The Penguin (4/5 Stars)

HBO’s new television series, The Penguin, starts off where the latest Batman reboot (Robert Pattinson’s 2022 The Batman) ends. Oswald Cobb, Colin Farrell reprising his role, breaks into the luxury apartment of the late crime boss Carmine Falcone to steal some blackmail material he knows is hidden in a wall-safe. He is surprised by Carmine’s son, Alberto Falcone and quickly turns on some subservient charm to distract from his trespassing. It works and they both relax over some drinks and start talking about Alberto’s inherited role as the boss of the Falcone family. Alberto feeling about it is one of smug entitlement. In an unguarded moment, Oswald describes a crime boss from his childhood, a guy who was feared but also respected, who helped the poor and knew everybody’s name. That was another type of power, Oswald reflects sincerely. Alberto finds Oswald’s take on power to be weak. He laughs and insults Oswald. In response, Oswald takes out his gun and shoots Alberto until he is dead. He sits there with a satisfied grunt until another moment passes and he realizes how enormously stupid his actions just were.

The Penguin above all else is an impressive exercise in character development. There are a lot of twists and turns that the murder of Alberto sets off in this eight episode arc in which Oswald schemes and cajoles and wrests power from the various organized crime syndicates of Gotham, but this first scene is especially important. The murder is not premeditated. It is an impulsive act. So despite where everything ends up, let it be known that Oswald did not have a plan. He may have a vague ambition of being the boss, but much of what he does here is scene-by-scene improvisation and self-preservation.

This matters as to the study of Oswald’s character. Much is made of whether the man can be trusted and whether he says what he means. It’s complicated and Colin Farrell’s performance is one in which Oswald seems to believe what he is saying in the moment, but as soon as options are limited or something different develops, well, he can adapt. Like the first scene, Oswald has this romantic idea of a godfather crime boss, but this isn't really who he is. He's too angry, too thin-skinned, and too reckless for that. 

Why can't Oswald measure up to his ideal? Well, that’s what makes The Penguin such an interesting TV series. The main impetus for Oswald’s character defects is also what makes him sympathetic. He has a disability, a bum leg. Combined with his ungainly height and weight, his bum leg makes him waddle, like a penguin, which is what people call him behind his back when they aren't saying it to his face. He is not helped by an ugly scar that crosses his face horizontally under the nose. (A shout-out to the magnificent makeup work here). Because of his poor looks and disability he is overlooked and mistreated. This is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because he is continually underestimated. A curse because his personality does not allow him to forget or ignore slights, which results in impulsive and sometimes stupid reactions. A blessing and a curse because he uses the way he is treated as an excuse to treat others poorly, which is helpful to his ambition if not his soul. And since he understands how mistreated people feel, he knows how to persuade and/or manipulate other mistreated people. 

There is this modern tendency in storytelling to treat disabilities as boons. The X-Men are a prime example of this. The series is a metaphor for discrimination (humans v. mutants), but the mutants all have superpowers. That is, their differences make them superior to normal people. In real life however, disabilities are exactly what they appear to be, a detriment to the people who have them. It is possible that a disability can provoke a more resilient type of character. For example, you hear some very successful people who have dyslexia claim that the inability to read correctly made them more creative with problem solving.  I do not doubt their experiences, but it is also true that the majority of people with dyslexia just straight up have a harder time learning and as a result don’t learn as much. There are many historical examples of people overcoming their disabilities and rising to greatness: Catherine the Great, FDR, etc. But most of the time, a person’s defects make them worse. It is a tough reality and it is rare that a movie shows it. But this is what makes The Penguin so interesting. Given what we are seeing on the screen, I think it is fair to say that Oswald would have been a better person if he didn’t have a limp. He would have been treated better and would have treated other people better in return. When Batman goes head to head with Oswald Cobb in the next movie, the best way to outfox him would be for that handsome billionaire to make fun of the Penguin’s waddle. It would likely provoke an impulsive error.

The weakness of The Penguin has to do with a story-line that too often solves political problems with murder. (One can contrast this with Shogun, a TV series that understood its society and people so well that the story resolved itself without the need of an actual battle.) There are several plot points where a multitude of people are liquidated just as soon as their presence in the storyline is no longer needed. Some are executed in crowded rooms with many people in them, as if the writers were in such a hurry that they didn't give the doomed men the courtesy of being dragged outside first and murdered on the lawn so that their blood wouldn't spill all over the nice carpets and hard-wood floors. It must be said that these types of murders should be much more traumatic to their many witnesses than are ever shown. Would you work for a boss that murdered an employee in the middle of an office meeting? Even minor characters deserve a little more for their deaths than what they get here. (Sometimes it is a major character that gets this treatment. I still haven’t forgiven the later seasons of Game of Thrones for how they dispatched Littlefinger).

