Reflections on the Pans Labyrinth - Essay Example

Pan’s Labyrinth Pan’s Labyrinth is a reflective movie of a story of a young girl’s anxiety and quest to escape the brutalities of Spanish Repression. This was the regime that led the Spanish people immediately after the Spanish Civil War. The girl travelled with her pregnant mother to the residence of Captain Vidal, a man who was signed by the ruling leaders to root out any rebel against the leader of Spain, Franco (Yocom 4). As the story of the young girl is told the movie portrays great amount of secrecy and symbols of the archetypes that tell another story within the movie. This is one of the esoteric elements in the Pan’s labyrinth film (McGillivray 2). In the film there are a lot of traditional stereotypic thoughts and beliefs of occults and other religious practices perceived to be devilish in nature and how they are related to Ofelia. The tale story spins around the harsh and oppressive nature of the leadership in the real world, articulated with the stereotypic tales that are at times disturbing the little girl’s conscious (McGillivray 4). With regards to the film, scapegoat myth is symbolism practice of offering sacrifices to the gods of the land with the humans in the land. The tragedies of diseases in the land troubles Ofelia so much that she is remorseful for the happenings of the maladies and tragedies that kill the people. She loses the value and the need to stay alive and she decides to offer her life to save the people (Yocom 4). In the traditional setting of the film, the people believed that out of the offering of the sacrifices the secrets of the society are revealed. Life changes after the offerings to the gods as the ways of life that the gods expect of the people are outlined. The sins of the people are carried away by the champion or the hero who agrees to be sacrificed or who offers the sacrifice to the gods (McGillivray 5). This is a form of relief from the burden of sins of the people as the sacrifice leaves them clean and ready to be reborn. The people strongly believe that the murder of the people is officiated by the demands of the gods and traditions in the society. Sacrificing humans was believed to be the most efficient way of appeasing the gods and thus relieve people from sins and reveal the ways of living the gods expect of them. With the traditional beliefs of the occult and the superstitious nature of the society she sees hopes that her death will save the rest from dying and will be reborn again (Miles 18). In the movie the little girl Ofelia is expected to certain things as the societal forces commanded as well as defy the orders to do certain other things as well. This is the motive she owns as a way of offering herself to die in order to redeem the people from the sins they submerged in. She had to expiate and make up the sins of the people such as the brutality of the leaders such as Vidal. In the region people are held captives when they oppose the musty leadership of the corrupt and unrealistic leaders. The health conditions of the people and the societal disorder in the society gave her much compassion to redeem their faith and relations to the gods. The people were exposed to severe diseases that have left them vulnerable to difficulties in life. This has been caused by the poor governance and the oppression of the leaders to the members of the society. When she reaches the labyrinth, she is given encountering tasks by the princess of the underworld so that her commitment to the unethical acts could be reaffirmed as intact and unwavering. Ofelia had to sacrifice her fundamental freedoms so that she could be put into tasks and false play her intentions to seek the truth in the society of the underworlds (Miles 20). The little girl’s offering to sacrifice was geared by the diseases that infested the land and highly affected the people. They suffered from health disorders such as mental disorders of memory lapses, poor skin conditions due to the suppression by the leaders and the entire authority of the kingdom. They are infected by allergies that interfere with their normal functions as the sun reacts with their skins and corrodes the underneath tissues (Perschon par 2-3). The women are infected by the birth complications, whenever they give birth or at the processes of giving life to a new baby, they often incur serious dexterities. They are susceptible to reproductive health challenges as they do not obtain health services from the authority. Even is the society was poor then, but the provision of services to the women by the mid-wives could be the least effort they could make to save the perishing lives (Miles 21). The film is acted in distinct archetypical images and most of them function. The presentation of the faun, the sheep horns resembled the uterus of the mothers. In most cases the horrific image of the faun who guided Ofelia throughout her initiation process portrayed to her the possibility of being swallowed back into the mother’s womb, which means death (Perschon par 3). There was a link between the pale man’s head and that of the Faun; this was a revelation of the relationship of their motives and the purposes of their wills. The labyrinth was in the form of the occult that Ofelia had thoughts about as being part of the society. This imagery represented the mythological belief of the Greek people that represented time, death and harvesting in the society (Smith par 3). The gruesome toad and the Pale Man are the interpretations and revelations of Vidal’s horrific being they are seen as the measures of the belief of atrocities of occult to the leaders. The little girl’s entrance into the terrific fig tree where the monstrous toads lives signifies an imagery of restrained sexual act. The out look of the tree with its curved branches that resemble the fallopian tube is the resemblance which revealed in a commentary by Del Toro. The tree also portrays her mother’s illness in the sickened manner of the tree’s position. This is further manifested in the blood-red tendrils in the roots of the tree. This archetypical vision happens moments before Ofelia’s mother dies of pregnancy complications (Perschon par 5). Ofelia, after her death did not epically fulfil the beliefs of the people by coming back to reunite with them as she believed that it was sinful to re-exist with the immortals of the underworld. She died to rescue the lives of the people and therefore never willed to reunite with the sinful world. The sins of the leaders were too much and wanted to redeem the world. Her will was to be with her mum wherever she was as life was pressingly worsening and impeditive. Life on earth was totally meaningless and decided to offer herself as a sacrificial hero (Smith par 5). Works Cited McGillivray, Anne. A State Of Imperfect Transformation: Law, Myth, And The Feminine In Outside Over There, Labyrinth, And Pan's Labyrinth: Oxford University Press, 2012. Miles, Robert. "Reclaiming Revelation: Pan's Labyrinth and the Spirit of the Beehive." Quarterly Review of Film And Video vol. 3 (2011): accessed from Academic OneFile. Web, on 13 Nov. 2013. Perschon, Mike. Embracing the Darkness, Sorrow and Brutality of Pan’s Labyrinth, tor.com. 2012. http://www.tor.com/blogs/2011/05/the-darkness-of-pans-labyrinth Smith, Paul Julian. "Pan's Labyrinth: (El laberinto del fauno)(Guillermo Del Toro)." Film Quarterly 2007: vol. 4. Yocom, Margaret R. "Pan's Labyrinth / El Laberinto Del Fauno. (Movie Review)." Marvels & Tales vol. 2 (2008): 345. Accessed from Academic One File Web, on 13 Nov. 2013. Read More