Saturday Night At The Movies
Karn Evil 9
By Dennis Hartley
Step inside, step inside: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Terry Gilliam must be a very persuasive man. How he convinced Heath Ledger to work with him again after that ill-advised train wreck The Brothers Grimm, is beyond my ken. Then again, there is no way that Ledger could have predicted that he would die prior to the completion of principal shooting for The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, which will now be cemented (for better or for worse) as the late actor’s swan song performance.
“For better or for worse” could be the mantra of the unflappable Gilliam fan, especially in reference to the iconoclastic writer-director’s spotty and artistically underwhelming output since 1998’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which arguably represents the last vestige of the “classic” Gilliam formula (a boundlessly inventive visual style + a highly developed sense of darkly comic absurdity). And as entertaining as that film was, it still doesn’t hold a candle to what I consider the director’s “Holy Trinity”- Monty Python and the Holy Grail (co-directed with Terry Jones), Time Bandits and Brazil. So-does his new film manage to both redeem his reputation and convey respect to Heath Ledger’s legacy?
Well, kind of…and pretty much. If you have seen the excellent 2002 documentary Lost in La Mancha (a behind-the-scenes glimpse at Gilliam’s ill-fated project, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote-which may yet see the light of day in 2011) or the illuminating “making of” feature in the Criterion box set version of Brazil, you know that Gilliam is one of those directors who seems to thrive in the face of adversity. Considering the tragic circumstances, Gilliam has done an admirable job at salvaging this film, both from a narrative standpoint and in the realm of preserving one last wonderful turn from Ledger.
An odd mash-up of The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao, The Stuntman, and, um, Angel Heart, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a “through the looking glass” fantasy about an anachronistic travelling circus touring present-day England. The small troupe, led by the wizened, mysterious and frequently plastered Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer, reeling through the film like King Lear on a bender) ply their trade via horse-drawn wagon, setting up anywhere they figure that they might be able to scare up some coin. The star attraction is the Imaginarium, entered (of course) through a mirror (only one at a time, please). Once inside, depending on what kind of psychic baggage they bring with them, the patrons become immersed in either their most treasured fantasy-or most dreaded nightmare (in full Sensurround). These “amusement rides” are brokered through the power of the doctor’s mind. So-how, when and where did he learn this neat trick? Long story, but I won’t bore you with the details (that’s the director’s job). Suffice it to say that it has something to do with immortality, and a deal with the Devil (Tom Waits!).
Now you and I know that every Faustian bargain carries a caveat. For Dr. Parnassus, it’s a heartbreaker that has literally driven him to drink, and the time is now fast approaching to give the Devil his due. In this particular case, the “due” involves the soul of the doctor’s lovely (and unsuspecting) daughter Valentina (Lily Cole), currently on the cusp of her 16th birthday. Valentina loves her father, but has grown weary of the troupe’s hand-to-mouth existence and dreams of escaping the family business to enjoy a “normal” life (which makes for an interesting twist on the standard cliché about the kid who yearns to run away to join the circus). In the meantime, the doctor’s young apprentice Anton (Andrew Garfield) secretly pines for her. The dynamics become more interesting when the troupe picks up a new barker (Heath Ledger), an amnesiac with a possibly dubious past, who they initially discover (literally) under a bridge (hanging, actually…don’t ask).
Without giving too much away, I will say that Ledger’s central (if unfinished) performance has been made miraculously whole through a Macgyvered combination of Gilliam’s adaptive inventiveness and the able assistance of three talented guest stars-Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell, who are each seamlessly incorporated into the narrative as several Imaginarium-enhanced “versions” of Ledger’s character. The entire cast is good; Waits is an inspired choice as ol’ Scratch (known here as “Mr. Nick”) and Verne Troyer is on hand as the doctor’s longtime counsel/business partner (it wouldn’t really be a “Terry Gilliam film” without at least one Little Person in the cast, would it?).
As I implied earlier, this film may not rank among Gilliam’s best work, but on a sliding scale, it comes fairly close in execution and spirit to his “classic” period (a choreographed number with dancing bobbies is an unexpected delight, and evokes the spirit of the original Pythons for one brief and shining moment). The director hasn’t lost his visual flair; he certainly knows how to fill every available bit of space in the frame with eye-popping imagery (and probably brought it in at a cost somewhere in the neighborhood of the catering bill for Avatar). Sometimes, the cheap rides are more fun.
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