There is also the character of Sofia Falcone (played by Cristin Milloti), which is in turns well-developed and also supremely outlandish. Her backstory is that she was the favored daughter of Carmine Falcone, but upon the outcome of a seemingly innocuous conversation, her father frames her for the murders of 10 women and has her committed to Arkham Asylum as a dangerous psychopath. Sofia is played by Cristin Milioti, a small woman. The type of corruption that would result in this type of framing and institutionalization is far out even for Gotham. I mean, come on. How does a small woman strangle anybody? They should have framed her for poisoning instead. Or just institutionalized her. That would have been enough.

Sofia Falcone makes a bunch of moves of her own, but ultimately, even though she has capacity for ruthlessness (and a decent wardrobe for it), her heart isn’t into it like Oswald's is. She makes the mistake of seeking revenge on a sociopath. She thinks she can hurt Oswald, like emotionally. But by definition, you can’t torture a sociopath emotionally. That’s what makes them so dangerous. And in particular, Oswald here has an uncanny ability to escape fatal situations while his enemies are pausing for dramatic effect. 

The look of The Penguin continues Matt Reeve's moody portrayal of Gotham as a very rainy, neon red, and dingy place. There is another nod to Nirvana, this time with a cover of "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" which Kurt Cobain famously covered from a Ledbelly song in his MTV Unplugged performance. And in the first two episodes, there are several scenes with very tasty martinis. Like most TV series, I bet it could have been a few hours shorter, but this is a good interlude between Batman movies. It is said a lot about franchise heroes, that after a few movies, it is the villains that become the attraction. Nowhere is that more true than for the Batman franchise and with this series has become truer still.

The Banshees of Inishiren (4/5 Stars)

Inishiren is an island off the coast of Ireland. This movie, the latest by writer/director Martin McDonagh (In Bruges, Three Billboard’s Outside Ebbing Missouri) takes place on Inishiren in 1923. Apparently, at that time there was a civil war on the mainland. The characters can hear and see distant explosions off across the channel in the distance. But no one on the island seems to know what the fighting is about nor do they have an opinion as to how it should end. Its just this bad thing that exists in the world and nobody can do much of anything about it.

The location of Inisherin is as much a character in this story as any of the humans inhabiting it. It is exceedingly small, holds perhaps hundreds(?) of people, mostly farmers and herders, and everybody seems to know everybody else and their business. Indeed, they would have to because there is only one church, one post office, and one bar in the whole place. The bar is called the pub, short for public house. You don’t need a brand when you’re the only place in town.

This isolation and poverty makes what would be a trifling event into a very big deal. You see Colm Doherty (Brendan Gleeson) does not want to be friends with Padraic Suilleabhain (Colin Farrell) anymore. He doesn’t want to drink pints with him. He doesn’t want to sit next to him. Indeed, he makes it clear that he never wants to speak with Padraic ever again. Padraic, much hurt, asks Colm why. After all, they were very good friends and Padraic does not recall ever saying or doing anything wrong. It is not anything you said or did to me, Colm explains, its just that life is short, he has things to do (or at least he feels that he should) and Padraic is dull. In other words, Colm feels that Padraic is wasting his time, time better spent working on composing music (he plays a mean fiddle) than listening to Padraic talk about his donkey. This would be a mean thing to say and do in any town, and in any other town it may just stop there. Maybe Colm and/or Padraic would just start hanging out in different pubs. But in Inisherin, there is only one pub, and its 1923, so there is absolutely nothing else to do in the evenings than drink in this one pub and stew about this cold breakdown in a long standing friendship.

