The Long Dark Marathon of the Soul 2022: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), directed by Terry Gilliam

 

The Trailer

and

The Appropriate Tune: 'Viva Las Vegas' by Elvis Presley

       When I was a teenager I was at the height of my weird writing phase. As a child my mind had been shaped by the retro futurism of H.G. Wells and Jules Verne, and as I matured that malformed imagination metastasized into something all the more bizarre, and it needed food to maintain it. Franz Kafka, H.P. Lovecraft, Mick Farren, Kurt Vonnegut, William Burroughs, surface level stuff for those who consider themselves alternative literature connoisseurs but mind-blowing to the isolated me. However I don’t know if there has ever been a writer that has been more influential in my attempts at being a writer than Hunter S. Thompson.

       There were two main reasons this was the case. One was that I was a big fan of the Venture Bros. and the comic series Transmetropolitan, both of which featured a Thompson-esque character, and his wild lifestyle was fascinating to someone who had entered his love of music through the 1960s and 70s. The main reason however was in the writing. It was magical to me; A speeding bullet train of razorwire thoughts and ugly feelings that brought to mind the freewheeling work of Kerouac, but unlike Kerouac never veered off course. As a kid who consistently struggled with expressing myself in words and especially in writing I was in awe of Thompson’s ability to not only to write down exactly how he felt but to do it so eloquently and effortlessly. Everything I’ve ever written since then, whether it’s this blog or other things you readers aren’t privy to, has been in an effort to reach that level of writing, that smooth-as-silk translation of the fluidity of thought into form. I don’t think I’ve ever reached that level, but I guess until the day I stop writing for good there’s still a chance. 

      Anyway, movies.

       Released in 1998, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was directed by Terry Gilliam, written by Gilliam, Tony Grison, Alex Cox and Tod Davies and produced by Patrick Cassavetti, Laila Nabulsi and Stephen Nemeth through Rhino Films and Summit Entertainment, based on the novel of the same name by Hunter S. Thompson. Johnny Depp plays Raoul Duke (a pseudonym of Thompson), a doctor of journalism who is tasked by the magazine he works for to cover the Mint 400, a motorbike race in the desert outside of Las Vegas, Nevada. Duke does make it to Vegas, but it’s not to cover any race; rather he, his attorney ‘Dr. Gonzo’ (Benicio del Toro), a cherry red muscle car, and a briefcase of every drug known to mortal man, are in Sin City to find the fabled American Dream, preferably while blitzed out of their mind. What follows is a sort of hedonistic Odyssey, as Duke and Gonzo go on the mother of all benders in the nation’s capital of debauchery, from the highest highs to the lowest of lows. It’s time to experience some true fear and loathing in Las Vegas.

       It’s worth noting that this wasn’t the first time that the work of H.S.T. had been put to film -- A decade or so prior had seen the release of Where the Buffalo Roam, with Bill Murray in the role of the infamous journalist, which was somehow not able to save the film from obscurity despite being a comedy movie from the 80’s with Bill Murray in it. Although the two films revolve around similar material however, Where the Buffalo Roam is cartoonish farce pretending to be an adaptation. Buffoonish even, noteworthy mainly for Bill Murray trying his best Thompson impression and Peter Boyle of all people playing Chicano lawyer Oscar Acosta. Maybe I’ll give it a proper review one day, but it’s not exactly high on the queue.

       Terry Gilliam on the hand has never been interested in just doing comedy. His entire directorial career had been about going into weird, dark directions that dabbled in comedy from time to time. While he had started off the decade relatively wholesomely with The Fisher King (which still featured mass murder, PTSD and homelessness), he followed that up with 12 Monkeys, his most openly nihilistic and depressing film since Brazil. Fear and Loathing isn’t quite as depressing, but true to its title there’s a violent miasma to this world that taints everything with a terrible ugliness. Duke and Gonzo’s can be amusing but more than anything else they’re disturbing, base expressions of paranoia, violence, and psychopathic antipathy spurred on by the copious amounts of psychoactive drugs warping the excess of Vegas into a pandemonium of sights and sounds. When Gonzo is a tub full of water and grapefruit, threatening to murder Duke unless he throws an electric tape player into the bath at the climax of Jefferson Airplane’s ‘White Rabbit’, thus killing him, the sheer absurdity of the situation lends itself to comedy, but rather than being funny it feels more uncomfortable and sad. If a Marx Brothers movie were set in the real world, it’d feel like Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas.

       The classic rule of storytelling is that you should always show and not tell. It’s one that Gilliam has built his career around and it’s one that’s showcased in full force in Fear and Loathing. Everything in this film is literal; Duke goes into a bar and the narration says that he was in a ‘reptile house’ and suddenly the room is filled not with people but extras from ABC’s Dinosaurs, when Duke takes a few too many hits of ‘adrenochrome’, a hallucinogen supposedly derived from the adrenal glands of children that Gonzo got from a Satanist client, Duke watches Gonzo transform into a demon before his eyes. Even during the more sober moments of the film the camera can’t sit still, leaning in close or contorting as if it’s as inebriated as the characters themselves. This, combined with the puppetry, the CG, the art direction all adds up to one of the most artistically ambitious films in an incredibly ambitious filmography up to that point, right up there with Brazil and Baron Munchausen. 

