
Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years - walterbell
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/04/terry-gilliams-don-quixote-film-finally-hits-the-big-screen-after-25-years/
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lisper
Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen
it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating
around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The
story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don
Quixote.

When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985,
before 9-11, before the internet, before ubiquitous surveillance. It is one of
the most prescient films ever made.

~~~
tomohawk
Great movie. When you watch it, you need to pay attention to every little
thing. For example, the movie opens with an advertisement for government
services. The dittie is hysterical, but its easy to miss. That theme gets
expanded quite a bit in the film culminating in a fantastic scene with Robert
De Niro as a rogue heating engineer.

~~~
toyg
I think you forgot the quotes around "heating engineer".

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max_likelihood
If you want the quotes added, you're going to need to fill out a 27b-6 ;)

~~~
BuildTheRobots
Completely missed that on previous watches of the film. 27b-6 is a reference
to George Orwell's address; Apartment 6, 27B Canonbury Square, Islington
London.

It's also the website of David Thorne, who is always amusing if you're looking
for some vicious sarcasm:
[http://www.27bslash6.com/missy.html](http://www.27bslash6.com/missy.html)

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stevewillows
I loved this film. Its quirky and scattered in all of the right ways.

I really admire Gilliam's persistence over the years -- and I'm thankful that
he was willing to allow not one, but two documentaries to be filmed about the
struggle to be made.

Critics have been a little lukewarm to the film, but everybody I know who has
seen it has loved it. It has definitely lived up to the hype. Its a shame I
wasn't able to catch it with a proper theatrical release. Its beautifully
shot, like a lot of his films.

~~~
monocasa
The standard critics have it out for Terry Gilliam for a bunch of reasons not
related to the quality if his work.

~~~
RobertKerans
I love Gilliam films, and I'll watch anything he does, but I think this a
stretch: he's _very_ patchy. No-one ever accuses him of not being interesting,
of not being full of ideas, not having a unique vision. It's just that those
ideas are so rarely fully realised, and his films tend to ramble. They often
feel incomplete, more surface than depth, gossamer.

As I say, I love his films and I'd happily watch almost anything he's done,
but I don't know how much of that is down to me being enamoured of what he
obviously tries to achieve. I just can't see how the critics are wrong most of
the time w/r/t his films, and to me those bad reviews have generally come
across as respectfully disappointed more than anything else.

~~~
malloryerik
When they aren't at their best, sitting through his films can feel like
watching some captivating person shoot arrows at the moon.

~~~
RobertKerans
Yes, definitely, thats a nice description. He tends to miss quite a bit, and
can be a quite frustrating experience just willing those arrows to hit.

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tomohawk
Also very entertaining: Lost in La Mancha. Its a documentary about the making
of this movie. It showcases some of the epic bad luck.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_La_Mancha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_La_Mancha)

~~~
matt4077
On a similar note, Hearts of Darkness
([https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102015/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102015/))
is among my top movies of all times.

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JeanMarcS
Finally ?

I saw it around a year ago in theater.

Is it just out now in the US ?

Edit : it seems that it is the case [0]. Well, we were lucky in France I guess

On a side note, I really liked this movie !

[0]
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1318517/releaseinfo?ref_=tt_ov_...](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1318517/releaseinfo?ref_=tt_ov_inf)

~~~
smacktoward
Yes. But wait, it gets worse! Here in the US, the theatrical run was exactly
one day long, and they didn't spend any money to promote it. So I, a huge
Gilliam fan, didn't even know it was happening until days later when stories
like this showed up.

Sigh.

~~~
JeanMarcS
That's bad luck.

I hope you can catch it this time !

~~~
smacktoward
C'est la vie :-D

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pbk1
Interesting - the last sentence of the logline reads "Or will love conquer
all?" [0]

Does anyone know if this is a snipe at Sid Sheinberg, who famously edited the
happy ending of Brazil which was titled "Love Conquers All"? [1]

[0]
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1318517/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1318517/)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazil_(1985_film)#Home_media](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazil_\(1985_film\)#Home_media)

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jfengel
I caught an interview with Gilliam on the Big Think podcast, on which he was
charming. He speaks very highly of Jonathan Pryce in the lead, but I'm even
more interested in seeing Adam Driver.

I haven't really enjoyed Driver's work in the past, not because he's bad at
his job but because he's typecast as the broody annoying guy. To hear Gilliam
describe it, he seems to start that way, but then gets to exercise comic chops
that I haven't seen him hit before. I'd love to think Driver has more range
than I've seen so far.