Martin McDonagh is best known for employing cruel wit with low born characters, many of them criminals. As an example, in In Bruges, the first time Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell were teamed up in a McDonagh movie, Gleeson’s character was tasked with an honor killing of Colin Farrell but changes his mind at the last moment in order stop the Colin Farrell character from committing suicide. That’s the type of irony that appeals to Mr. McDonagh black sense of humor, and it works more often than not in his plays and movies (A Behanding in Spokane, yes, Seven Psychopaths, not as much.) Interestingly, Banshees is one of McDonagh’s least funny movies and that probably is a good move. Cruel humor would be out of place here given that all of the characters are basically good and some of them faultless. When bad things start to develop, it is appropriate that McDonagh does not try for the types of laughs he usually goes for. This keeps the story engaging as opposed to off-putting. There are only so many ways this can turn out given the constraints of the location and it remains fresh up to the end.

What drives the material home is the performances by Gleeson and Farrell. Gleeson has always been an interesting actor. He has the type of looks that generally would deprive an actor of a starring role in anything but interesting movies. Over time he has become one of those beloved actors that can just show up in a mainstream flick like an old friend and liven up the joint (have you seen Paddington 2?). It is Colin Farrell that is more of a revelation. Here is a man that has the looks of a leading man and if he wanted to, could remain a boring hot shot indefinitely. Instead, he has become a favorite of movie buff’s for his great acting against type. You wouldn't know to look at him but Colin Farrell is at his best playing losers (In Bruges, The Lobster, True Detective). I tell you, he is exceptionally good at it. His character is Banshees is a boring dolt. It’s another fantastic performance.

It can also be noted that the movie is particularly adept at capturing the language of 1920’s Ireland. I have no idea whether the dialect is accurate, but can attest that it is much different way of speaking than you may hear today. At the least, if you see this movie, you’ll finally have an idea of how to pronounce the name Siobhan.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer (1/5 Stars)

Last year, I saw writer/director Yorgos Lanthimos’s film “The Lobster” and stated that it was one of the most original romantic comedies I had ever seen. It was the only film I had seen of Mr. Lanthimos, who at that point, had been making movies since the 1990s. After watching “The Killing of a Sacred Deer” I may never see another of his movies again.

The Lobster’s idiosyncrasies, it’s quirky characters, and its weird dialogue had the appearance of making sense because of the absurd fictional world that they inhabited. Having never seen a Lanthimos film, I suppose I just assumed that when he set stories in the real world, he would not expect to people to speak and act in the same unreal way. My assumption was wrong. “The Killing of Sacred Deer” has no place being set in the real world, but there it is. The unreality of what is happening on the screen and the unbelievable way the characters react to it makes it impossible for the viewer to empathize or care about what is occurring in the story. As a drama, it failed dramatically. As a comedy, the only laughs it garnered were the bad kind.

“The Killing of a Sacred Deer” takes its sweet time in getting to the main conceit of the story. As it meanders, you are left to wonder what might be happening. Several interesting story-lines seem possible, slowly the story is developed and you realize that the story-line that has indeed been chosen is one of the stupider ones. I will now give it away. A surgeon, played by Colin Farrell, once negligently caused the death of a man during a surgery. The son of that man, a shifty and sweaty Barry Keoghan, has put a hex on the surgeon’s family. Actually, to say it is a “hex” is doing more explaining than the movie cares to. What happens is that Colin’s family one-by-one slowly become paralyzed, stop eating, and start bleeding out the eyes. This happens to Colin’s son first before happening to his daughter. We do not know how Barry Keoghan is doing this or whether it a unique hex or has been attempted by anyone before. There is literally no attempt to explain it.

I guess that would not matter so much if other things were not missing. After all, many movies are based on otherwise impossible things happening. But the movie is so deadpan toward the situation, and its characters reactions are so absurdly understated, that it seems the movie is making a point of how pathetic  they are as they are confronted with otherworldly horror. Is the situation being played for laughs? People in the theater were indeed laughing when the story called for the kids crawling along the floor using just their elbows. But did Lanthimos want us to find children crawling on the floor because they can’t use their legs anymore funny? Really?

Characters in movies are fictional, yes I know this. But it also says something about a writer/director who seems to be purposefully positioning his characters in ways where it is impossible to empathize with them. What is left is ultimately is a waste of time. After all, if Lanthimos doesn’t care about whether or not the sacred deer is killed, why should we?

The Beguiled (4/5 Stars)

In the midst of the American Civil War, on an abandoned Southern plantation, there remains a girls school, seemingly marooned from the world. It is headed by Miss Martha (Nicole Kidman) and employs one teacher named Edwina (Kirsten Dunst). She teaches five girls ranging from eight years old to an almost adult named Alicia (Elle Fanning). One day the youngest girl finds an injured Union soldier on the road named Corporal McBurney (Colin Farrell). He is taken into the plantation where the women go about nursing him back to health.