       Of course on the flip side there’s an argument to be made that visuals can be detrimental, or at the very least not helpful to a film. Monkeybone was a visually interesting film. Most of Ralph Bakshi’s films were visually interesting. That doesn’t make them good films, it makes them good wallpaper compilations. There are a few moments where we pull back and we actually get into something with substance, Duke soberly reflecting on the death of the 60’s social optimism and the dispelling of the grand illusion that was acid culture as the cure for the ills of society.  Duke and Gonzo aren’t taking LSD and mescaline in the 70’s  to expand their consciousness and thus become better people, they do it to get fucked up, because trying to get through Vegas and to a greater extent life completely sober has become increasingly tolerable. But then we get right back to the wild and bizarre stuff, and it makes you wonder if that’s just how the book is written or if Gilliam is missing the forest for the trees in order to be ‘out there’. That was certainly true years later with the Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, a flashy production utilizing the hip new technology that all adds up to a dull viewing, although by that point Gilliam had been all but forced into the realm of ‘has-been’ filmmakers. In 1998 though Gilliam was at his peak, and it’s because those moments of introspection are so few and far between are why it works. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas isn’t a story about answers, it’s about questions. It’s about being lost, morally, spiritually, chemically, and the desperate struggle to find purpose in nothingness. And even if we manage to distract ourselves with chaos, as Duke and Gonzo do, that taint is etched into our souls, rising up in those moments of lucidity before we force it back down again. 

       Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas gets the recommendation. While these days films and TV about the darkness of the post-Flower Power era are commonplace, in the 1990s when pandering to 60s nostalgia was at an all time high (they tried to reboot Woodstock twice), films like Fear and Loathing and The Basketball Diaries provided a nice counterpoint to the jam bands and tie-dye shirts. And since disillusionment with America has only increased with the years, this film has so far aged like a fine wine. Not to mention adding yet another feather to the caps of both Johnny Depp and Benicio del Toro, who had both had a pretty good decade and would only get bigger moving forward. A damn good, damn crazy movie. For best results, pair with Apocalypse Now! or Taxi Driver for the full burn out 70s experience. And avoid bat country if at all possible, you’ll thank me later.

The Long Dark Marathon of the Soul 2021: The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (2018), directed by Terry Gilliam

 

The Trailer

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The Appropriate Tune - "Capricho arabe" by Francisco Tarrega

       In the year 1605 the novelist and poet Miguel de Cervantes released the first part of a story called (as translated to English) “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha”. It told the story of an aging noble by the name of Alonso Quijano, who spends his days absorbed in the stories of knights in those heady days of chivalry. So infatuated is he with these fanciful tales that one day Alonso comes unstuck from reality and believes that he too is a knight, like Orlando, Lancelot and the rest. So he straps on a rusty set of armor, saddles up his old raggedy ass horse, grabs one of the local peasants to be his squire and sets off against the wishes of his family and friends to travel the countryside of Hapsburg era Spain as Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, performing chivalrous acts of heroism and vanquishing wickedness wherever it might be found. Or to put it another, more realistic way, attacking inanimate objects and getting their asses kicked by almost everyone they meet. This was back in the day when the only known treatment for mental illness was severe beatings, you see.

       Don Quixote was quite popular upon its release, a sophomore hit from the part-time writer and full-time soldier and tax collector Cervantes, and in the years following its completion and release has gone on to become one of most popular and acclaimed books in the entirety of Western literature. Having read it myself some years ago I can say that it is a multifaceted novel; Farcical at first, yet quickly opens up into satire, and metafiction as the would-be knight runs up against a world several hundred years removed from the landed gentry. One interpretation is to view it as an allegory about the division of mental and physical labor in class society, upper class Quijano's obsession with this romanticized vision of the world built on fiction and ephemera ultimately causing his transformation into Quixote and his attempted clashing against the lower classes more material, grounded understanding of reality. Other interpretations are a tad more metaphysical, painting Quixote as this injection of optimism and wonder into a cynical and jaded world, as much a noble figure as he is a tragic one. Either way, while the focus on this blog is on silver screen adaptations of books around here, if I did cover books then Don Quixote would certainly get the recommendation.

       Speaking of film adaptations of books, if anyone were to adapt a story like Don Quixote, in turns a comedy and a tragedy, it would be Terry Gilliam right? The man built his film career on the fantastical clashing with the mundane with tragicomic results, Jabberwocky, Time Bandits, hell The Fisher King is essentially a riff on Don Quixote, it’s like the story was made for him. After reading the novel himself Gilliam thought so as well, and he immediately set about getting his vision of Cervantes’ story on screen. The year was 1990. He then spent most of the 90s trying to get it made, eventually starting production in ‘98, before being stopped two years later. Then he tried again in 2003, which didn’t gain much traction, and so on and on until 2016, when the planets aligned and he was finally able to complete the film I’m reviewing today. Given that filmmaking is a supremely laborious process in terms of time and money that has no guarantee of completion let alone recompense, as we’ve seen with The Thief and the Cobbler, and the fact that Gilliam has failed to make as many movies as he’s made, it is a small miracle that this movie exists at all. Is it an actual miracle though, or an ironic, genie’s wish kind of thing? I guess we’ll see.

