Way back I watched the directorʼs commentary of Panʼs Labyrinth by Guillermo del Toro. I then had this crazy idea of creating a column in Urban Jungle: Interviews I Didnʼt Have. I even took notes, and actually saved them for years, thinking I would eventually write it up. While I finally was sitting down to re-watch the movie to go over said notes, and guess what? I couldnʼt find them, so I watched and retook notes, 17 pages of them, and then I finally came to the conclusion to take the time to get an accurate interview with reliable quotes, I was going to have sit and rewind a bunch. Iʼm a single mother of a teenage boy, who doesnʼt drive yet. I canʼt rewind without monitory compensation just yet, and not feel guilty. So Iʼm going to not mock up an interview but instead give you some bullet points on what I found most interesting, as itʼs amazing what you learn by taking the time to re-watch a movie with the commentary on.
Now, I am thinking, that you are thinking; “Why should I care about a ten year old movie?” I donʼt have an answer for that, but I did find out that Guillermo del Toroʼs latest release, October 2015, Crimson Peak, which, “marks del Toroʼs first true ghost story since his 2001 feature “The Devilʼs Backbone,” and the director has slipped in some references to that movie in his latest.” http://variety.com/2015/film/spotlight/guillermo- del-toro-crimson-peak-monsters-1201603998/
And, now you are probably asking, “But what does The Devilʼs Backbone,” have to do with Panʼs Labyrinth?” And because I watched the directorʼs commentary, I know that they are sister films.
The Devilʼs Backbone is set in 1939, the end of the Spanish Civil War.
Panʼs Labyrinth is set in 1944. Five years into a Spain run by Fascist.
Yes, I have 17 pages of notes, but mostly scribbles as he talks very fast, and all his incredible insights come flying at you and it is impossible to grasp it all in one take. I still love my interview idea, but will be satisfied for now with a condensed bullet point presentation.

Guillermo del Toro starts off the film by connecting the two films.
In both, the film is set in motion with a child arriving to a new location by car with an adult.
And both children are visited by a magical creature and given a problem to solve.
“To make the fantastic tangible, you have to make it mundane.” Both magical creatures are introduced in the daytime with no special music or,lighting, “treating the magical like any other subject.”
del Toro then he brings up how the fairies came to him while filming, I thought I heard Hellboy, but itʼs really Hellboy II. He told his team he “wanted a fairy with long limbs, long body and wings out of leaves.”

http://editorial.rottentomatoes.com/article/exclusive-hellboy-ii-edit-suite-visit-and-
The scene where the Captain kills the boy and his father. del Toro based that on an oral report of about how in post war a grocery clerk didnʼt take off his hat to a “fascist, so the fascist smashed his face with the bottom of his pistol.”
Throughout the film del Toro goes on about color schemes and scene wipes. Most of them horizontal, just two of them from top to bottom, and how the faunʼs actor was puppeteer with his own legs. And how they made explosions the old fashioned way,with mud, wind, and water.
The biggest nightmare to film: The Frog and vomit.del Toro wanted th frog to jump around. They even built the set. However, the frog was too heavy and couldnʼt move, let alone jump around. They had to dump the huge set and keep it stationary. del Toro admits that in the end it actually works better for the frog to be still. And the vomit shot, he laughs in the commentary, but says how torturous it was during filming.
Guillermo del Toro hates dialogue and horses.
He wants to tell a story with the camera.
“Horses are nasty motherfuckers, if he shoots a Western, “Just know that the poor fat bastard suffered a lot.”

I hadnʼt picked it up, that poor Ofelia hadnʼt eaten since she arrived at her step-fatherʼs house. Her mother had sent her to bed without any supper after returning from her meeting with the frog. She is starving and disobeys the Faun and the fairies, resulting in the scariest part of the movie in my opinion. Ofelia eats the grape, wakes the paleman, as del Toro, calls him, and he ends up eating two out of the three fairies, which is based on Goyaʼs Saturn devouring his Sons.
The is so much more detail del Toro talks about. I didnʼt even mention the nods to other films and fairytales, but to keep this short, and I am going to just jump to the question most of us had when we watched Panʼs Labyrinth for the first time.
The film opens with Ofelia shot and dying. When we catch up and are back at the beginning, is she a princess about to make it back home, or just a lonely, scared, girl, in the safety of her imagination, who then gets too lost in it?
Guillermo del Toro is very adamant that she is indeed the lost Princess, and the scene that seals the deal is the one when Ofelia sneaks into her step-fathers heavily guarded room to steal back her brother. Later when the Captain discovers the mischief, he finds chalk and breaks it. Itʼs the chalk that Ofelia used to make the door to get into the palemanʼs dining hall. The chalk has crossed over from the fairytale into the reality.
And then in the final scene of the film the legacy of Ofelia is shown in the flower blooming on the dead tree as the insect looks on.
There are so many other jewels of behind the scenes and insider knowledge I could write a term paper. Not all director commentaries are like a lecture at a Liberal Arts College, where you come away feeling smarter.
I did watch The Devilʼs Backbone, and thought it was the perfect amount of scary and I liked it very much.Guillermo del Toroʼs latest, Crimson Peak, is another period ghost story and the preview looks like it wonʼt be horror, and I can handle suspense, I will most likely check it out. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oquZifON8Eg
Now if I really wanted to be fancy, I would travel to Champaign, Ill, April 13th through the 17th to attend the Roger Ebertʼs Film Festival, as Crimson Peak will be the opening film. http://variety.com/2016/film/news/guillermo-del-toro-crimson-peak- ebertfest-1201684451/
I highly recommend checking out The Devilʼs Backbone if youʼve seen Panʼs Labyrinth. And if you have time to indulge in the directorʼs commentary in both films, I say do it.