Pan's Labyrinth

[Toxarch]

We watched Pan's Labyrinth last night in the home theater. I had no clue what it was about (other than the obvious Labyrinth) or that the movie was not in english. Started the movie and thought I had hit the wrong setting when I set it to DTS when all the words on the screen were in Spanish. So I turned on the subtitles and began watching. There isn't a whole lot of dialogue so reading won't make you miss too much of the film.

The movie was good, and the scenery was good. But I wasn't too sure who the target audience for the movie was. There is a child's story that is fairly simple as though the movie was written and made for children and wouldn't appeal much to adults because of its simplicity. But then there is also a war going on with a couple of gorey scenes and people getting shot that would make you say that this is obviously not a children's movie. And I am still not exactly sure who the target audience is. Maybe fathers who read stories to their kids at night and miss all the blood and guts in stories?

I would recommend watching the movie. The sets and costumes were really good and it was well filmed. But I don't think it would be worth buying because it's kind of a simple rated R film with a kids' PG film mixed in.

[John Simpson]

Truthfully, my wife and I were disappointed. It *is* a very good movie, but I think the previews simply didn't represent it accurately.

For months after seeing the Quicktime teasers, my wife was saying "I think this will be my all time favourite movie" (she loves fantasy stories). When we actually saw it, the fantasy element was there, but we had already seen most of it in the trailers. The rest of the movie was a gritty, and sometimes exceedingly confronting, war film.

Five stars for the film, but two stars for the total misrepresentation in the previews.

[Hakka]

I watched this last night, thought it was very good. I do have to agree with the above comment about it being misrepresented in the previews though.

Going to watch it again today without the subs now that I know whats going on.

Hakka.

[Toxarch]

If you go into this movie with high expectations, you will be very disappointed in the movie. It's not a great movie that will wow you. I didn't know what to expect when I sat down to watch to movie. The cover mentioned something about an Academy Award nomination or something.

I try to avoid previews, especially if it's a movie I really want to see. They show too much in the preview to get people watch the movie. And once you go in to watch the movie, you realize that they showed all the highlights in the preview and you are just watching the fat between those points. Plus, once you have seen a certain scene a few times in the preview, you keep waiting for that scene to come up while watching the movie.

[brandonnash]

johnson4 wrote:

Truthfully, my wife and I were disappointed. It *is* a very good movie, but I think the previews simply didn't represent it accurately.

For months after seeing the Quicktime teasers, my wife was saying "I think this will be my all time favourite movie" (she loves fantasy stories). When we actually saw it, the fantasy element was there, but we had already seen most of it in the trailers. The rest of the movie was a gritty, and sometimes exceedingly confronting, war film.

Five stars for the film, but two stars for the total misrepresentation in the previews.

Movies now do that way too much. Not to say that this is a good or bad movie, because I haven't seen it, but a lot of bad movies are getting these 30 second trailers on TV that tell absolutely nothing about the movie and are nothing like the movies themselves.

Perfect example is the first time I saw Lost In Translation. On the trailer it looked like it would be just a hilarious movie. It had some funny bits, but for the most part it was a slow moving film with very little comedy. I was very disappointed and didn't try to watch it again till it came on a cable channel and watched it again. Turns out it IS a decent movie, but watching it the first time I was left completely less than impressed.

[Sonnie]

I was disappointed with the trailers vs. the real deal myself. I was expecting more of the fantasy world experience. I agree that trying to determine the intended audience is mystifying at best.

While the movie was okay, not great IMO, I was definitely bummed out when I found out it was Spanish audio with no option for English audio. It was quite a bit more reading to follow than Passion of the Christ or Apacolypto.