       Finally released in 2018, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote was directed by Terry Gilliam and written by Gilliam and Tony Grisoni and produced by a number of people (including Gilliam’s daughter Amy and Spanish director Gerardo Herrero) through a number of production companies (including Recorded Picture Company and Entre Chien et Loup). Adam Driver plays Toby, a filmmaker currently in Spain to make a film adaptation of Don Quixote. A process that isn’t going well, mainly because Toby is a narcissistic primadonna piece of shit who is never satisfied. As he is setting the stage to fuck his producer’s wife, Toby happens to stumble upon a bootleg copy of ‘The Man Who Killed Don Quixote’ -- a student film that he had made a decade prior, coincidentally enough in a village not too far from where they’re shooting. So he decides to visit, mainly because it gets him out of work and out of sight of his producer, but it’s not quite a nostalgic reunion. The man who played Sancho Panza is long dead from consumption, Angelica the unnamed village girl (Joana Ribeiro) left for Madrid in search of fame and fortune as an actress and never returned, and poor Javier the cobbler (Jonathan Pryce) now suffers from the same condition as the character he played; He believes that he is Don Quixote, the knight errant tasked by god to reignite the age of chivalry, and that Toby is his squire Sancho Panza. Toby doesn’t believe and promptly abandons the place, but after a series of events involving a fire, a Romani thief, and a shot police officer, Toby finds himself stuck playing second-fiddle to this holy soldier of gallantry, traveling the countryside in the search of evil to vanquish and feats of derring-do to accomplish. Which of course they don’t because Javier is an old man who believes he’s a 400 year old fictional character, but the longer Toby travels with ‘Don Quixote’ the more the places and people around him seem to shift and mold themselves to the knight’s worldview and the line between fantasy and reality seem to blur. Sounds like the perfect kind of atmosphere for an adventure!

       I wrote earlier that The Fisher King was Gilliam’s riff on Don Quixote, and ironically enough after watching The Man Who Killed Don Quixote I feel it’s a riff on The Fisher King with a metafictional semi-biographical ‘Don Quixote film about a director trying to make a Quixote film’ twist, which is in line with the Cervantes’ novel as the second part of that novel has the first part be an actual book in that world. Both films are about long-haired show biz douchebags who don’t have the healthiest relationships with women who stumble across quixotic figures who they inadvertently ‘created’, and then said figures intrude upon the douchebags' lives and over the course of the film push them towards a better direction. Gilliam stated that he read Don Quixote in 1989 and The Fisher King came out in 1991, so it was clearly on his mind at the time even if it wasn’t technically Don Quixote.

       The Man Who Killed Don Quixote is closer, not quite an adaptation but a metafictional twist on the story that devolves into a sort of Apocalypse Now fever dream. The Fisher King posited that the world could be a cold and indifferent place but didn’t discount empathy, but not so in the world of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote. Here the virtuous poor are punished for their good deeds, the vile rich are not only successful but thrive, and our protagonist goes through what could be described as an anti-arc. The original novel was cruel in its way, it is about a series of people beating up and mocking a mentally ill old man, but Gilliam seems to dive into that cruelty with an orgiastic, nihilistic glee. It patterns itself off of the books, even recreating scenes from the book, but since it’s not just an adaptation but a sort of metafictional commentary I’m not sure what that commentary is meant to entail. That the world is shitty? Rather than learning from tragedy and developing oneself as a person that it’s preferable to retreat into delusions and madness? Neither feel all that satisfying an answer, but that is about the only thing we’re allowed to do as we sit for two hours watching Adam Driver complain about stuff while never taking action. It certainly aims for the Pythonesque wackiness, and at times I’d say it succeeds, but on the whole it just comes off as morose.

       There’s no better example Gilliams misstep of excess than Joana Ribeiro’s character Angelica, the village girl from Toby’s student who dreams of stardom are scuppered and is subsequently pushed into prostitution. Prostitution by its very nature is a loathsome and dehumanizing practice that is better off in the trash, but Angelica can’t just be a prostitute; She has to have giant welts from getting the shit kicked out of her and lick shit off of people’s shoes, otherwise how would we know it’s bad? Similarly Toby’s moves to help her can’t just be out of a desire to stop abuse, because indeed Toby doesn’t really do anything to help people of any gender in this film, but because it’s within the context of a romantic relationship. Not an uncommon thing, which isn’t to excuse it, but then we get the added step of this entire romance being set up when Toby was a film student presumably in his 20s and Angelica was 15 (the irony of the Trump jab at one point of the movie is lost). Why?  Is the ‘naive country girl’ trope suddenly untenable if she’s of legal age? It’s not like they age up Adam Driver any besides giving him a mustache, so they lose nothing by just having them start at similar ages. Though I suppose if they changed that they’d have to make other changes, like giving the Romani a name rather than just listing him as ‘Gypsy’, and Gilliam had already spent almost three decades on this movie.

       Joana Ribeiro does put in good work here, despite my reservations of the character, and if there’s one thing I’d praise about this movie it’s the casting. Jonathan Pryce was downright fantastic as Javier/Don Quixote, capturing the essence of the character effortlessly and intimately, just as Boris Karloff did for Frankenstein’s Monster and Basil Rathbone for Sherlock Holmes. Seeing him here one wishes that this was just a straight-up adaptation, as he knocks it out of the park every time he’s on screen. Of course then we wouldn’t have as much time with Adam Driver...which is bad? When Toby is at his most cartoonish fish out of water asshole I think Driver is at his best, it’s those moments where he attempts sincerity that fails to excite. He’s like a lankier Shia Labeouf.