According to the dictionary, to beguile means to “charm or enchant (someone), sometimes in a deceptive way.” The titular “Beguiled” in this movie is perhaps everybody in it. It is a case study in very polite sexual tension. It is not just that Colin Farrell is handsome, and he is, or that the house is full of hospitable southern women who are quite beautiful, and they are, it is that there are several dynamics in between all the characters playing at once. The union soldier is injured so he must rely on the women. But the women are trained by the culture and the time period to acquiesce to the man. But the number of women in the house far outnumber the man. But the women are competing amongst themselves for the man’s attention.

It is a credit to the writing and direction of this movie, that the above does not drown itself in melodrama. Instead through very fine attention to detail and pointed understatement the situation hovers between absurdity and suspense. There is something funny about the women offering the man a home-cooked meal (“would you like some pie, corporal? It’s my special recipe.”) at a dinner they have all dressed too much up at, and also something sinister about it given that any actual sexuality would have drastic consequences. The consequences again are on several levels: The impropriety of such a lady-like institution harboring any such sensual situation, the jealous competition between the ladies themselves, and then there is the war waging outside that technically makes the man and all the women sworn enemies.

The Director is Sofia Coppola, who based her screenplay off a previous movie of the same title. (I bet this remake is much better.) Ms. Coppola perhaps more than anybody in the business is a good argument for nepotism. The thing is that, and if you ever watch interviews with Ms. Coppola perhaps you would agree with me, Ms. Coppola doesn’t really come off, forgive me, as a particularly interesting person. She comes off strikingly competent, yes, but way too literal to be engaging. For those who generally enjoy the insight of a director's interview, Ms. Coppola has a way of making it seem like there is less to the movie than meets the eye. Of course, this shouldn’t be held against her because what counts is the movie and not her personality, and she does make good movies. I simply find it hard to believe that she could have risen through the ranks without her last name because its hard to believe she could ever successfully pitch a movie.

But whatever the reason she gets to make movies, it is a good thing that she does. Most directors aren’t like Sofia Coppola and her movies in turn are not like most. Just as nobody but Coppola would imagine a biopic about Marie Antionette without a beheading, here nobody would have had the follow-through to base a movie for such a sustained period of time on tiny movements, glances, and phrases that may or may not mean what they say they mean. Counter-intuitively, “The Beguiled” may be a movie you should see in a theater because it is small. If you saw it on Netflix, you might miss a good portion of what is happening.

When the movie finally does get dramatic it is very satisfying. The ensemble is perfectly cast. In particular, Nicole Kidman, as the head-mistress, and Elle Fanning, as a really bored girl, do well in their roles. Given the general dearth of good roles for women, I wouldn’t be surprised if this movie got multiple Oscar nominations for acting. And Colin Farrell again made me regret ever thinking he was bad actor. I take it back. I really like that guy.

The Lobster (4/5 Stars)

“The Lobster” is such an original movie that to describe it would necessarily require a comprehensive rehashing of the plot. I simply cannot say it is like some other movie you know. But to not rehash the entire movie and only focus on the beginning would also be to sell itself short because one of the more interesting characters (Rachel Weisz) is only introduced halfway through and what happens with her and the main character, i.e. the Lobster (Colin Farrell) is more interesting than what happens in the first half. But for the second part to make any sense, one needs to understand the first part, and I can’t do that without giving it all away. So just take my word for it: Rachel Weisz is great in this movie and I can’t tell you why.

It starts with The Lobster checking into the Hotel on the Seashore next to a Forest away from the City. He has been recently divorced. The Hotel, a creature of the State, will allow him to stay for 45 days to find himself a mate. If he doesn’t they will turn him into an animal. He gets to choose the animal. He chooses Lobster. It isn’t a completely arbitrary choice. As he explains the animal will live a long time and he likes the sea. So it works in a way. And that in a nutshell is how this movie works (more a miracle the more I think about it). It chooses seemingly arbitrary and bizarre rules to follow and then with a totally straight face follows them without flinching. The result is an sincere, engrossing, and surprisingly consistent romantic comedy. And it is a romantic comedy as strange as that may sound when applied to a movie such as this.

