Pan's Labyrinth

Tonight Movie Night In The Back Yard presents Pan's Labyrinth (2006). Written and directed by Guillermo del Torro, Pan's Labyrinth tells the story of a young girl and the fantasy life she creates to escape the brutality of post civil war Spain. Beautifully crafted and at times violent, the film showcases the creative genius of del Torro while also showing us the terrible political situation in 1940's Spain. In 2006, Del Torro, along with Alfonso Cuaron (Children of Men) and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Babel), created three of the year's best films and became the story of the year in the film industry. Unfortunately, all three films were filmed outside of Mexico where studios, previously averaging over 100 films per year, made about 7 films in 2006. Hopefully the attention received by these Mexican directors can help revive that struggling industry.

A Fistful of Dollars

Next Monday night, Movie Night In The Back Yard presents A Fistful of Dollars (1964). The first part of a triptych including A Few Dollars More and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, A Fistful of Dollars was one of the first "Spaghetti Westerns." This term was largely intended to mock the films made by Europeans with little knowledge of the American west other than what they had gathered from American films. Years later these films are seen as more innovative and violent, and less idealized than their American counterparts. The Italian director Sergio Leone couldn't speak much English, but he had the wisdom to cast Clint Eastwood in the role of his nameless main character and to hire Ennio Morricone to create the film's score. Morricone would repay Leone by producing a revolutionary score that incorporated the sound of gunshots and ricocheting bullets along with some very unusual music. He also created one of the most famous sounds in western movies: "do - we - oo - we - oo." The plot of the film is borrowed from the Kurosawa masterpiece Yojimbo in which a stranger comes to town and plays two rival families against each other. Don't miss this classic piece of film history.