PRGAAMWA DVD Fight: Pan’s Labyrinth vs. The Fountain

I thought about declaring Pan’s Labyrinth the winner this week and saying that the other movie didn’t even show up for the match. However, The Fountain looked like it could stand up to a little Spanish girl and have a shot at winning. After watching them both, I’m thinking that maybe The Fountain shouldn’t have shown up at all and just stayed in it’s little New Age juice bar nursing a lemongrass tea and splashing patchouli on itself.

I know this is a DVD review, but I’ve got to say this. When we saw Pan’s Labyrinth in the theater in January, there were several parents who brought their SMALL CHILDREN with them and left before it was over. What the hell? It’s an R rated movie, which clearly indicates, you know, NOT FOR KIDS!

Pan’s Labyrinth is violent and graphic and bloody, just like fairytales used to be before Disney got their hands on them and made everything musical and non-violent. Most old fairytales have more in common with horror stories than our Disney-fied world lets on.

But, Pan’s Labyrinth is as close to a perfect movie as I’ve ever seen. It’s also one of the first movies I reviewed for Pink Raygun, and everything I wrote still holds true after a second viewing on DVD at our neighbors’ house. I was emotionally pummeled and crying again (which had nothing to do with John and our neighbors teasing me relentlessly about an earlier verbal flub and my being, in general, a nutcase) and had nightmares about the baby-eating Pale Man again.

Then I watched The Fountain, which should have been good and was really just. . . ummmm. . . not. I like Darren Aronofsky’s films because they get a reaction out of me, which doesn’t happen often. Pi made me kind of dizzy, Requiem for a Dream made me throw up. The Fountain made me yawn and scan the bookcase next to the TV for something to read, but I’ve already read all of those books, so I had to keep watching.

There’s three stories: a conquistador in Central America searching for the Tree of Life, a medical researcher searching for a cure for his wife’s cancer using botanical elements from a Central American tree, and a guy in a space bubble taking a dying tree to the Xibalba Nebula while he eats it’s bark, hallucinates and tattoos himself.

I got the feeling that Aronofsky was trying for something Lynchian or Donnie Darko-ish in the inter-cut stories and weird camera shots, but ended up masturbating all over the screen instead. It’s disappointing because the pieces of an amazing movie are there – Rachel Weisz, Hugh Jackman, Darren Aronofsky, Clint Mansell’s score and an interesting premise – they just didn’t get put together in a way that fit. It’s like Aronofsky tried to put a puzzle together without looking at the big picture first to see how everything fits. That’s hard. I’ve tried it.

I kept reading that The Fountain isn’t an easy movie to follow and I’m just not seeing it. It’s very easy to follow; the only aspect that’s ambiguous is bald Tommy in the space bubble, which can be taken as the end of Izzy’s book or reality. Either way, the movie sucked.

Duh. Like there’s even a question. Hugh Jackman totally got beat up by a little girl. Pan’s Labyrinth takes this match.

Never miss an update. Subscribe to Pink Raygun by Email, or Subscribe via RSS

The Pink Raygun Association of Associated Movie Watchers, Associated 2008 March Movie Madness Tournament Prize Pack So Far…

Below

Requiem for a Dream by unknown 17.00X11.00 Framed with Black Metal Frame

Pi [VHS]

Pi

Proposed constitutional amendment 30 to eliminate the Montana Board of Regents: An analysis within U.S. public higher education governance and Montana University System historical contexts