       I’ll also give credit to the cinematography here in regards to the location shooting; We get a look at the beauty of the Spanish countryside and some of the ugliness, but the thing that gets me is the feeling of emptiness. Aside from when the film specifically addresses it all sense of time and space disappears, granting the film this atmosphere of surreality which aids in the metafiction angle. There’s also some special effects that look pretty good in spite of the obvious CGI. Not as much as you’d want given the possibilities provided by Quixote’s delusions, but it’s understandable given the hectic nature of the production and I don’t know how much a 16 million euro budget gets you in 2018.

       Maybe this movie got me in a bad mood today, but I’m going to say that if it weren’t for the scenes with Jonathan Pryce then this would fail to get the recommendation. The best formula for Gilliam seems to be equal parts darkness and whimsy, knife in hand and tongue in cheek. Time Bandits, Baron Munchausen, The Fisher King, Jabberwocky, though they could be said to have their own individual issues all managed the balanced act; Subverting the overly sentimental or lampooning the darker and more cynical. The Man Who Killed Don Quixote and by extension The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, which was covered a while back, don’t have that balance. They might have good actors or good special effects, some good scenes, but they get too bogged down by the weight of their own concepts and plots to be an enjoyable film. As I said the scenes with Jonathan Pryce are the highlight, but on the whole The Man Who Killed Don Quixote doesn’t get the recommendation. Congrats Terry Gilliam finally getting his movie made though, it’s more than I’ve ever gotten the opportunity to do.

The Long Dark Marathon of the Soul 2020: The Fisher King (1991), directed by Terry Gilliam

 

The Trailer

and

The Appropriate Tune: "Fish and Whistle", by John Prine

      We're getting down to the wire here folks, only one more movie before we get into the Final 10, which means revisiting one of our first ten directors: Terry Gilliam. Strange to think now that I was barely aware of the entire Monty Python idea back in high school, the prime Monty Python years, and yet years later I find myself waist deep in Python adjacent media, all because of Terry Gilliam. I’ve tried for a while to describe the source of that phenomenon in this paragraph, try to compose some sort of thesis on the nature of cinema but I think the simplest answer I can think of to write here is that I like his style. I’ve loved his films (Baron Munchausen) and I’ve hated them (Doctor Parnassus) and everything in between, but the reason I keep coming back is because I respect his cinematic vision. So it is with Lynch and Carpenter; Even if their movies aren’t perfect, whatever perfect means in an imperfect, I find myself drawn to the way they tell a story because they approach things in such a novel way. Is that how auteur theory works? I think that’s how it works. I don’t know much about movies, even though I’ve reviewed about two hundred of them.

Released in 1991, written by Richard LaGravenese, The Fisher King was directed by Terry Gilliam and was his only film to be released through TriStar, otherwise known as that one company with the flying horse. Everyone’s favorite uncle Jeff Bridges plays Jack Lucas, an inflammatory New York shock jock in the vein of Howard Stern, because who else could it be? Jack is on the cusp of mainstream success, that tantalizing primetime sitcom fruit is within arm’s reach, when one of his listeners takes his flippant comments seriously and goes on a shooting spree, killing seven people as well as himself. Three years later, Jack is a broken man mooching off of his girlfriend Ann, using copious amounts of booze to try and drown the demons. One inebriated night, Jack is mistaken for a homeless person and almost set on fire by a couple psychopaths when he is saved by a homeless man named Parry (played by Robin Williams). Parry isn’t just a homeless man, though; He’s a knight of the Aruthurian persuasion, tasked by God to retrieve the Holy Grail, which just so happens to look like a trophy sitting in local business tycoon Langdon Carmichael’s study. At least that’s what the invisible cherubim tell him, and they also say that Jack happens to be the Chosen One who will facilitate that request. Invisible naked babies know best after all.

Well Jack is ready to get the hell out of Dodge after that revelation when he learns the truth: ‘Parry’ isn’t actually Parry; His name is Henry Sagan, a former college professor of medieval literature at Columbia University. He was at that bar during that rampage, where he got a front row seat to his wife’s face being blown to pieces with a shotgun, causing him to go into catatonic shock and ultimately leading to the state he’s in. Holy intervention, or just a really big coincidence? Either way, Jack decides to try and find some way to help Parry, some way he can pay him back in order to assuage the overwhelming guilt that’s hanging over him. Recompense, but perhaps it should be more mutual aid, as it turns out Jack might be in need of fixing just as much as Parry.

In the case of music, oftentimes the case is to lead with some grand and high-energy song, and then follow it up with the quiet, emotional ballad. So it is in a way with Gilliam here. His last film, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen was that grand, high-energy ballad, with the over-the-top special effects and costumes and sweeping vistas and what have you, so it makes sense that he would pull back in his next film (also the fact that it made back less than half its budget at the box office). Still The Fisher King feels magical; the use of saturated colors and New York’s gothic architecture, and the occasions where we slip along into Parry’s delusions really gives the film a magical realist tone, sans the magic. Proof that Terry Gilliam could still make a Terry Gilliam without the trappings of genre films per se, and considering this film made almost double its budget at the box office, I’d say that I’m not the only one to think as much.

