80
Suspended between the brutally graphic and flights of lyrical fancy, Pan's Labyrinth unfolds with the confidence of a classical fable, one that paradoxically feels both timeless and startlingly new.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
100
Pan's Labyrinth Like his terrific 2001 "The Devil’s Backbone," Mexican horrormeister Guillermo del Toro's new movie offers us both real-life and fantastical monsters, and if you know his work, you won't waste time figuring out which to root for.
100
This intense film, a mix of horror, fantasy, and history that convinces on all those levels and mixes them up with dizzying brio, is a searing cinematic experience, a beautiful, terrifying vision from writer-director Guillermo del Toro.
100
Literally and figuratively marvelous, a rich, daring mix of fantasy and politics.
88
ReelViews by James Berardinelli
The lack of family friendliness does not diminish what del Toro has achieved with this magical motion picture.
80
There's plenty of blood -- both literal and figurative -- coursing through the veins of Pan's Labyrinth, a richly imagined and exquisitely violent fantasy from writer-director Guillermo del Toro.
100
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) by Liam Lacey
This is like no movie you've seen before, a haunting mixture of horror, history and fantasy that works simultaneously on every level.
100
Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington
A brilliant work of the imagination capable of truly seizing and igniting our fantasies.
80
The Hollywood Reporter by Ray Bennett
The performers are all good with Baquero poised and beautiful as Ofelia and Verdu vital and spirited as the rebellious Mercedes. Lopez gives an extraordinary performance as the bestial captain, an irredeemable villain to rank with Ralph Fiennes' Nazi in "Schindler's List."
90
This is a true fairy tale, and one of the finest fantasy pictures ever made, but please do not take your young children to see it unless you want them to be scarred for life.
I love the way fantasy is approached from a more artistic lens in this film, especially when the fairytale conflict combines with the political turmoil. Truly feels like entering a Surrealist dreamscape or a myth someone would put on a stained glassed window.
Just like an adult fairy tale. The juxtaposition between childlike fantasy and 1940s Fascist Spain makes this film unique, gripping, and hard to look away from. It's truly one of those films I keep coming back to. It's beautifully violent and brilliantly horrifying!
My favorite thing about Pan's Labyrinth is the strength and love that Ofelia possesses, making her a loveable child protagonist. However, watching this film as an adult, it is impossible not to draw connections between Ofelia's magical story and the Spanish civil war, which gives the story a much less innocent layer of meaning-- as much as it is a fairy tale, Pan's Labyrinth is also a story of escapism, of a child's desperate attempt at grappling with the trauma inflicted upon her by adults.