Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

As he slowly approaches the age of 70, Terry Gilliam is still trying to get films made. It's been a difficult decade for him so far, in September 2000, his long-cherished project The Man Who Killed Don Quixote collapsed after only 6 days of production, he struggled to find another film to make, eventually settling upon The Brothers Grimm (2005), an underrated fairy-tale where Gilliam stood up to Bob and Harvey Weinstein. However, hot upon doing Grimm, he headed to the praries of Saskatchewan, Canada to the low-budget dark fantasy Tideland (2005), proof that he can still weave a magically engrossing film without the need for a big budget. For his next film, he's decided to do something else that looks quite small, but with room for Gilliam's imagination to go wild upon!! The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus will show Gilliam can still be a great filmmaker and storyteller, it started filming in London in December 2007, and it looked as if it would be a quick and easy shoot. Fate would have other ideas...

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus is set within a traveling theater company, which offers to see within the mind of the titular Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer), who is a 1,000 year old magician who sold his soul to the devil known as Mr. Nick (Tom Waits) one such person who enters is Martin (Heath Ledger), who enters drunk from a nightclub, and enters the titular imaginarium through a mirror in the wagon in which the travelling show goes around in, it is within this strange world, he gets alot more than he bargained for.

The film has already courted attention for all the wrong reasons and for all the right reasons, when tragedy struck. The London shoot wrapped on January 19th 2008. The cast and crew departed to Vancouver for the remainer of the shoot. Heath Ledger stopped off in New York for a quick break, on January 22nd, he was found dead in his New York apartment from an accidental overdose of medical drugs. It was an upsetting loss to the film industry, and an even more upsetting for Gilliam and the film's cast and crew. But, they'd come so far, and they weren't going to give in easily. With some rewrites later, Gilliam got a call from 3 of Hollywood's finest. Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell!! The 3 actors agreed to come in and help finish the film for Gilliam and for Heath. As alot of the film would take place behind a magical mirror, this allowed for Heath's character Tony to change appearance in these parallel worlds, which is where Johnny, Jude and Colin would take over!! It's an idea which will work. The Gilliam curse had struck again, but they had overcome it!! They did it all for Heath, and he would be proud of it!!

Now, it's extremely hard for Gilliam to find money for his films, as they're often seen by snobbish Hollywood executives as being too weird for mainstream audiences, and they won't even stump up a penny towards any of their development. Yet Gilliam has been lucky with Dr. Parnassus, the film looks will be produced by French producer Samuel Hadida, had recent #1 film at the American box-office now, Resistent Evil: Extinction. But, he's made a wise choice in selecting this one, and if successful, it could have Gilliam making more of the films he wants to make!!

As for a cast, Gilliam has got together a few good names so far, some of whom, he's worked with before, he's got Christopher Plummer as Dr. Parnassus, one of the finest actors working in cinema, well remembered for the likes of The Sound of Music (1965), Waterloo (1970) and The Man Who Would Be King (1975), he would work with Terry on Twelve Monkeys (1995), and it's good to see Terry work with him again. The same goes with Tom Waits as well as being a good musician, Waits has got some good films to his name, he's worked with Francis Ford Coppola on films such as One From The Heart (1982), The Outsiders (1983) and Rumble Fish (1983), oh and he also did Robert Altman's Short Cuts (1993), as well as doing an uncredited cameo in Gilliam's The Fisher King (1991), so he seems like a natural choice for the role of the Devil!! But, the film belongs to Heath, it's all been completed for Heath as well. Since his death, he's found HUGE posthumous success in The Dark Knight (2008), this will make a fitting epitaph to his short but perfect career, with his part completed and complimented by Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell, it'll be exciting to see what they do with the part left to them by Heath, Oh, and equally as brilliant, Gilliam has also cast Mini-Me in the film!! Yes, Verne Troyer, (who played the "Wee Waiter" in Gilliam's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998)), has been cast in this one as a dwarf called Percy!! That alone, should make the film worth seeing!! ;-)

Around the time of Tideland, look at what Gilliam was reduced to!!



Here's some more images from the film taken on set in London and Vancouver!!



























Anyone like the sound of this little beauty!? Remember, it's Terry Gilliam and he doesn't make bad films. Tragedy may have hit this film in an awful way. (twice in fact, it's producer Bill Vince died in June from cancer. :sad: The film will stand as a tribute to their talents, the film could have been abandoned like Don Quixote, but it was saved from a similiar fate by a clever rewrite here and there, and Johnny, Jude and Colin, who did it for Heath, as they knew it's what he would have wanted. But, the film reunites him with his usual cinematographer Nicola Pecorini, and even writer Charles McKeown, who co wrote Brazil (1985) and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) with Gilliam, and seeing as they were two of his best films, you should be starting to get excited about The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus...

Peter Stormare is in the film as well!!

You'll remember him as Gaear Grimsrud in Fargo, and one of the nihilists in The Big Lebowski, but he's worked with Terry Gilliam before as Cavaldi in the underrated fantasy masterpiece The Brothers Grimm (2005), it would appear he's working with Terry again on Dr. Parnassus!!

