Pan's Labyrinth

I think that war was needed for this movie to work, because it provided the elements needed for you to understand why the little girl was so desperate to escape reality. Using Spain at that time was a good setting because it reflected the tension of that time which allowed you to believe and helped to understand what Ofelia might be going through and why she might not want to live her life based on her harsh reality. I liked the way Guillermo Del Toro implied that it was not by choice that Ofelia was living in a fantasy world, but that it was in some way a parallel life, because it also involved her baby brother and mother. It was a great way to show both the reality and fantasy worlds, and how sometimes they can intersect.

I believe that both reality and fantasy were needed in this movie, because each affected the other in various ways. For instance, when the little girl was hungry, and needed to eat, which is necessary in reality to survive, it screwed up her fantasy world because she had broken the rules set forth to her by the demon in the fantasy world. So in this case both were related and both affected each other directly even though they were in fact two separate things. That is why I argue that both things are actually running in parallel to each other.

The themes of obedience and disobedience where played out in several different ways, one example I could give would be the woman who was working for the Captain. It was obvious that she despised the Captain and everything that he stood for, but she was still obedient to him, because her friends and family where a part of the Rebel forces, and they needed her to help them from the inside. An example of disobedience would be Ofelia not obeying her mother and getting her dress dirty, being late, etc. which her mother knew would infuriate the Captain and draw his wrath. I think Ofelia's mother made the greatest sacrifice of all, because she risked losing the love of Ofelia by giving herself to the Captain, just so she could have a provide a good life for her son and Ofelia. This may have been what inspired Ofelia to also sacrifice her life, not only for her brother, but for her mother as well.