No State in the known world would ever force people to find a mate within 45 days before turning them into an animal. And that is likely because no state in the known world deals with the kind of hopelessly anti romantic people that inhabit this movie. Colin Farell along with his new guy friends John C. Reilly and Ben Whishaw do not want to be turned into animals. Neither do the females at the Hotel. But at the same time there seems to be an unwritten rule that couples need to have a unique trait in common. Ben Whishaw has a limp. John C. Reilly has a lisp. There is this really hot girl who eventually gets turned into a pony because she can’t find anyone else who has great hair.

The Hotel has seminars and mixers in which relationships are promoted in the least appetizing way possible. There is a rule against masturbating in the hotel and the maids, as part of their job desciption, are to dry hump the guests (but not to climax) in order to stimulate them to find mates amongst the other guests. As Colin Farrell understatedly intones, “Awful, just awful.”

If this is a satire on something I don’t know what that could possibly be and honestly I do not really care. I don’t want to think there is an agenda behind this movie. If there were it would be a stupid way to push it because nothing in here has anything to do with reality. The only way it works is by its own rules all by itself. And encapsulated as such, it sets its rules out clearly follows them steadfastly and exploits them for humorous and romantic effect.

To make matters more interesting, the outcasts of this mandatory romantic society are a guerilla band of loners who carry out terrorist missions targeted to break up the couples at the retreat. The guests at the hotel are given tranquilizer guns and every once in a while bussed to the woods where they can earn an extra day for each loner they capture. There is a heartless woman guest (played by Aggeliki Papoulia) that is particularly adept at hunting other human beings. She is at 158 days currently. Hilarity and Tragedy ensues when The Lobster tries to woo her by pretending to be heartless as well.

The movie is filled end to end with interesting details: for example when the loners celebrate they listen to electronic music with headphones. That way even when they are celebrating together they dance alone. And in the city, a person shopping alone can be stopped by the police and asked for their marriage certificate. The movie was directed by Yorgos Lathimos and also co-written by him. He is obviously a type of insane.

Anchoring the movie is Colin Farrell who has turned into a special actor. I remember him quite well as someone I would point out as rather bad (or at least miscast). He was doing these great epic roles (Alexandar, The New World, Miami Vice) and doing them, frankly, not so well. But then he had a career turnaround in “In Bruges,” in which he played a down and out suicidal loser who, quite importantly, had the same accent as his very own Irish brogue. It was a revelation. His true calling was not as blockbuster hero. It was as a loser and he has excelled in that role ever since. His turn in “True Detective: Season 2,” “Seven Psychopaths,” and most importantly this movie prove that he is at his best playing broken men. Colin Farrell brings a pathos and honest humor to this character that seems entirely tuned to him. This is his best role and I would argue an Oscar nomination for it.

Rachel Weisz, as we all know and I hope I have written about before, is great and a very big movie girlfriend of mine. I wish I could tell you what she does in this movie without giving away the last half of the movie except to say, like everything she does, it is perfect. (I never got to rave about her comedic performance in “The Brothers Bloom” but for fucks sake wasn’t that revelatory). She’s worthy of a great romantic gesture. I’ve said too much already.

John C. Reilly rises to the occasion again as a welcome competent face in a movie totally out there with no money backing it. I’m reminded a little bit of his work in “Cedar Rapids.” He is a great team player. Also there is Lea Seydoux playing against type as queen of the loners given she is currently one of the sexiest women in movies (Blue is the Warmest Color, Mission Impossible). Then there is Ben Whishaw who is also very good. Everybody in this movie, amazingly, is very good at playing people who do not resemble humans in a world that does not resemble reality. It’s great acting drawn from great directing and writing by Yorgos Lathimos who, as I related before, is probably insane. Anyway I vote for an Oscar Nomination for Best Original Screenplay, the key word being Original. Want a cold breath of fresh air in your movie going experience. Go see “The Lobster.”

Crazy Heart (3/5 Stars) February 9, 2010

Gone Fishin'

All the Hollywood buzz says that Jeff Bridges is going to win an Oscar for his performance in this movie as an aging alcoholic country musician named Bad Blake. So I went to see for myself what all the fuss was about. It certainly is a good performance, maybe even perfect, but ultimately the movie itself is just so forgettable that any recognition, especially something as big as an Oscar, is simply not warranted. This movie will be lost to the sands of time in ten years. I’d be surprised if anyone was watching it a year from now. Can we really not think of anybody else who would be worthy of the gold statuette this year? 