Moving onto our cast, we of course have Jeff Bridges and Robin Williams as Jack and Parry respectively, Mercedes Ruehl (who has appeared in The Warriors and Last Action Hero) as the girlfriend/video store owner Ann and Amanda Plummer as Parry’s love interest, Lydia Sinclair. Bridges and Williams give exactly the performance you’d expect from them, rugged/too cool for school and manic with a core of pain respectively. Mercedes does the put-upon assertive Italian woman role that you’ve probably seen hundreds of times in films based in New York, but she does it with heart and she does it well. Amanda Plummer similarly seems like an actor that you’d bet dollars to doughnuts would be a regular in Tim Burton or the Coen’s filmography and so it’s surprising that she never has been, and similarly she does great work as Parry’s very own Dulcinea del Toboso. I find it hard to describe, but it’s as if she projects the exact opposite of charisma. Everything about her, the way the acts, the way she eats seems tailor made to ward off the audience, and to reiterate the fact that Parry ‘sees’ things that other people can’t see, just as he does with Jack. It’s a shame she doesn’t get more screen time.

      Which ties into what might be the key issue of this film, which is the romance. Parry and Lydia’s romance being underdeveloped, they only get one real scene together before we’re thrust into the climax of the film, so it doesn’t hit as hard it might have otherwise. The Jack and Ann romance...while it is given a build, I could see the argument that it’s a one-sided, even toxic relationship that’s never really treated as such in the film. Ann is put behind the figurative 8-ball right out of the gate, being put-upon financially and emotionally, and she never gets past it and stands on her own two feet. Even the ending which is framed as sweet and romantic comes across as weak because it's framed around Jack making the smallest possible concession and Ann forgiving him for all past transgressions. I’m not exactly an expert when it comes to romantic entanglements, but I dunno, their whole arc didn’t ring true to me.

      Then of course there is the depiction of homeless people (as in a bunch of old mentally ill guys) and mental illness (as in talking fast and acting eccentric), which is treating with a bit more humanity than some but still reeks of Hollywood standards. I don’t necessarily mind it in the case of Parry, as there is a clear line of influence between his character and that of Don Quixote, and anyone who knows Terry Gilliam knows how he feels about La Mancha’s favorite son. If that is the case however, I wish then that we did get to spend some time with Parry and that we got to see more of his hallucinations brought to life. Really get to see him at work as the knight, or fail to work as quixotic tradition would have it. Then again I guess pushing Gilliam to go crazy with it would contradict my praise for doing something down-to-earth after Munchausen, so clearly I don’t know what I’m talking about.

      As much as Gilliam’s movies tend to lean towards the cynical and the sarcastic, I think The Fisher King has a sentimental core. The importance of love and of forgiveness; Forgiving others, and allowing yourself to to be forgiven, loving others and allowing yourself to be loved. The Fisher King gets the recommendation, it’s a solid film that plays to Gilliam’s artistic vision while leaving you wanting more, and considering how this blog functions that’s not an empty statement. Grab some Chinese food and a date this Halloween and enjoy. Just remember to avoid any red knights.

The Long Dark Marathon of the Soul 2014: Time Bandits (1981), directed by Terry Gilliam

The Trailer

and

The Appropriate Tune: "Time Bandits", by VHS-OST

     On my oft-neglected film blog, I once remarked that former Monty Python member Terry Gilliam was perhaps my favorite director, aside from the Coen Brothers. While I try to avoid things like ‘favorites’ as often as I can, I based it on the fact that I have seen a good portion of his filmography and have not yet seen a movie of his that I didn’t think was at least enjoyable. Brazil was excellent, Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas was good, 12 Monkeys, The Fisher King, all fine films. The Brothers Grimm might have been a bit of a misstep (I’ve only seen parts of it), and I think Jabberwocky works largely because of Michael Palin, but all in all I enjoy his style immensely. A lot of directors attempt to be ‘quirky’ or ‘weird’, but I think Gilliam is one of the few who has the ability to translate that effectively into his films. So, knowing that Gilliam’s work tends towards the fantastical and the darkly comic, I decided to try out one for the marathon.

     If you’ll recall way back on the Monster Squad entry that I referred to it as a ‘kids adventure’ movie, which deals with a ragtag group of kids going on some kind of extraordinary adventure. Time Bandits is also a ‘kids adventure’ film, but in this case there is only one kid (much like 90’s film classic The Pagemaster, starring Macaulay Culkin). As the story goes, Kevin is an inquisitive yet oft-ignored boy who lives with his stern father and appliance-obsessed mother somewhere in Britain. One night, after failing to convince his parents that a knight had lept through his closet the time before, he is abducted by a ragtag group of dwarves from the very same closet and forced to travel through a strange portal through his bedroom wall to escape a giant glowing face. As it turns out, the group of dwarves are disgruntled employees of The Supreme Being (the giant glowing face), and have stolen a map that outlines all the gaps in the universe, through which one can travel about anywhere in space and time. The dwarves, like most people in their position, have decided to use the map to become stinking, filthy rich, by thieving from all throughout time, and now Kevin is along for the ride. With only their wits and the map at their disposal, the time bandits must contend not only with The Supreme Being and the numerous historical figures that make up their hit list, but also the secret machinations of The Evil One (David Warner), who desires the map for what I’m sure are completely gregarious reasons.

