January 7, 2010: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
I’ve always considered myself a fan of Terry Gilliam’s movies, although I have the impression that I haven’t seen many of them. However, when I start to go through the (non-Monty Python) list – Time Bandits (1981), Brazil (1985), The Fisher King (1991), Twelve Monkeys (1995) – I realize that I’ve seen about half of his output, which seems fair. Not having seen The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) always comes back to bite me in conversations about him, though, and it appears that I haven’t seen anything he’s done in the past 15 years. Well, tonight I put myself on the road to fixing all of that.
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus continues Gilliam’s legendarily troubled history of filmmaking. In this case, one of his lead actors, Heath Ledger, died during filming. Left with the prospect of another movie dashed on the rocks of cold reality, Gilliam was able to rejig the story a bit and appease the money people by filling in the remaining bits of Ledger’s role with three other A-list actors. How did he do this? Well, as anyone who is familiar with Gilliam’s oeuvre will know, fantastical sequences are part and parcel of the way he works, and it just so happens that there is a dream world in the brain of Doctor Parnassus. So really, does it matter if Ledger appears as three different people when he’s in this dream world? Actually it doesn’t, and in fact a solid argument could be made that it adds another welcome element of strangeness to the movie, despite the performance from Jude Law which is about as dull as I can imagine him actually being in person.
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is about a travelling theatrical/puppet show, which operates in the present day out of a rickety old horse-drawn wagon reminiscent of something from the 19th century. They group is ostensibly putting on little shows, but really trying to lure people into the mind of Parnassus, in order to claim their souls as part of a deal the good Doctor made with the devil. When this travelling show happens upon the homeless and amnesiac Ledger, who turns out to be a natural showman and promoter, their business improves dramatically, but the devil is there in a flash, to up the ante on his deal. I won’t spoil the story and tell you whether or not the devil wins in the end, and only with a Gilliam movie does this leave the reader still wondering.
I don’t always appreciate Gilliam’s sumptuous visuals, as I tend to much prefer cleaner production design so that I’m not stressing myself out over the work people had to do to bring the vision to the screen. But that wagon, with the fold-out stage and all the boxes and bundles hanging off it, is quite the sight, and the fantasy land inside the head of Doctor Parnassus is classic Gilliam in a modernized setting and is really very well suited to today’s computer graphic effects techniques. It stands in contrast with, but with a clear relation to, the overblown practical set design elements in Brazil. I can only imagine what this director would have done with today’s technology back when he was making the Monty Python animated-cardboard bumpers between scenes in their shows and movies.
The story is simple, the journey is the point, and the visuals are rich and rewarding. The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus has its weaknesses in story and character elements, but that doesn’t much matter. If you’re considering seeing it, you’ll probably like it.
Gilliam remains strong when facing adversity.
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