Movie Review: The Devil's Backbone

8/10

There is a very real possibility that Guillermo Del Toro is the best horror director in the world.

Why?

He doesn't make horror films. He makes films about people that have horror in them. Pan's Labyrinth isn't about scary monsters and psychotic soldiers, it's about a little girl trying to come to terms with the real world through fantasy (and not succeeding). Hellboy is about a lovestruck man who finds it impossible to fit in. That this is because he's an 8 foot demon is hardly the point. The enemies don't so much threaten the world as almost get in the way of the character study.

In fact, on current knowledge the only truly average movie he's made was Mimic, which by all accounts was as studio-compromised a vision as Fincher's Alien 3 was, and stands out like a sore thumb on Del Toro's record as much as that film does on Fincher's.

So imagine my anticipation with this orphanage-during-the-spanish-civil-war set film in which a ghost is plaguing the young kids and is referred to as "the one who sighs" (which I think may have translated badly). This story is secondary however, to the plot about the man and woman charged with looking after these children and the rest of the motley bunch in charge.

It's impossible for me to care about two-dimensional characters - any less sophisticated modern horror tends to give the killer more depth than its victims, since it's the received logic that the killer is the star. To these directors go watch the original of the species, Halloween, and be reminded that the star was Jamie Lee Curtis, NOT Michael.

What with the setting and the Spanish language nature, you may be forgiven for thinking this is just "The Orphanage Part 1" and there's a certain amount of overlap beween the two films (scary child ghosts for a start) but where it matters (i.e. everywhere else) these two films are very different. Where the Orphanage was about a mother's love for her son, the Devil's Backbone is about one man's hatred - I won't tell you which since it's a major spoiler.

Acting is exemplary throughout, particularly the unadmitted love between the good Doctor and Carmen (Federico Luppi and Marisa Parades) and all the children do a great job too. I think the direction of the children is done so well probably because Del Toro is essentially a big kid himself. One only has to watch a video of him being interviewed or backstage to see that he is having a whale of a time making these films.

Devil's Backbone is not really a horror film, despite the fact that the ghost is genius - the tagline is that "The Living will always be more dangerous than the dead", and the plot really bears this out.

Should you see it? Yes!

It's Del Toro's favourite of his films, and I differ on this point, it lacks the sheer exuberant imagination of Pan's Labyrinth and doesn;t share Hellboy's sense of humour, but it's till ten times better than any of the more mainstream "horror" movies out there, which tend to be either Torture Porn or crap cookie cutter slasher movies these days.

As with all of Del Toro's work I highly recommend you give two hours of your life to this film.

Now... to see Cronos and Hellboy II.

A