     The main issue with all kids adventure movies, and indeed is the problem with Time Bandits, is that when the kids) aren’t likable then it doesn’t work. For a movie that’s ostensibly about Kevin he barely seems in the damn thing, and in the times he is in there he’s annoying as all hell. Perhaps Kevin’s background nature is meant to be in reference to the fact that we often feel like observers in our dreams, as this world of magic, time-traveling dwarves and chaos certainly has a dreamlike quality. Honestly though, this movie would probably be just fine if Kevin wasn’t in it at all. It’s a great adventure, with memorable characters and decidedly macabre sense of humor for a family movie. It’s a fantasy film with just the right mood for Halloween, so why not check it out?

The Long Dark Marathon of the Soul 2018: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), directed by Terry Gilliam

The Trailer

and

The Appropriate Tune: "Da Art of Storytellin' (Pt. 1)", by Outkast

       With all these modern day films that I’ve been reviewing on this year’s Marathon, I bet you all were thinking that a piece on Terry Gilliam’s long-overdue creation, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote was just waiting in the wings. Well shame on you! Readers should know that this blog isn’t about being ‘up-to-date’ or ‘relevant to current interests’, it’s about me farting out a meandering, incoherent mess of a film critique that no one is ever going to read, and then you folks out there not reading it. It’s a proven system honed over years of trial and error, so I see no reason to change things up now. So maybe in a couple of years if I’m not lying dead in a ditch somewhere I’ll get around to Don Quixote, right alongside watching The Wire and forming a sense of self-worth. 

       But not today.

       If you’re ever walking the streets of London when the time is right, there’s a chance that you might come across a horse driven cart containing the most magical show of all, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Step right up and through the silver door and Doctor Parnassus, immortal mystic of the ages, will transport you into a world of your dreams. Anything can happen in the Imaginarium and everything does, and at the end of the journey all you have to do is make a simple choice. Tough but rewarding, or quick and easy? Moral or immoral? Purification or, as the case may be, immolation?

       The truth is, perhaps, a bit less glamorous. Yes Doctor Parnassus is immortal and the Imaginarium is real, but he’s not much of a mystic anymore. He’s more like a bum, drinking himself into a stupor as his troupe, Anton the young ward, Percy (played by the late Verne Troyer) and the Doctor’s daughter Valentina cart their wagon across the city. One day however, Parnassus is visited by his old betting partner Mister Nick, played by music legend Tom Waits. Seems that that’s almost Valentina’s 16th birthday and based on the outcome of the last wager, that means she’s going to be coming with him (hope she likes fire & brimstone). Unless of course if Parnassus wanted to make another wager, say, the first person to sway the souls of 5 people to their side wins? Parnassus eagerly accepts, although with the way the show has been doing lately there seems little hope that Nick won’t run away with the whole thing. That is until the Imaginarium happens to find a hanged man under a bridge, with a pipe in his mouth and strange symbols on his forehead…

       Now before we move on to the nitty-gritty, you can’t really talk about this movie without mentioning that this is Heath Ledger’s final film, passing away before its completion and being replaced in select scenes by Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell. I didn’t have much of an experience with Ledger prior to this film, a couple of snippets of A Knight’s Tale and a half-remembered viewing of I’m Not There and The Dark Knight years ago, but I think his final performance shows him off well. Hell, he’s probably the best character in it. Using substitute actors was the best choice in the long run, not only in the context of the story/character and also as a nice gesture of support during a tragic event. Don’t know how many othe actors would’ve been honored like that.

       Imaginarium presents itself as having a underlying theme of telling ‘stories’, although most of the allusions tend to lean towards the religious, particularly East-Asian beliefs. Parnassus is depicted as various types of holy men, a yogi, a Sikh, even a pseudo-Krishna at some point, while Mister Nick is clearly analogous to Satan. Parnassus was once a leader of men, until he’s tempted by the pleasures of the material world and ultimately falls from grace. Heath Ledger’s character, as a Hanged Man, symbolizes self-sacrifice in Tarot and is occasionally represented as Judas. Then of course there’s the crux of the film, Parnassus and Nick competing with each other over people’s souls, the struggle between yin and yang played out right on your screen and the positively Buddhist implication that the answer lies beyond them. Gilliam lays it on pretty damn thick too, so if the boats with Anubis’ head don’t make you get the hint than there’s about a dozen other things that will.

       However, while analyzing all of this imagery can be entertaining, the film itself struggles to do the same. The opening scene with the Imaginarium is quite interesting; this bizarre caravan with oddly dressed people just appears on the street, an aggressive drunk chases Valentina through the silver door and he ends up in a giant cardboard forest where his face completely changes, he’s launched into outer space with giant jellyfish and eventually gets blown up by a bar. It’s all wonderfully surreal and mysterious and really draws you into the film. Then they keep going into the Imaginarium, or they have flashbacks, and every single time it’s not as good as the first time. CGI is quite obvious in 2018, and in 2009 a blind man couldn’t miss it. Seeing Johnny Depp pretend to dance on some floating plate is probably funnier than any joke in this movie, and they throw out a lot of jokes here. For a director that I have sung praises for in the past for creating such fanciful, visceral settings for his films, this almost feels like an insult. I came to see something like Brazil, not Shark Boy & Lava Girl.

