Broghan Isabelle Lawrie

Analyzing the Pale Man scene of Pan's Labyrinth.  Typical fairy-tale conventions of other worlds, Ofelia needs to complete 3 tasks and is about to be given her next challenge, we see throughout the film that a sequence of 3 is often used.  The mise-en-scene denotes her looking through the book to see her next task. The room is dark with a cold blue wash as there is no natural light. We see a long shot of Ofelia reading, this highlights her escapism.  She looks in the book and we see what she needs to do. The shape of the pale man is similar to the womb - a symbol we see throughout the film - it implies that something will be born from this challenge.  Close-up shot of hand touching the chalk - the chalk has been edited to make it come to life.  Long shot of Ofelia looking through the tunnel, shows how small she is compared to what she is about to step into. Loud sound of the door suggests the huge gravity of the situatio...

Analyzing the opening sequence of Pan's Labyrinth. The beginning of the film is a black screen with a series of text cards displaying  the historical background and providing the audience with some context of the Spanish Civil War. Eventually,  there is a fade up from black and we can hear the heavy breathing of Ofelia, Mercedes softly humming the lullaby and the wind whistling - this all sets up the tone of the scene. The opening shot is shown when the camera pans from right to left following the drops of blood that are floating back to Ofelia's hand. We see a close up of Ofelia laying on the ground with blood coming from her nose however the blood is moving in reverse which hints that this is the ending and we're now going to be taken back to the start of the story and see how she ended up like this. The blue filter that we see in this shot represents sadness and despair. This opening shot suggests that the film isn't going to follow standard fairy-tale...