Deprivation as the core of menstrual symbolism

Rating: Null/10 (26 May 2007)

What exactly do the events inside the labyrinth, or underground, mean? It's very simple, you only need to perform a simple operation of addition, that is to sum up 1 + 1. First, the frog beneath the tree. The frog, we learn, is DEPRIVING the tree of its nutrition, DEPRIVING it of its vital fluids, so to speak, and thus hindering its growth. What Ofelia does is destroying the frog and eliminating the state of deprivation. Second, the banquet hall with the creature, the Pale Man. He, seemingly, has been depriving human beings of their nutrition for a long time, by gathering food on his table and not letting anyone touch it. He, actually, is DEPRIVATION itself, personified, or, better maybe, monsterified. He thrives on deprivation. And again, what Ofelia does is, if not destroying him, at least tricking him and thus de-personifying him, making him a monster with a flaw, which is as much as eliminating him, for there can nothing much be left of him if his act of depriving others is not total. And third, Ofelia doesn't let the otherwise benevolent faun (Pan) hurt her newly-born brother, that is, she doesn't let the brother be DEPRIVED of even one single drop of blood. Instead, she gets deprived of her own blood, and with it her own life. One should note only that not merely a life, but her GIRLHOOD life.
So, what does this sum up to? It sums up to a very obvious (but not at all clumsy!) SYMBOLISM OF MENSTRUATION. Ofelia grows into a woman, a very self-conscious and world-understanding woman (just the kind Mercedes is; note that Mercedes is the only one who ever mentions the labyrinth and seems to know that there lives a faun a little girl needs to meet ...), the one who realizes that ONLY WOMEN ARE ALLOWED TO BE DEPRIVED (of their menstrual blood) in order to grow up, to understand themselves and the world around, and that deprivation of any other living being leads only to disaster, just like the tree had been deprived by the frog and the children by the Pale Man. And the Captain - the male - of his vital fluids by his father!
The movie shows how wrong it is if a male gets deprived. He simply can't bare the notion that anything of or on him would disappear. This is exactly the notion the Captain's father leaves over to his son - the notion of year, month, day, hour, minute and second of his DISAPPEARANCE, of his deprivation of life. That's why the Captain panics, and all he is now able to understand about what is going on around him is disappearing of others and REMAINING OF HIMSELF, himself now and here, and himself projected onto his son. All he sees in the present, as well as in the past and in the future, is himself. He exists as a particle of a genetic lineage, and this genetic lineage - his father and his son - is essentially identified as his own self. The brutality of the Captain is thus the brutality of a self-centered male ego who cannot understand the gaps life needs to embrace in order to continue, in other words, the brutality of a male fearing his own disappearance and invalidation.
The magic, on the other side, is by no means lacking in Pan's Labyritnh. The labyrinth is always present, never is there a moment that would leave you grumpily wonder why there is not more of the labyrinth. It sure isn't Disneyland with all the characters and stories and adventures neatly packed in an instant-food-like arrangement. It lingers in your mind, creeping deeper and deeper into your unconscious darkness. And their is one genuinely magical, touching moment, very short, but so effective that pierces your heart. The moment when Pan returns.
10 (excellent)