       Ironically though, those scenes still end up being the highlight of the film, because everything else just sort of stands there awkwardly. A whole bunch of time in this movie is waiting for the plot to catch up with the audience, and then trying to gaslight you with trippy ‘mind-bending’ visuals. Just throwing more and more stuff onto the pile that we’re supposed to accept without explanation, like the eternal story bit or the declaration that black magic doesn’t magic, or that some people change faces in the Imaginarium but not everybody, until you’re so tired and numb to it all that you throw your hands up in the air with exasperation. Hopefully you’re already in the second hour of the movie by then.

       Then we get to characters. Not the acting per se, which is fine, but the characters, which the movie utterly fails to make me care about. Parnassus is barely relevant in his own film until the last 15 minutes or so when the movie decides he’s actually the protagonist. Anton is the typical doormat character who’s there to take abuse until the plot decides he has a spine. Valentina is an overbearing angsty teenager who is constantly pushed into romantic and sexual, and while yes it’s normal for a 16 year old girls to be interested in sex, that doesn’t mean I want to see Heath Ledger put his dick in one. Percy is okay but he’s also immortal for no adequately explained reason so screw that. Which leaves the entire weight of entertaining the audience and moving the story along squarely on the shoulders of Heath Ledger’s character, Tony Shepherd, and while Heath and his substitutes are certainly charismatic enough to entertain an audience, this is not one of those films that can be carried on the performance of one character (even if they’re played by four actors).

       It pains me to say it, but The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus might be the first film by Terry Gilliam covered on this blog that isn’t going to get the recommendation. It’s a two hour long mess of special effects and half-baked philosophy that feels like watching Larry Byrd going for a free throw and hitting the popcorn vendor instead. You can’t judge his entire career based on it, but it certainly takes the shine off it. If you’re interested in movies with a lot of subtext to unpack this Halloween, especially if it's tied to religion, you might want to try Circle of Iron, Jodorowsky’s El Topo, or even David Lynch’s Dune if you’re feeling saucy. Or perhaps you can hang out with your friends and not even bother watching a movie at all. Either way you’re missing out on much if you decide to give this one a pass.

The Long Dark Marathon of the Soul 2017 - The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988), directed by Terry Gilliam

The Trailer
and
The Appropriate Tune: "Vulcan and Venus", by Michael Kamen

     You know, I consume a lot of media in my life. Lots of movies, comic books, TV shows, etc. So much so that I often forget why it is that I do it. It is just something I do out of habit, having done it since I was a kid? Something I do to distract myself from my inevitable death, and with the kind of brain I have that’s a necessity? Or is it that each time I watch or read something new, it’s done with the hope I’ll stumble onto something truly great? A story which envelopes me completely within its world, bringing me into a place where all the hardships and bigotry and misery of life melt away and I am able to see it as it truly should be, full of heroes and villains and monsters and high adventure. A world where the good guys always win, where there’s a smile on every face and death is never the end. Something that makes me feel as free and happy as a child, like I never could when I was that age.

     There’s been a several films over the years that have been able to elicit those emotions, and even fewer directors, but one of the most consistent is Terry Gilliam. A couple Marathons ago I covered his 1981 film Time Bandits, in which a young boy joins a troupe of time traveling dwarves as they used a map of the universe to commit robberies, and Sean Connery is a Roman for some reason. Since then I haven’t touched another Gilliam movie, although I have watched a couple episodes of the surprisingly decent 12 Monkeys TV series (not to mention the Gilliamesque Erik the Viking), so it’s time to dip my toes back into those waters. Back to the 80s, the age of Time Bandits, Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life, Brazil, and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen.

     In the late 18th century, during the Austro-Turkish War (the other late 18th century Turkish War), a small seaside city is being besieged not only by the Turks, but by oppressive and arrogant government officials. Their only source of entertainment in these trying times are an acting troupe known as The Henry Salt and Son (who is actually a daughter known as Sally) Players, who are performing a play known as The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, detailing the fantastical and absurd tales of the titular Baron. At least they are until an elderly man arrives at the theater, waving a sword about and interrupting the performance. The man claims that he, in fact, is Baron Munchausen, that all of these stories did, in fact, happen, and that apparently he isn’t much of a theater fan. The Baron explains that it was he, along with his servants the quick Bertholt, the strong Ulbrecht, the keen-eyed Adolphus and the blustery Gustavus, that embarrassed the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and thus lead to this war, but he doesn’t get very far. He’s just a old man spouting fairy tales, and there’s no room in this Enlightened world of laws and logic for someone like him.

     Sally isn’t content with either the war or seeing the Baron lay down and die however, and after running off to the battlements to berate the soldiers, an uncanny situation with cannon balls reveals that the old man wasn’t lying after all: He really is Baron Munchausen, capable of derring-do beyond the realms of mortal men. Sally (and some beautiful women) convince the Baron to help end the war, and after constructing an airship out of women’s underwear he (and Sally) escape the city and go off to find the Baron’s servant so they can finally defeat the Sultan and his army, and perhaps even Death. A journey that will take them beyond Austria, beyond Earth, beyond the limits of time and space itself.

     As a film, Munchausen bears a couple similarities to Gilliam’s previous fantasy film, Time Bandits. Both movies feature a child wise beyond their years (Sally is more savvy but gets less focus than Bandits protag, but still) who joins a group of adults who act far more childish than the actual child on a magical and bizarre journey. However, where Time Bandits is almost a satirization of a fairy tale, even throwing in an unhappy ending, Munchausen is the opposite. Munchausen deals in big ideas; Big characters, big locations, big villains, it’s that gloriously wide scope that all the great stories of old dealt in, like the Odyssey and the Voyage of Sinbad. Yet it never loses its warmth or its sense of humor, both visual and otherwise (the benefits of having a Python behind the camera), and it’s what really makes this film. You just feel happy watching it, and I rarely feel good doing anything.

