Darkly enriched Fantasy...

Rating: Null/10 (19 July 2008)

A young girl named Ofelia (Baquero) living in Spain in 1944 during the Franco regime is taken by her pregnant mother (Gil) to live with her Fascist Franco loyalist and commander stepfather (López) in a remote part of central Spain. Her life becomes more interesting when upon she encounters a faun (Doug Jones) who tells her she may be more important to the realm of another world.
My Review:
Director Guillermo Del Toro gives his final film of the trilogy that really mixes and mingles fantasy and brute horror to unconventional ways. With 'Cronos' and 'The Devil's Backbone' now in the bag, his focus shifts from Mexican vampires and ghost children in orphanages to mythical fantasy and brutal war time horror.
With the recent success of European directors conjuring up landmark films director Del Toro has come back and delivered a sophisticated piece to his earlier Spanish film, it really is his finest hour.
We get to focus on young Ofelia (Ivana Baquero), who is nothing short of well played introverted child who' life is change at the sudden appearance of a faun. Del Toro proves his direction with child actors is yet again undiminished, his continuous efforts to weave great performances through younger generation actors that seem to have refined talent.
We need a baddie, and who is better than that of demented and paranoid dictator/stepfather Vidal (Sergi López). His personality equally matched in his commitment of a neurotic approach to ending the rebellion/resistance, as if he were Darth Vader in 1940's Spain. But being the stepfather of Ofelia suggests that with his current regime he'd rather care about passing on his lineage to an unborn son and half-brother to Ofelia. And you though step- mothers were bad.
Supporting Ofelia and the tyranny of Vidal is maid Mercedes (Maribel Verdú) whom is really known well enough for her impressive number of films in Spain. She supports Ofelia and her mother after a few distraught ordeals, however, never underestimate a lion is sheep's clothing, when given a chance so see what Mercedes can do with a knife.
The stunning taste of fate playing into effect as this seemingly young girl, who was assumed ordinary is now drawn into a bemused revelation of that she is to be a princess of a supernatural world. Del Toro plays with the actual and imaginary aspects of a child in a sense that they become blurred, is this actually real, or is it that her imaginings runaway with her? It's hard to guess, you'd rather not go for the latter even when she arrives at an old mill in cutoff Spanish woodland, clutching a parcel of books filled with fairy tales.
CGI delivers, it definitely delivers with magical sequences and real cringe-maker scenes. An adult tale dealing with the stuff of fantasy that is rooted in children.
Verdict:
You can never be too old for any fairytale. This one deserved the rare score: 10/10.