Pan’s Labyrinth – Overly Depressing Towards Women

This article assumes that you have seen Pan’s Labyrinth. If not, a cliff note version is thankfully available via Wikipedia here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan’s_Labirynth).

The main problem with this movie is that the women are excessively portrayed in a less than favorable light, mistreated, abused, and finally killed by war mongering men. Yes, it is the time of the Spanish Civil War and men are also victims of violence, but not quite to the degree and humiliation of women. The main question to ask the writer/director Guillermo del Torro is if he has any daughters of his own, and what kind of message is he installing in them, frankly in all of us, as to the degree to allow the humiliation of women?

The Role of Carmen, Ofelia’s Pathetic Mother

Carmen, Ofelia’s mother and wife of Captain Vidal, takes human suffering and subjugation to new levels. She finds no love or support from her husband, and indeed is slated to die upon child birth if given a choice to save the life of the child or mother. Carmen, indeed, dies during childbirth. Yet, not before she is able to pass along the most depressing ‘words of wisdom’ to her daughter Ofelia, that life is cruel and hard.

Ofelia, meanwhile, being only a little girl tries to inculcate some semblance of reasoning to her mother with obvious questions as to why she married the Captain in the first place, why are they living with him, etc. The only answer she is able to obtain, repeatedly, by the self made beast-of-burden-mother is that when she is older she will understand and that things are too complicated to explain.

The last few days of Carmen’s life were heavy. While suffering pain from her pregnancy, she also endures humiliation and insults from the wives of other General’s during a dinner party in her house. Not only is she insulted by her guests, but she is insulted by her husband who pleads forgiveness for his wife’s homely nature. Instead of causing a scene, leaving the table, ordering the guests to leave, or some other form of self worth, she bows her head as her husband belittles her even further.

With a mother like this, Ofelia has a severe lack of role model for her developing sense of self, unfortunately.

The Role of Ofelia – Brave But Murdered

Ofelia, thankfully, does manage to have more spunk on her own. Where she obtains it, who knows, since it certainly was not handed down by her mother. She constantly defies her new ‘father’, refuses to call him father, and even steals her baby brother away from him.

Ofelia is mired in the world of fairies and goblins, who clearly have their own issues. Actually, it is one of them, the Faun, that asks to take her baby brother for sacrifice. Ofelia naturally refuses, and is killed by the Captain with a gun shot to the stomach.

As Ofelia’s blood pours into the fairy world below, her spirit is heralded by her true parents and cohorts for sacrificing herself to save her baby brother. Although her baby brother is saved, Ofelia, yes another female killed by a man, dies in a mortal sense.

Summary

The media needs to wake up to such blatant mistreatment of the role of women in any movie. Why were the roles not reversed? The fact that this movie has won so many awards and recognition deeply troubles me, as a woman, and actually plays a role in propagating violence against women. Yes, at the end of the day, this is fiction and is protected by the creative umbrella of anything goes and free speech.

Just once, it would be welcome to see a fantasy movie where the roles were reversed, where the women were constantly humiliating and killing men. Yet, how would this role reversal go over with the Academy Awards? At least it would give young women time to pause and realize that the constant stream of violence against women by the media has taken a refreshing change of pace. There is a choice, and no one from any gender needs to take mistreatment of any kind.

Violence against women by their husbands, and child abuse by their care takers are all very real problems, which were glorified to new heights in this movie with fairies and fauns prancing nearby. One can only wonder about the material for Pan’s Labyrinth 2, but it will probably continue the the female-degredation-hit-parade, unfortunately.

Reference:

• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan’s_Labyrinth