There’s something unexpectedly coherent and pleasant about Terry Gilliam’s 'The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.' And that’s quite surprising, given that “coherent” and “pleasant” are the last words that should come to mind when talking about a Gilliam film, and specifically this one.
Doctor Parnassus is the latest from the ever-eccentric Gilliam, one of the few directors who has consistently let his imagination run wild – with the Monty Python movies, Brazil, and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen just a few examples from his filmography.
When Gilliam started shooting Doctor Parnassus, it instantly became one of the most anticipated movies of the year, thanks largely to its avid promotion by fans who follow the director’s work religiously (and there are many out there). Moreover, when the lead actor Heath Ledger died in the middle of filming, Doctor Parnassus became another notch on Gilliam’s string of cursed films – the most notorious of which is The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, a movie in production hell for over a decade now.
