The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus is Terry Gilliam's latest concoction of fantasy storytelling. Gilliam kind of took a break for a few years after his last film Tideland got pretty poor reviews. I actually happened to like Tideland for what it was and I thought it was a daring move by Jeff Bridges to take on such a dark role of a heroin addict like that. But with Dr. Parnassus, Gilliam is pretty much back in top form with his signature dark and twisted family fun fantasy film much like he was with The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, my favorite Gilliam film as well as my favorite fantasy film of all time. But this film is also unique in a way that it just so happens to be the great Health Ledgers final role before his tragic and untimely death.

The film centers around an old fashioned traveling theater that gets pulled around from town to town by horse. Led by the elderly Doctor Parnassus, brilliantly played by Christopher Plummer, the theater offers it's customers much more than they bargained for once they enter through the backstage area. When the traveling theater of four stumbles upon a man named Tony, played by Ledger, hanging by the neck from a bridge, things get even more weird as Tony starts to enter the imaginarium world with the customers.

The unfortunate passing of Ledger led to Gilliam having to shoot the scenes where Tony is in the imaginarium world with three other actors playing him instead of Ledger, and it actually works giving the film yet another unique Gilliam vision. The other three "imaginarium Tony's" are played by Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell thus creating a freaking all star cast. But I'll give you fair warning that Depp has maybe five to ten minutes of screen time at most, Law scraping in maybe five more minutes than that, and Farrell with the longest at maybe twenty minutes. Farrell actually has the best performance out of the three of them and has a really cool story line too. His section of the film which comes towards the end is definitely my favorite. I must admit that Farrell has been growing on me more and more over the years as I really hated the guy when he first entered the scene, but he really seems to have his shit together now and is choosing his roles more wisely.

The film is visually stunning as are all of Gilliam's films but the script and storyline get a tad confusing here and there and I was led off track a few times. Health Ledger and Christopher Plummer both turn in great performances and it was sad watching Heath knowing that it was the last time we'll see him in something new. It was actually a bit eery in some scenes where I saw the character of The Joker still in him mix in with his Tony character, keep an eye out for that. I didn't want to turn this into a Heath Ledger tribute, I'll save that for another day when I can dedicate my true time to the man, but I will definitely miss him as an actor. At least he left us with many great memorable films to remember him by. As for Terry Gilliam....keep'em coming man. I'm excited for this blu-ray as I'm sure it will look spectacular. The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus gets a 3 and a 1/2 outa 5.

Crazy Heart

The Crazy Heart is this years The Wrestler. A down on his luck aging country musician battling an addiction to alcohol, who's stuck playing at small town bars and bowling allies, attempts a comeback to try and revive his dead end career.

Jeff Bridges stars as the aging has been Bad Blake, one of the most bad-ass names I've ever heard used on screen. Right in the first scene we see the type of person Bad Black is as he parks his old busted up pick-up truck in the empty parking lot of a bowling alley, steps out with his pants unbuttoned growling and moaning, and dumps his urine out of the plastic bottle from his truck onto the pavement. He's down on his luck. Later we see that he's a raging alcoholic and heavy smoker who can't give the whiskey bottle a rest. Bad Blake's got talent though. After he meets Jean, a local reporter, and agrees to give her an interview they both end up falling for each other. But Bad still doesn't change his whiskey ways. After he loses her young son in a crowded mall while trying to get a drink at a bar she draws the line and leaves him. I won't give much more away but throughout the film he works on one particular song (The Weary Kind) and by the end of the film it fits in perfectly.

The supporting cast did it's job but not much more other than Robert Duvall who plays as Bad's good friend and mentor, Wayne. Colin Farrell was descent I thought as rising country star Tommy Sweet, who was once mentored by Bad. He actually plays a pretty big part in the film and his character is an important one as he really cares about Bad and helps him come back into the country scene. It was a role that could have easily been laughable but I thought he did a pretty good job. Scott Cooper also did a good job at directing and I'll be looking forward to his next feature. What a year it's been for first time directors, first Duncan Jones with Moon, Tom Ford with A Single Man, and now Scott Cooper with Crazy Heart. Just shows that there's lots of talent out there waiting to be discovered. Another cool little thing I noticed were Bad Blake's references to The Dude from The Big Lebowski. The very first scene where does he pull up to?? A bowling alley. There was another scene too where he runs off stage and outside to throw-up in a garbage can losing his glasses in it, he takes them right out and puts them right back on again. This also happened in Lebowski when he gets his head dunked in the toilet, and he pulls them right out and puts them right back on. Just something kinda cool that I noticed, there may be more but I'll have to wait until blu-ray. I give Crazy Heart 4 and 1/2 outa 5, Jeff Bridges was fantastic.