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Returning to similar ground as explored in his wonderful 2001 Spanish civil war ghost story, The Devil�s Backbone, Mexican director Guillermo del Toro outdoes himself (as well as everyone else) with what is undoubtedly the best horror fantasy film of the year, Pan�s Labyrinth. After knocking everybody�s socks off at Cannes in May and London�s Frightfest in August, del Toro�s breath-taking and awe-inspiring film is as dark, shocking, beautiful and moving as a classic fairytale should be.

Set in 1944, Spain still finds itself war-torn with guerrilla fighters campaigning violently against Franco�s regime. When young fairytale obsessed Ofelia (the wide-eyed and impressive Baquero) is escorted with her ailing, heavily pregnant mother to meet her new stepfather, the vicious and egotistical Captain Vidal of the Spanish Civil Guard (a truly staggering and spellbinding performance from Lopez), she finds herself living in a world of fear, torture, brutality and violence. Their new home, a remote castle in the forested hills taken over as a military post, sits in front of an ancient crumbling maze. Warned by the housekeeper (Y tu mama tambien�s Maribel Verdu) to stay away from it in case she gets lost inside, Ofelia finds herself being drawn there one night when a large cricket transforms into a fairy (copying a picture from one of Ofelia�s books). Mesmerised, she is lured deep inside the labyrinth to meet the ancient faun (the wonderful del Toro regular, Jones, who played one of the giant insectoids in Mimic and the fishy Abe Sapien in Hellboy). Half-man, half-goat (never referred to as Pan, the name was added for the English title), his long thin body encrusted in moss, he tells her that she is the reincarnation of a princess who has the power to bring the long lost magical kingdom of her father back to life and join him forever. To do so, she must perform three tasks.

The most memorable of these tasks is confronting the Pale Man (again played by Jones), a child-eating saggy-skinned featureless monster (his eyeballs are actually in the palms of his hands) who sits lifeless at one end of a gigantic banquet table, his chair surrounded by discarded children�s shoes. Ofelia has to steal the Pale Man�s key without (and this is the most important bit) eating a morsel of the delicious tempting food. What strikes so hard about the film is that even though her fantasy world is filled with darkness, childhood fears, and nightmarish creatures, it is still a relief to be there compared to the absolute terror and violence of the real world. Captain Vidal�s determination to kill the guerrilla fighters living in the surrounding woods leads to the film�s most shocking and horrifying moments. With sudden acts of violence, wince-inducing scenes of torture, and extremely naturalistic moments of warfare, Pan�s Labyrinth manages to blend together some truly beautiful and moving moments of fantasy, dark and superbly-crafted moments of true gothic horror, and some extremely brutal and horrific realism. With Pan�s Labyrinth, Del Toro proves himself (if proof was actually needed) not only as one of the most inventive and stimulating horror fantasy directors working today, but also as one of cinema�s truly original and visionary filmmakers.