Hey FOOLS! You got to hand it to Terry Gilliam he just knows how to melt my mind with his tripiness and each time I watch one of his films I'm unsure if I like it or am a little weirded out by it but I keep going back for more so I guess I do like it. I actually think the confusion I feel after watching one of his films is what I love about his films. Anyways on to the film ultimately The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a Good vs. Evil tale. Dr. Parnassus made a wager with the Devil in which the Devil would receive Parnassus' daughter, Valentina, on her 16th birthday. The Devil loving a good wager offers Parnassus a chance to save his daughter, the first to claim 5 souls would win the wager and win Valentina. Parnassus and his traveling theatre troupe try to win the wager to save Valentina from becoming the property of the Devil. Along the way the troupe finds a man named Tony almost dead, the help him to recover and Tony joins them in trying to gain 5 souls.
So what is the Imaginarium? Dr. Parnassus has a mirror that if you enter allows you to explore the wildest areas of your imagination, a great example of this is that when a drunk guy stumbles into the mirror he falls into a ravine that is constantly filling up with empty alcohol bottles. Another example is when Tony enters the Imaginarium his world is one with lots of ladders leading upwards into the sky, reflecting the ambitiousness of his character. The worlds inside the Imaginarium are trippy surreal places and director Terry Gilliam does not hold back on them, they are places where winding rivers can become snakes, where Dr. Parnassus takes on the form of a Hot Air Balloon featuring many faces of the Doctor, giant faces with rolling tongues drill their way up from the ground and this is only a taste of just how trippy the worlds inside the Imaginarium are.
Terry Gilliam just doesn't get enough credit for the casts he is able to put together for his films and Dr. Parnassus is another film filled with great casting. Parnassus is played by Christopher Plummer, whose work ranges from the Sound of Music through to this year's Up, and I have to say this is really the first time I watched Plummer and really appreciated his performance. I've always liked him, especially in Inside Man, but I really loved him as Doctor Parnassus. He was tormented, enlightened and lost all at once, there was actually a moment where I wished he had been the man to take the reigns of Dumbledore when Richard Harris passed, which is saying something because I love Michael Gambon. The Devil is played by Singer/Actor Tom Waits, when I heard Waits would be involved with the film I was slightly skeptical but he was fantastic as The Devil, Waits is slimy, creepy and entrancing and the polar opposite to Plummer's Parnassus. There is something about the interaction between Parnassus and The Devil which makes you believe that even though they are foes they really couldn't survive without the other and that is a credit to both their performances.
Parnassus' theatre troupe is made up of 3 performers, the first, Percy, is played by Verne Troyer (Mini Me from Austin Powers) is Parnassus' right hand man and friend. Troyer actually surprised me with his performance it wasn't great but it also wasn't terrible which I sort of expected as I've only seen him in Austin Powers or The Love Guru, as Parnassus' right hand man Percy is the hard ass that tends to have to keep the troupe focused. Parnassus' daughter, Valentina, is played by Lily Cole, who was last seen in St. Trinians, was sweet and alluring, everything Valentina needed to be as she longed to live a normal life away from the theatre troupe. For me the most impressive performance was that of Andrew Garfield as Anton, Anton is a sleight of hand expert and is in love with Valentina. Garfield was awkward, hilarious and absolutely smitten with Valentina and really held his own in a cast of mega stars. Since Parnassus was made Garfield has been cast in David Fincher's The Social Network and he has become my vote for Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit despite Prester John's Jim Sturgess love.
Finally I need to talk about Tony, when you first meet Tony he is hanging by his neck and is saved by Valentina and Anton. Parnassus believes he is another person sent to cause issues by The Devil and The Devil doesn't want anything to do with him. There is a mystery surrounding Tony, which I won't spoil, but his character is made all the more intriguing by the turn events that effected the casting. I was reading an interview with Gilliam before I watched this film and he said that he decided that he'd storyboard Dr. Parnassus, which is something he hadn't done in years, and so he called a meeting in his storyboard room to discuss the progress of the film. When he arrived for the meeting he had forgotten he'd promised that Heath Ledger could use the room to storyboard a music video he was directing (I'm assuming it was the Modest Mouse clip released a few months ago) and as a result told Ledger and Co. they could attend the meeting, during the meeting he said Ledger slipped him a piece of paper that said four words "Can I play Tony?" and that was how Ledger was cast as Tony. Sadly Ledger passed away mid way through shooting the film, after at first thinking the film was dead and then some creative thinking in terms of the story line Terry Gilliam came up with a solution. Luckily the majority of Ledger's involvement outside of the Imaginarium was shot so Ledger's friends Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell agreed to come on board to play different versions of Tony when he was in the Imaginarium. I would have loved to see Ledger's take on Tony within the Imaginarium because he felt a little like he was trying to mimic Johnny Depp outside it, that's not discrediting Ledger's performance but it was very Depp-esque, but the use of Depp, Law and Farrell added more depth to Tony's interpretation within the Imaginarium. Depp brought a slickness, Law brought a joyness and Farrell brought a slyness and unveiled Tony's true character. Despite the circumstances that brought about their involvement it definitely enhanced the character of Tony.
Something I love about Terry Gilliam is his shots when people are talking, there is a real depth to most of them, one of my favourites was the conversation between Parnassus and The Devil in the monastery as The Devil was questioning Parnassus' faith, after silencing the chanting monks, the background had monks rolling around trying to chant. The shots was comical but was still beautiful. Overall The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus was a good film, it could have been a great film but I think sometimes Gilliam can get lost in the surrealism, it's just my opinion but I definitely think people should go out and watch this unique take on Good vs. Evil.