The Devil's Backbone (2001)

Directed by Guillermo del Toro
Written by Guillermo del Toro, Antonio Trashorras and Mavid Muñoz
Starring Fernando Tielve, Íñigo Garcés, Federico Luppi and Eduardo Noriega

After Carlos, a 12-year-old whose father has died in the Spanish Civil War, arrives at an ominous boy's orphanage, he discovers the school is haunted and has many dark secrets that he must uncover. Mainly the mystery of "the one who sighs", the ghost of a little boy who wanders the orphanage.

There are truly no horror films like those of Guillermo del Toro. He has such a way with storytelling, that he does not need jump scares and gore to keep you terrified. He does so with a subtlety and grace of the building tension, until the pot boils over.

Rather than having a monster or ghost the source of fear in his films, he uses them as the victims to the much more real villain of human cruelty. It is certainly a privilege to watch his stories unfold and this is no exception.

Being one of his earlier pictures, "The Devil's Backbone" fells as though it set the course for his career. It also becomes apparent that his style has not changed, not that it needs to. The themes of the innocence of children and their first experience with death has been prevalent throughout his career, and this is no different. It is one of the thing that makes him unique. 

He does not present death as something you should be afraid of. He presents it as the sad, inevitable finale of life that we must all accept. He finds a way to find the beauty and humanity of pain and present it with a sense of calm and solace. He continues to show why he is one of the more unique directors out there.

My Rating: 7/10

In the Name of the Father (1993)

Directed by Jim Sheridan
Written by Terry George and Jim Sheridan, based on the book by Gerry Conlon
Starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Pete Postlethwaite, Emma Thompson and John Lynch

In the midst of the IRA terrorist attacks in London, an Irish man named Gerry Conlon, along with ten other Irish citizens are convicted of crimes they did not commit. Sentenced between 4 years to life for their various convictions, the eleven innocent Irish men, women and children all served their sentences while maintaining their innocence. Until fifteen years later, when an English lawyer discovers a Police cover-up.

An infuriatingly true story of corruption and government conspiracy and the prejudice of all Irish citizens in England during the 1970s, "In the Name of the Father" shows just how easy it is for a police force to lie and affect innocent lives in order to get the illusion of results. In a so-called "Democracy", where the government is there to protect their citizens, they create a veil of lies and destroy the lives of eleven people.

It's a film that will make you think and ask just how accurate our judicial system is today. The truly terrifying thing in this case is that no police officers or detectives were ever charged for their crimes. The government protects it's own despite the cruel and unjust actions they are guilty of.

I'm no lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that this constitutes as a mistrial…

only unfortunately for Guiseppe Conlon, it was after he had died.

This is the kind of movie that will make you angry while you watch it. You won't believe you are hearing what you're hearing and you find it even harder to believe that the antagonist succeeds, thus creating a two-hour and fifteen-minute movie instead of a forty-minute, anti-climactic one.

As usual with Day-Lewis, his acting is on point. And being from Ireland himself, I'm sure this story hit close to home for him. With every movie I see him in, new or old, I am amazed at just how good of an actor he is. He is recognizable, yet has a tendency to disappear in his characters. Remarkable.

My Rating: 8/10