     The cast is great. John Neville is about the best looking Baron you could ask for, possessing a wizened charm and childlike vitality that resembles classic literary character Don Quixote. Eric Idle and Jonathan Pryce put in good work, Robin Williams does some classic Robin Williams antics, Uma Thurman seems incredibly well suited to be a love goddess, and so on. Even the kid who plays Sally ends up coming across as endearing more often than not, and that can be a make or break moment for movies that rely so much on child characters. Not every movie can be Stand By Me.

     The Adventures of Baron Munchausen hits pretty much every mark for me. I love the combination of the modern and the antique, I love the grimy beauty of the sets, it all fills me with the same passion and excitement that filled me when I watched my first Disney movie, or cracked open my first copy of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. A time of possibilites. Anyway, strong recommendation from me for this Halloween, if you’re anything like me at all in your movie tastes, this is definitely one to check out.

Jabberwocky (1977), directed by Terry Gilliam

those of you who have't seen the Police Squad television show should get on that. Only 6 episodes, which is a shame, but so damn good.

The Trailer
and
The Appropriate Tune: "Jabberwocky", by Branford Marsalis Quartet

     Terry Gilliam might one of my favorite director when it comes down to it. Up until I started writing this blog I never really put much consideration into the idea of favorite directors, a misguided attempt to avoid bias when it came to recommendations I suppose. He’s got a fantastic track record though: Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Brazil, The Fisher King, 12 Monkeys, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, all of them great films (in my opinion of course), all of them interesting films, and ones that I would heartily recommend when asked. Okay, The Brothers Grimm was a particularly fetid turd in the ‘make stories and people who aren’t that cool into super cool badasses’ action subgenre, (which I believe began with the ungodly awful League of Extraordinary Gentlemen movie yet still clings to to its wretched life like a half-drowned rat) and I don’t know what all could have been done to keep it from being Van Helsing-but-with-fairy-tales (fire, possibly). Certainly a misstep, but it hasn’t ruined my appreciation for Terry Gilliam films, and I haven’t been discouraged from eventually completing his filmography.

     Only a few more movies left to go.

     The movie takes place in a realistically filthy medieval kingdom (It’s always the Welsh who end up filthy) currently being besieged by a man-eating creature known as the Jabberwock. It’s a horrible looking beast, despite the fact that no one knows what it looks like, which consumes every part of a human, except for his bones and face for some reason. Gilliam seems to be implying that this creature is the same jabberwocky from the Lewis Carroll poem, not only with the name but even placing voice-overs of the poem throughout the film, occasionally acted out by a Punch & Judy show. I’m not entirely sure the reason, maybe because of the recognizable name, because there seems to be little relation to the events of the movie and what happens in the poem. Unless, as I now wonder, Mr. Gilliam’s purpose was to subvert the story in much the same way as he helped to subvert classic British literature in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which wouldn’t surprise me at all if that was true. There is a distinct lack of momeraths, in any case.

     Enter Dennis Cooper (Michael Palin), apprentice/son to the village barrel maker and consistent fuckup. Although Dennis has philanthropic ambitions, his constant mistakes have cause almost everyone he knows to viciously hate him, especially his father. When his father suddenly passes away (after telling his son on his deathbed that he hated his guts), Dennis decides to move to the city in order to make his fortune. Armed with only a half-eaten rotten potato and the ambivalence of his rotund lady love Griselda Fishfinger, Dennis Cooper is thrown a series of events that are as numerous as they are coincidental. Will Dennis win the heart of Griselda? Who will slay the fearsome jabberwock? You’ll have to watch to find out.

     Jabberwocky is a movie of reaction and coincidence. Nothing that happens to Dennis throughout the story is due to his own actions, and everything he tries to do ends up being a colossal failure. Stumbling through an adventure is not an uncommon thing in comedy; Arthur Dent helped save the galaxy several times by just existing, after all. When you make a character completely subject to circumstance you can’t go far into the extremes: If the only things that happen to them are good, then they are viewed as unrealistic and boring. In the same vein, a character who is beset again and again by misfortune is also considered unrealistic (or perhaps too realistic) and eventually boring. I feel that Gilliam finds the right balance, having Dennis achieve success without meaning to but having him suffer for it as well. Because he’s a nice guy, and we want to see him have something after being like dirt by the rest of the world, but we need to see that dirt being thrown to keep us interested.

     There are way more scenes of Dennis getting urinated on than I expected. I was expecting none at all.

     If you can imagine Monty Python and the Holy Grail with less emphasis on breaking the suspension of disbelief, or perhaps The Princess Bride with Stan Laurel, and you might get an idea of what Jabberwocky is like. It’s not really a movie that generates a large amount of post-movie discussion like 12 Monkeys or Brazil can, but it has that mix of the real and the fantastical that I can’t help but identify with Terry Gilliam’s work. For those interested in some British-style comedy, or are otherwise looking to branch off from Monty Python’s Flying Circus, I direct you here.

Result: Recommended