Crazy Heart follows the travels of a country musician named Bad Blake. Bad used to be big-time. Now he tours the country alone in his car playing at very small joints. His persona includes bad habits. He habitually chain-smokes and drinks. People instinctively know what type of whiskey to use when they buy him a drink. He’s been divorced several times and hasn’t written a song in three years. He has a son but has never talked to him. Other than that he’s a pretty laid back guy whom is easy to get along with. Jeff Bridges plays the part so convincingly that it can be hard to believe that there isn’t already a Bad Blake out there that looks just like him. In fact, it very much dawned on me that Bridges could probably tour the country as this guy right about now and the concerts would be definitely worth the ticket. The music in this film, written for the film by T. Bone Burnett, comprises one of the best soundtracks of a movie I have seen this year. The one Oscar nomination this movie deserves is the one for Best Song for “The Weary Kind.”

The main problem with this movie is that there is just this incredible lack of conflict in the storyline. Nothing really happens nor is the main character challenged in any significant way. For one thing, the movie completely lacks an antagonist. For example: Bad Blake gets mad at his agent for his hurting career but is informed that he will have a record deal just as soon as he writes new material. He’s no longer as famous but everyone he meets is very polite and women still line up for one-night stands. One is a reporter played by Maggie Gyllenhaal. One thing I learned from this movie is that being a reporter is a great way to hit on rock-stars. (“Hey can I get an interview with you in your hotel room?”) Then there is his protégé, Tommy Sweet played by Colin Farrel, who has made it big and left Bad Blake behind. There is a hint of bad blood here but once the two characters meet in the movie there is nothing but reconciliation. Tommy Sweet asks him to open for his concert, joins him during a song, and sincerely apologizes for any wrongs he may have done to Blake in the past. Finally, Bad Blake has issues with his substance abuse. Well, about five minutes of movie time in AA meetings and all of that is taken care of too. His relationship with the reporter does end poorly but I didn’t really care. I didn’t want them to be together anyway. The dude is twice her age. 

In other words this movie isn’t tragic to the point of catharsis in any way. Nor is it funny enough to be considered a comedy. (There are some good one-liners. My favorite was, “Aint remembering wonderful.”) I suppose it could be considered a character study but who knows. My suggestion is to buy the soundtrack and listen to it while going fishing or lazing about the house drinking. There is no special reason to see this movie. (Unless of course you like watching other people going fishing or lazing about the house drinking. There are a bunch of scenes that are exactly that. Most people I know would rather do it themselves though.)

I can understand why Jeff Bridges would get an Oscar nomination. He totally carries this film. But for the life of me I can’t understand why Maggie Gyllenhaal would get any recognition. I’ve always liked this actress but there has to be better performances out there. I would say this year’s Oscar nominations for the acting categories reflect more than anything, the Academy’s tremendous lack of creativity. They just can’t imagine a comedian or an action star deserving a nomination. I will talk in a later post on who I think should have been nominated, but suffice to say Gyllenhaal will not be one of them. Somebody somewhere has been unfairly overlooked. 

One more thing: What the hell is Colin Farrell doing in this movie as a huge country music superstar? Does that strike anyone else as completely inauthentic? I can only suppose that they obviously miscast the part to drive home the point that Bad Blake is Real Country (whatever that means).

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (4/5 Stars) February 4, 2010

Gilliam Goes CGI

There are perhaps only two American directors I can think of that employ visual styles that unapologetically engross whatever story is being told. The first and certainly more prolific is Tim Burton. The second and unfortunately consistently out-of-work director is Terry Gilliam. 100 years ago they would surely have been world famous painters or something. They are perfect example of my theory that all the best artists have left the still-life painting world and gone into movies. (I also happen to believe all the best poets have become musicians or screenwriters. (Sculptors have become bodybuilders, ha ha.)) I think Gilliam’s style can best be described as “Salvador Dali visits a junkyard.” Still that’s doesn’t do it justice. If anything, Dali is a very unaccomplished Gilliam who does art in really static and boring ways (and doesn’t use as much trash.) It’s not Dali’s fault he’s so inferior though. He just didn’t have the technology. Movies and CGI special effects in general allow artists such as Gilliam to go places a guy like Dali never could. This movie is also a perfect argument for my idea to clean out all the crap-art in the MOMA and just hang still frames from great movies for a change. 

