 |
| Devil's Backbone |
Co-produced by Agustin and Pedro Almodóvar's El Deseo production company, del Toro shot
The Devil's Backbone in Spain, casting Almodóvar regular Marisa Paredes (
All About My Mother) with Federico Luppi (
Cronos) and Spanish actor Eduardo Noriega (
Abre los ojos).
Also featuring a remarkable cast of child actors, from whom del Toro elicits impressively nuanced performances, the film is a perfectly realised synthesis of gothic melodrama and political allegory.
Set during the Spanish Civil War, comparisons of this hybrid war movie, classic ghost story and Western with John Ford's
The Searchers and the films of Sergio Leone would not be out of place. Del Toro calls it his 'Mario Bava Western', though he also manages to integrate a stylistic nod or two to cinematic heroes Hitchcock and Buñuel.
"The most complete and complex genre movie of the year - the best horror movie, the best fantasy movie and one of the best films, period."
New York Press
