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Devil's Backbone, The
EMAILPRINTSony Pictures Classics
Generally favorable reviews
Based on 25 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 11 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Suspense/Thriller
Written by:
Guillermo del Toro
Antonio Trashorras
David Muñoz
Directed by: Guillermo del Toro
Release Date:
Theatrical: November 21, 2001
DVD: June 25, 2002
Running Time: 106 minutes, Color
Origin: Mexico / Spain
Summary
RATING: R for violence, language and some sexuality
Starring Marisa Paredes, Eduardo Noriega, Federico Luppi, Fernando Tielve, and Íñigo Garcés
A ghost story set in a Catholic orphanage during the Spanish Civil War.
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Blade II Cronos Hellboy Hellboy II: The Golden Army Mimic Pan's Labyrinth
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
del Toro builds excitement, dread, and melodrama in equal layers.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
What gives the story resonance is the tenderness and sacrifice and even innocence del Toro reveals amid the savagery.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly F. X. Feeney
Here is a ghost story so dynamic you could call it a ghost poem.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas
With the ambitious and ominous The Devil's Backbone, Del Toro rises to a new level of accomplishment, adding history and politics to his distinctive blend.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Luke Y. Thompson
The sensitive art-house viewer should be warned: Though slow-moving at first, the film ends in explosions and violent death, with a level of sadism that will undoubtedly prove too intense for some viewers.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Brooding ghost story is rich with psychological and political implications that never obscure its fundamental creepiness.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
It's a horror flick, and a creepily good one, that also functions as an allegory of the war that still haunts Spain seven decades later.
Washington Post Stephen Hunter
This film is much more atmospheric; it builds, not so much logically as viscerally, until you feel you can't escape. Lurid and overdone as it is, it's still a real disturber of the peace.
Read Full Review >Village Voice J. Hoberman
The movie is an expert, sunlit chiller audaciously predicated on an unquiet historical memory: "What is a ghost?"
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
Del Toro has made a ghost story that's not only evocative and original, it's a pleasure to watch.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Dana Stevens
Mr. del Toro provokes your screams and shudders, but he also earns your tears.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Kimberley Jones
Is nothing if not exquisitely detailed: It's like a blood orange that del Toro spends the film seductively unpeeling, revealing layer upon layer of meaning and pathos.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
The Devil's Backbone has been compared to "The Others," and has the same ambition and intelligence, but is more compelling and even convincing.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
Creepy and compelling and beautifully shot, The Devil's Backbone is a tale of the supernatural that feels completely natural. Its realness is what makes it so scary.
Boston Globe Jay Carr
A seductively corrosive horror story that also potently suggests the ways war can shatter childhood.
New York Post Lou Lumenick
Genuinely scary, exquisitely shot -- and very well-acted.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
It's imaginatively filmed and builds a sense of brooding emotional power.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
Along with "The Others," -- represents a welcome diversion from loud, senseless Hollywood extravaganzas.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann
The film doesn't explore the nature of ghosts, as it promises to initially, but it's fun to watch Del Toro confront death and fear with such energy and humor.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
After a leisurely first half, The Devil's Backbone becomes utterly spellbinding, its tension mounting in steady increments, its story taking one dark turn after another, and its bittersweet resolution destined to haunt you long after you've left the theater.
Variety Jonathan Holland
Though it fails in its final reels to capitalize on its early promise, picture is still stylish, accomplished and tremendously enjoyable fare.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine Peter Rainer
del Toro blends agit-prop politics and ghoulishness without making the entire enterprise seem silly.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Christopher Varney
That The Devil's Backbone makes any sense at all -- with its many, swirling plotlines -- seems like a little wonder.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 7.8 (out of 10) based on 11 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Bill S. gave it a9:
An atmospheric wonder of a film. Del Toro uses horror to enhance the film, rather than making it the film. The characters are engaging, and the symbolism is rich. One in a recent line of smart horror films (Sixth Sense, The Others) that hopefully signals a resurgence of an almost lost genre. Buy this, don't rent it.
Gabor A. gave it an 8:
A ray of light in the dark abyss that is the horror genre. Like the sixth sense this movie focuses on character more than anything. Combine that with a unique plot, great directing, and a heart stopping finale makes this one of the best films to ever emerge from the horror genre or any other genre as well.
Chad S. gave it a 6:
As the orphans whittle away their sticks in order to overpower their capturer with spears, it hits you that "The Devil's Backbone" could be a Disney film, had the orphans been plucky, and the villain not some benign threat to their welfare. In "101 Dalmatians", Cruella de Vil and her henchmen were never going to hurt the puppies. But the unwritten taboo is broken in "The Devil's Backbone", a purportedly sophisticated film that also has the base mentality of a slasher pic in how women are punished for desiring sex. Aesthetically, the talented Guillermo del Toro has crafted an intriguing ghost story that obliquely quotes Alejandro Jodorowsky's "Santa Sangre"(a pool of water, the missing appendage of a woman), and "The Sixth Sense"(a ghost that needs help), and maybe, "Map of the Human Heart" (that baby in the jar of alcohol is a map of sorts, and the war backdrop). It's a smart film, with a smarter metaphor than the red doorknob in M. Night Shyamalan's masterpiece. Indoor fireworks are more explosive than the outdoor kind is how we translate the key del Toro visual. For all that's right about the plotting and tone of "The Devil's Backbone", there's something diabolical about killing women, old people, and children, to be ironic. These people live in a war setting, but die at war with themselves. This bit of cleverness left me cold, perhaps, because there are so many cold bodies.
Ricardo R. gave it a 9:
Very well done, not the stupid plot about ghosts.
Jacintha gave it an 8:
Beautiful! Well acted, well filmed...if anything, i wish it could been longer, could have gone more into depth about Jacinto. And other than him, there were no "bad guys." But excellent nonetheless.
Richard gave it a 6:
Not really scary, but sad like most ghost stories. The payoff may not be worth the investment if you're looking for "Boo!"-type scares.
