"Goya meets Alice in Wonderland in this genre-obliterating tour de force," Kinn and Piazza write of the 2005 film directed by Guillermo del Toro. "Intermingling dark and shimmering special-effects imagery with an abiding respect for character, del Toro questions our notion of the polarity between reality and imagination."
Director del Toro said during an interview with the Guardian that "we had a distributor tell us, during pre-production, that if we made it in English, the exact same story and everything, they'd raise their backing to $30m [more than double the original budget]. The answer was very immediate: no. Because the moment you start accepting anything that feels remotely wrong... the moment you give in, you're giving up. You've lost control, it's not the movie you wanted."
The director was next to author Stephen King at a screening of the film and saw King shifting uncomfortably at some of the gorier sections. Del Toro said it was the greatest moment of his life.
Actor Doug Jones played the Faun that speaks with girl explorer Ofelia, and Del Toro told that for the end of the film, when the Faun is stronger, he "told Doug to go rock star on me, like a glam rocker. But less David Bowie, more Mick Jagger."
