Directed by Guillermo del Toro / Screenplay by Guillermo del Toro

Although he is no stranger to English-speaking blockbusters like Hellboy, Pacific Rim and The Shape of Water, the reputation of Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro rests just as significantly on a sequence of Spanish-language pictures, including Cronos (1993), The Devil’s Backbone (2001), and the film that many regard as his masterpiece, the darkly majestic parable Pan’s Labyrinth (2006). Set in Spain during the rise of General Franco’s dictatorship, the film embraces the ideas and techniques of ‘magical realism’ pioneered by Latin-American writers like Gabriel García Márquez, Isabel Allende and Jorge Luis Borges. The year is 1944 and our heroine is Ofelia (Ivana Baquero), a ten-year-old girl whose stepfather is an officer in Franco’s Civil Guard, charged with hunting down members of the Spanish resistance. One night in her bedroom, Ofelia encounters a fairy who leads her into a fantastical labyrinth, where a horned faun tells her that she is the reincarnation of a fairytale princess. The faun gives Ofelia a magical mandrake root to treat her ailing mother, who is pregnant with the officer’s child. So far, so whimsical… but as the film unfolds, we realise that Ofelia’s adventures in the magical labyrinth are an escape from the horrifying brutality of her life, and in particular of her stepfather, a psychopath who is torturing and killing the local villagers in his ruthless mission to eliminate the resistance. As the human atrocities escalate, the creatures Ofelia encounters in the labyrinth grow stranger and more sinister. Reality and fantasy link arms in a macabre dance to the death, as it begins to appear that the labyrinth might, after all, be more than just a little girl’s dream…

Framed Dimensions: 315mm x 400mm

Acrylic on 230gsm Winsor & Newton canvas paper

Glazed, mounted and framed

Supplied with signed letter of authenticity from Barnaby.