He gave a hint of it on Swedish TV!! (If anyone can understand Swedish, let me know!!)

From what I've heard, he's been cast in the film as the President of the United States!! What on earth does Terry have in mind for this film!?

The more I hear about this, the better it gets!

PEOPLE!! GO HERE NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here's a very quick featurette with Terry Gilliam, (now without his beard), showing us some of the artwork for the film and explaining the story!! Honestly, the artwork on display here is some of the best he's ever come up with!! This is classic 1980's-era Terry back with us again!! (Time Bandits/Brazil/Baron Munchausen era Gilliam!!)

THIS WILL BE THE BEST FILM OF 2009!! MISS IT AT YOUR PERIL!!

Seeing that makes me want to go and watch his other films right now!

Gimli the Waste of Space wrote:

Seeing that makes me want to go and watch his other films right now!

Especially the ones he made in the 1980's!!

Anyways, seems as if the film's shooting has had a lasting effect!! Jude Law took over on the Vancouver shoot, now it would appear he's fallen for the lovely Lily Cole, who plays Parnassus' daughter, Valentina!! They're both dating, he's 35, she's 20.

Oh, and Lily posed nude on the cover of the French edition of Playboy!!

Poor Heath

Johnny Depp and Colin Farrell in the same movie!!!! il be in heaven! lol

Here's Terry Gilliam talking about the film at the Milan Film Festival in September, he talks about his films, and mentions Dr. Parnassus, and says he thought about giving in when Heath died!! But, he didn't. He speaks of how the best film of 2009 was saved.

Here...

...and here.

Go here for an interview with Terry Gilliam and his son Harry, and the hardships of having a famous Dad. (Terry still has a beard btw... )

Oh dear, it looks like the film has another obstacle to face. According to Christopher Plummer, the film still has a long way to go before we can see it...

When asked if Dr. Parnassus was finished, Plummer said:

"No, he's waiting for all sorts of insurance problems to be cleared because of Heath Ledger's death. And although Heath Ledger was replaced by three actors as you know - Jude Law, Johnny Depp and Colin Farrell - which is terrific replacing, my God. There are still some monetary problems over insurance. Otherwise, it's almost ready to be released. And poor Terry has gone through torture."

Hmm, could the problems with the insurance company prevent it from being released!? No!! People need to see this film!! It'll be the last time we ever see Heath on film, that in itself is unmissable. I know they've been running on fumes moneywise with the film's post-production, but it'll get finished. I know it will...

Terry Gilliam writes a touching tribute about Heath for The Observer...

Everyone!! Go out and buy the new Empire!! they've got a special feature dedicated to The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, and how it was nearly doomed, and how it was saved by Johnny, Jude and Colin!! They speak to Terry, (who was recently diagnosed with gout, Get Well Soon Terry, if he's reading this!!) But, it makes for a good read, and it is a good story of how they met and worked together on Brothers Grimm and this. It also claims that Jude Law was considered originally for Heath's part!! They say the film will be released this autumn!!

I've scanned the pages for the article, for the benefit of foreign users on another forum. So here they are!!

https://2img.net/r/ihimizer/img218/9485/heath1zu3.jpg

https://2img.net/r/ihimizer/img218/3392/heath2uo6.jpg

https://2img.net/r/ihimizer/img84/8278/heath3xe3.jpg

https://2img.net/r/ihimizer/img84/4425/heath4ke7.jpg

https://2img.net/r/ihimizer/img232/7877/heath5dx5.jpg

https://2img.net/r/ihimizer/img220/3118/heath6zk2.jpg

A fine article, should be a great film!

TERRY GILLIAM IS GONNA GET A BAFTA FELLOWSHIP THIS SUNDAY!!!!!!!!!!!

He deserves one!!

It says the Fellowship award has been given to people like Chaplin, Hitchcock and Spielberg in the past, now Gilliam is on that list. He's just as good as those three, better even!!

Well done Terry!!

Here's a new image from the website of the film's cinematographer, Nicola Pecorini!!



See if you can spot Johnny, Jude and Colin!!

Nice pic!

Did you see Gilliam get the Bafta Fellowship? They cut his speech, swines!

I know, the bastards!! Still, better than nothing, isn't it...

Anyways, here's a poster from South Korea for Dr. Parnassus...

It's FINALLY finished!! Terry Gilliam was at the Empire awards yesterday, and said "We’re putting the last shots in tomorrow, and that’ll be it." Go here, picture No. 6

Plus, he's downplayed any stories that the film will never be released in America, he said "There's this story running round that has absolutely no basis in truth at all, it started from a little blog and it's all over the place but it's good, it gives us free publicity." Go here...

Oh, and here's the complete, uncut BAFTA speech!!

First review from Harry Knowles at Aint-it-cool, and he thinks it's excellent!!

Has Terry made his masterpiece!?

Here's a review from someone who worked on the film!!

It's Cannes Premiere is on May 22nd!!

Christopher Plummer looks like Dumbledore though.