Doctor Parnassus was my most anticipated film of 2009. I went to see it on the first or second day at the cinema and the big screen is definitely the place to see a film like this. I can tell it after re-watching The Imaginarium on a DVD at home to refresh my impressions and write this review.
I wouldn’t say that my previous experience with Terry Gilliam’s films was so exciting. The Fisher King never grew on me, nor did Time Bandits despite being a bit of a classic. The Brothers Grimm had some amazing stylistic elements (particularly the Mirror Queen’s costume) and was fun overall, but seemed too pop. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas created a much more positive impression though. In the case of The Imaginarium, I just knew it was my sort of thing aesthetically and, having seen it twice, I can say it still is.
Thousands of years ago Doctor Parnassus (Christoper Plummer) spent his days in an isolated monastery somewhere in the world. Today he is travelling across modern London with his daughter Valentina (Lily Cole), two assistants, Anton (Andrew Garfield) and Percy (Verne Troyer) and a bottle of strong drink, desperately trying to attract audience to his Imaginarium. All because of Mr Nick the Devil (Tom Waits) who once tempted Parnassus into a bet and kept on visiting him again and again until Parnassus agreed to give Mr Nick any child of his over the age of sixteen in an exchange for youth which allowed him to win the love of his life. As a result, a few years of happiness brought the immortal Parnassus (immortality was another gift from Mr Nick) the pain and despair of watching his only child Valentina approach her sixteenth birthday. Mr Nick kindly offered Parnassus another bet: he has to prove to Mr Nick that good souls still prevail over bad. Whoever wins more souls to his side through the Imaginarium will keep Valentina. The clock is ticking. Parnassus has to win his 5 good souls before Valentina’s birthday, if only he could attract anyone into his Imaginarium. On top of this, Doctor Parnassus and friends save the life of some suspicious Tony who was hanged under a bridge. Tony effortlessly charms Valentina who immediately forgets she was planning an escape with Anton into the proper modern life like in magazines. But good people seldom end up being hanged under bridges, do they?
Needless to say, The Imaginarium happened to be the last Heath Ledger’s film, which threatened the whole project with being left on the shelf unfinished or re-shot from scratch, which was a doubtful prospect given how hard it was to scrape the budget for it. Gilliam solved this problem gracefully and creatively: he added up to the mystery of Tony by having him change faces every time he enters the Imaginarium, thus Tony is also played by Jude Law, Johnny Depp, and Colin Farrell. Interestingly, the Russian mobsters chasing Tony at first do not recognise him in the Imaginarium, but Valentina doesn’t seem to be bothered that her Mr Right has a different face when reassuring him that her age of consent has arrived.
The plot itself is probably not the strongest side of The Imaginarium. At times it feels like too much has been thrown into it and the film is racing through events too quickly without a proper introduction and preparation of the audience. In the film intro Terry Gilliam says he wanted to create an original story, i.e., one which is not a book adaptation. This prompted a little cynical “huh!” in my mind because betting with the Devil on beloved children is quite a widespread story.
Yet The Imaginarium definitely has much stronger sides and its surreal design and breathtaking dream atmosphere are just two of them. I believe there is no need to go into detail about the aesthetic side of the film because it is really great, especially when viewed on the big screen. It seems like CGI has finally caught up with Terry Gilliam’s artistic imagination, even though nobody tried too hard to achieve total believability, perfect natural light, etc., which in most cases even helped the atmosphere and the style. Everything looked grandiose and weird, with a good touch of dreamy nonsense and humour bordering on social satire. Just think about Tony’s redesign of the Imaginarium based on a mixture of glossy magazine trends, social and charity propaganda and self-help literature. Or the Russian gangsters running happily under the Freudian mama’s skirt (the gangsters, by the way, spoke Russian with a horrible accent). Or Tony’s paradise built on vanity, greed, and corporate brainwashing.
“Don’t believe everything you read. Especially The Mirror.“
In fact, the examples of interesting ideas, creative scenes, clever observations and allusions are so numerous that it seems there are just too many of them. It is the case when the film’s strong points working together, surprisingly, produce a weakness, which must be some dodgy law of quantum mechanics. The whole film is like the Imaginarium before Tony’s redesign – too bright, too colourful, too everything. And all these elements are not cemented strongly enough with some main idea or a driving force. One time it makes me think of people being essentially good despite the times changing. Another time it is all about children paying for their parents’ mistakes (the idea that makes me understand the “We are the children of the world” song quite literally rather than in terms of the humanity). Then it is all about Doctor Parnassus who, despite his immortality, magic powers, and years (if not centuries) in the monastery at the heart of the Universe’s wisdom, turns out to be just an old invertebrate fool who can’t cope with his passions, including drink and gambling. A perfect client for Mr Nick! Although, to be fair, not many of us would be able to resist such a Devil: despite the great work on all the Tonies, Tom Waits is my absolute favourite in the Imaginarium when it comes to acting.
Perhaps in most generalised terms the film is about our little human weaknesses that put us before seemingly harmless choices all the time, the choices that determine our life and essence. The only problem I have with this interpretation (as well as others, actually) is that I doubt The Imaginarium grew out from an intellectual idea of any kind. It was conceived as a purely visual thing and even terry Gilliam himself mentioned in his interview that he just had an idea of an odd folding theatre travelling through a modern city. And thus a visual thing it remained all the way through.
So the conclusion: I anticipated this film with a lot of enthusiasm and left the cinema with a mixed feeling of being impressed by its scale and some essential, childish kindness so rare in modern cinema, and somewhat disappointed, as if someone had given me a pair of beautiful wings and then trimmed them. Now that I have watched the film again, I only feel more certain of this conclusion, although the temptation to give it 5 stars just for the beauty of it is quite strong, but I’m afraid by doing so I would be giving the 5 stars to what I want The Imaginarium to be rather than to what it is.
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus on IMDb
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus on Amazon UK
P.S. When the film’s credits ended the most patient part of the audience could hear a phone ringing. With the cinema sound, it was as if the phone was actually somewhere in the house. But that wasn’t all. Before the light went back on, a child’s voice asked: “Is the amusement over?” Now, that bit wasn’t in the film and the child was real, but for a second it was hard to tell whether the question was just a coincidence or an intended part of the show. And, gosh, is was creepy!