~~~
KingFelix
Go check it out, I was able to see this a couple of months ago. I really
enjoyed it, Gilliam has an amazing film style / world building ability.

I really feel transported to another universe/world in his films, Zero
Theorem/Dr Parnasis/12 Monkeys/Time Bandits/Fisher King.

I can only imagine what it feels like to finally release this film after so
many hurdles.

Love his work, his distribution lately has been rather crap, thumbs up from a
random on the internet.

~~~
entropicdrifter
I seriously wish they would do a sequel to Time Bandits. That movie was a cult
masterpiece.

~~~
egypturnash
There’s gonna be a series on Apple’s video service.

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puzzle
Which might or might not involve Gilliam himself in some kind of consulting
form. He's not sure yet, because they've been talking, but at the moment
there's no signature.

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greenstork
I wish they were doing a wider release in the USA. It only played for one
night in LA last week and it's going to play again for one night this week in
a tiny theater. I'm a big Gilliam fan and have been waiting to watch this
film, but it's difficult to see.

~~~
bigmanwalter
It's available on torrents ;) The Pirate Bay has it in 1080p!

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toyg
I want to see it but at the same time I don't. _Gilliam 's Don Quixote_ had
long surged to the pinnacle of "the best picture never made", the clearest
manifestation of the genius-destroying hardships of moviemaking. It had become
the embodiment of an aristotelian category.

Now it's just another film. Like _Duke Nukem Forever_ , its release has
inevitably declassed it.

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CalChris
I remember seeing a snippet of this film like 15 years ago (with Johnny Depp).
At that point it was never going to be finished. Now it's playing at the _4
Star_ in SF this Friday. I can't wait.

[https://screenmediafilms.net/productions/details/2795/The-
Ma...](https://screenmediafilms.net/productions/details/2795/The-Man-Who-
Killed-Don-Quixote)

~~~
jfengel
You probably saw some of _Lost in La Mancha_ , a documentary about the
disaster that project was.

This is a revival of that project. They resuscitated the script and completely
re-cast it (since, among other things, original lead Jean Rochefort passed
away more than a year ago).

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dysosmia
I'm hardly familiar with all the trouble this movie went through to get made,
I'm really, really happy with the main actors that finally got to see it
through. Jonathan Pryce and Adam Driver have such great interactions in the
small scenes of this movie, and those really made it for me despite the
legitimate problems this article brings up.

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drdeadringer
I volunteer as a projectionist at Cinequest, a film festival in San Jose. This
movie premiered as one of the festival book-ends this year [2019].

I personally didn't go out of personal preference and I have no regrets over
that. I've heard mixed reviews before and after. Maybe I'll see it eventually,
but I'm not itching for it.

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neves
There's a marvelous documentary about the failure of this movie: Lost in La
Mancha
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_La_Mancha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_La_Mancha)

BTW, I've ready the book other day. It is really fantastic.

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woodrowbarlow
i would characterize chaos, loss of agency, and delusion/delirium as the
common themes that tie together all of gilliam's major works. i love the
experience of watching the narratives unravel as the characters lose touch
with reality -- but rather than becoming isolated from the world, we see a
perspective where the entire world seems to descend into madness in the
character's footsteps.

i felt differently about this movie. the same themes are here, but much more
explicit. in this film, the character becomes more and more isolated, the
world becomes smaller and smaller, and the delusions are unilateral. it
doesn't allow me to follow the main character into the spiral and i'm left
feeling like an observer rather than a participant.

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8bitsrule
_Unfortunately, the plot, such as it is, unravels into delirious chaos during
the second half. Toby even breaks the fourth wall at one point to wonder
aloud, 'There's a plot?'_

I've asked the universe that question many times, but all I ever get is a
chuckle.

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danidiaz
The continuous blurring between different levels of fiction and reality in
this movie reminded of Philip K. Dick's novels, also of Stanislaw Lem's
"Futurological Congress".

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DINKDINK
Lost in La Mancha (2002) chronicles Gilliam's ordeal

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Pxtl
Did the allegations about "never get into an elevator alone with Terry
Gilliam" ever go anywhere?

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naranha
Reading the article, this has a werner herzogian vibe to it. I wonder how it
compares to aquirre - that film certainly has its delerious moments.

I love gilliam and brazil and twelve monkeys are among my favorite films.

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fb03
If you enjoy this, please try "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" from the same
Director.

