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movie review - The Devil's Backbone

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

This is a ghost story set in Spain during that country's 1930s civil war. It features a boy sent to an orphanage following the death of his father at the front. The boy is confronted by a bizarre staff, a cruel population of orphans, and one of the creepiest ghosts ever to grace film.

The plot is very original, involving the ghost's death and the staff of the orphanage in a way that only comes together in the very final frames. Along the way, the movie is a collection of stunningly shot scenes involving a cause, some bars of gold, and tiny corpses in a rum-based precursor to formaldehyde (yuck).

I strongly recommend this one.

Strongly recommended.