Twenty years on, the Pale Man is coming back to British cinemas, and this time he can reach out of the screen for you. Studiocanal returns Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth to cinemas nationwide from 30 October. The new 4K restoration was struck from the original 35mm negative, and there are select screenings in 35mm and in 3D. It launches the distributor’s new Studiocanal Classics label, which is a sensible way to open the shop. You don’t launch a restaurant with the soup of the day.
The Americans got theirs first, on 9 October, and most of the noise drifting across the Atlantic has been about how it was done. Del Toro set one rule for the 3D conversion and announced it to applause at San Diego Comic-Con in July: absolutely no goddamn AI. Instead, by his own count, upwards of 1,300 artists went through the film frame by frame over well more than a year. He won’t commit to the exact headcount, and he freely admits the hand-made route costs far more. His view on that: “It’s much more expensive… I don’t care.” One imagines the accountants took it well.
James Cameron, who knows a thing or two about squeezing an extra dimension out of a picture, apparently warned him that anything rushed in under 300 days would be unacceptable. This from the man who took thirteen years to get round to a second Avatar. Anyone who sat through 2010’s Clash of the Titans, post-converted in a matter of weeks and looking like a pop-up book left out in the rain, will understand the caution.
SDFX Studios handled the conversion, and the 3D is reportedly selective rather than wall-to-wall, concentrated in the fantasy sequences. That seems wise. Captain Vidal’s shaving scene was quite sharp enough in two dimensions, thank you. There’s a fresh colour grade and sound mix too, del Toro oversaw every version, and a 4K UHD collector’s edition follows in 2027 for those who prefer their fauns at home. The figures don’t quite match: the UK publicity credits “over 600” artists at SDFX, so del Toro’s larger number presumably covers the wider crew.
The film needs no introduction here. Francoist Spain in 1944, Ivana Baquero’s Ofelia, Doug Jones folding himself into the faun, three tasks and a fairy tale with teeth. It won three Oscars and got a 22-minute ovation at Cannes. It still carries a 15 certificate, so don’t take the kids expecting David Bowie and a goblin singalong.
There’s something pleasingly contrary about a re-release whose big selling point is the number of humans involved. In 2006 we marvelled at a monster with eyes in his palms. In 2026 the marvel is that somebody drew round him by hand.
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