Mar 17, 2010

THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS (2009)


Wow! I have to watch it three times to get the idea from thiz movie. Usually, it’s very very rare that there’s movie that I couldn’t understand right away. If you haven’t seen thiz one and would like to watch thiz movie, my suggestion is you better read the synopsis first. Thiz is ultimate Terry Gilliam’s movie! Terry Gilliam as we know him before, he is a visionary and peculiar Director at the same time. His previous movies are the sensational “Twelve Monkeys” (1995) and “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” (1998). Even for thiz time, Gilliam arranges all scenes in strange perspectives. He doesn’t seem to care whether or not the audience will be able to understand, he just keeps putting all of his scenes and tells it boldly without proper explanations. Even more, most of the dialogue is extremely poetic. A long time ago, Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) who is the leader behind the travelling show, bargained his immortality and youth with Mr. Nick (Tom Waits) who is the devil in human form, in order to marry a woman he loves. On the exchange, he must give away his daughter Valentina (Lily Cole) when her age reaches 16. Now the time is near, how he retrieves his daughter’s soul from the devil. Lily Cole’s performance as the daughter is surprisingly adorable able to represent all the emotions very well. The most interesting part is that thiz movie is starred by the late Heath Ledger. By the time of his tragic death, thiz movie was not finished yet. So Gilliam creatively changed the storyline and replaced Ledger’s character with three other Actors all at once, they are Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrel. In the end, I actually like thiz movie, because it has shown that Gilliam is brave enough to keep his unique characteristic and makes all directions are unpredictable. But in the same time, I have doubt his survival for the coming years, if he’s still going to make thiz kind of movie. How talented Director like him hasn’t broken Box Office records yet? Or maybe he even isn’t interested to do so at the first place. Like Heath Ledger’s character once said, “The Imaginarium does not cost a thing. We’re not here for the money”?!

Stars : 6/10
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Jonny Fendi



"Can you put a price on your dreams?"

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