El Laberinto del Fauno

El Laberinto del Fauno ("Pan's Labyrinth", in English), is a 2006 film by Guillermo del Toro.

Plot & characters (spoilers)

The film is simultaneously a fairy tale--gory and graphic like classic fairy tales--and an allegory for the horrors of war and fascism.

• The central character is a child, Ofelia; she is brave, loving, and humanly childlike in her occasional thoughtlessness.

• Ofelia is cared for by her ailing mother, Carmen; Carmen loves her daughter but is rarely an effective character; rather, she is a woman apparently trapped by circumstances, who appears to have made at least one serious miscalculation.

• Ofelia is also cared for by a secret revolutionary, Mercedes. Mercedes is an active agent in the "real world" of post-Civil War Spain (1944), occupying a dangerous position in the household of Captain Vidal, an officer in Franco's fascist army.

• Captain Vidal is the domestic evil, whose horror becomes increasingly apparent throughout the movie. A fascist in the fullest sense of the word, he adheres to fascist elitism, a foolish sexism, and a callous disregard for the life of others.

• A fairy (both in insect and more traditional "fairy woman" form and a faun connect Ofelia to the fantasy world; both are mysterious and potentially frightening characters, who may mean her good or ill; however, the fairy assumes a clearly positive and protective role over the course of the film. The faun remains more ambiguous and mysterious, but any danger or mystery it (he?) poses pales in comparison to the cold Captain Vidal.