The story in this movie is kind of convoluted. Doctor Parnassus, played by Christopher Plummer, made a bet with Mr. Nick, aka the devil played by Tom Waits, that he could use his imagination to capture more souls (of apparently innocent passersbys) than the devil could. Doctor Parnassus won the bet and Mr. Nick granted him eternal life. Unfortunately, as all bets with the devil turn out, it was a blessing in disguise. Doctor Parnassus ages, he just never dies. 1000 years later he’s on the street accompanied only by his dwarf friend, played by Verne Troyer, begging for change. At this point a beautiful woman, played by the supermodel Lily Cole, walks by and Parnassus falls in love. Mr. Nick, always liking a deal, agrees to grant Parnassus his youth again so he can woo her in exchange for his first-born daughter at the age of 16 (again Lily Cole). Fast forward another 100 years (the movie doesn’t go chronologically by the way) to the beginning of the movie when Parnassus is at the centerpiece of some freak travelling show that hangs outside modern bars near freeway underpasses. He has an imaginarium that does crazy shit. His fellow travelling band members find a mysterious stranger named Tony, played by Heath Ledger, hanged somehow from the underside of a bridge. He’s got this lucky fife and has a plan to…

Well, whatever. Suffice to say that the story doesn’t really matter. Or should I say the story matters as much as the story in one of your dreams matter. It seems pretty vivid and real when you’re in it. Places, people, and things transform and transition into different places, people, and things quite seamlessly. But once you awake you can’t really remember what logic wound the whole thing together. Every thing blurs like a stream of consciousness. But I want to make the point that I wasn’t entirely bothered by this. I may not have understood what was going on some of the time but there was always incredible dazzling visual somethings to behold. This is one of those movies you can play muted on your TV during a party. I bet it would be a great conversation piece. (Is this supposed to be an acid trip? What the hell is going on??)

Stuff needs to be said about the imaginarium. How it works is this: A person walks into it and gets transported into a fantasyland created by the mind of Doctor Parnassus. This place will usually be tailored to the traveler inside. Like say a kid has a candy-land fantasy imagined for him. A wealthy woman has a fantasy filled with gigantic pearl necklaces, gold coins, and high heels. Etc. etc. Every single trip inside the magic mirror is something different and something special. At the end of the trip the traveler is presented with a choice between choosing the imagination of Mr. Nick (like say a shady bar or seedy inn) or of Dr. Parnassus (steep staircase to heaven, a bunch of transvestite cops dancing a show tune.) Whoever wins gets the traveler’s soul. Then there’s how Gilliam dealt with Heath Ledger’s death halfway through shooting the picture. All the principal on-set shooting had already been finished so all there was left was imaginarium scenes. Well, instead of just throwing in the towel because one of the major actors passed away, Gilliam just invented the idea that Tony’s looks are morphed by whatever imagination is being serviced in the imaginarium at that time. So each of Tony’s trip into the imaginarium produces a different movie star cameo: Johnny Depp, Colin Farrel, and Jude Law respectively (wow two good Jude Law movies in a week. I’ve stepped into the twilight zone). This works splendidly mostly because no logic is required in an imaginarium. The best thing about the imaginarium scenes though is that they are in CGI. What this does is offset Gilliam’s notorious penchant for real life grunge. What I’ve noticed while watching Gilliam’s many movies is how ugly (though very imaginative) the art direction is. (Ex. 12 Monkeys, Time Bandits, Monty Python). Fortunately it’s practically impossible to do something as realistic as dirty grungy trashy trash with CGI. So Gilliam was forced to design some beautiful art for a change. This movie proves he can.

The actors casted in this movie are like Gilliam works of art in themselves. Google Lily Cole, Verne Troyer (aka Mini-me from Austin Powers) and Christopher Plummer and see what I mean. All of them fit neatly in ancient surrealistic landscapes. Perhaps the best character though is Mr. Nick played by the rockstar Tom Waits. You should look that guy up on Pandora. He’s got a gravelly voice that bests Bob Dylan. The devil has never sounded so devilish. We had an especially poor collection of Supporting Actors in this year’s Oscar Race. Tom Waits was unfairly overlooked. Last but not least is Heath Ledger. His performance was the hardest to wrap my head around. If it had all been done by Ledger, it may have made more sense. But this is something I’m not about to hassle a dead man about. He did fine and the Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a pretty good movie to go out on. It at least speaks to his very ambitious taste for interesting roles in fearless movies. He will be missed. Rest in Peace.