is so full of meaningless crap. Yet the one for this film was as interesting as the one for Young Frankenstein. If you are an avid movie lover, as am I, I found de Toro's references to other movies and techniques fascinating.
I've seen a few good movies recently. I also like the wonderful Judi Dench and Cate Blanchette (always good) in Notes on A Scandal, Sharon Stone's incredible and Justin Timberlake's surprisingly good performance in the disturbing Alpha Dog and the fantastic Helen Mirren in The Queen (see the bizarre The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097108/).