the imaginarium of doctor parnassus

I seem to recall the reviews for Parnassus being fairly negative when it came out. I can't actually remember what about it they criticised, but I rather enjoyed the film.

I think if I were to pick on negatives I'd probably go for two. First off, the film was a little long - there could easily have been some snips made that would have tightened things up and not really lost anything. Secondly, the core story was perhaps a little simple.

The second isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's just that the film itself tries to be a little more obtuse and distracting than the simplicity of the basic story needs. I think really I'd have preferred it to explored some of its sub-themes and throw-away ideas a bit more than it did over the stuff it tired to put in to make the core story seem more complex.

I'm not sure the above really makes sense, but I was trying to avoid anything that would count as spoilers. I'm also not really saying it because I disliked the film, more that there was some really good stuff in there that isn't really given enough time. Which is a bizarre contradiction given what I said about the length, but there you go.

Where the film does excel, brilliantly, is in the creativity and visual flair. This will come as no surprise to anyone who's familiar with Gilliam and his work, but I think he's really outdone himself here.

The other thing I should touch on, I suppose, is the whole issue of Heath Ledger's death. I was a little worried going in that it would be obvious where Ledger died - as in, certain scenes would inexplicably lack him. Well, as it turns out this was true, but they also managed to tweak the film such that, story-wise, it works.

So while the bits where Johnny Depp, Jude Law and then Colin Farrell step into his shoes are obvious, that obvious transition becomes a virtue. Not wanting to give anything away, the change of person becomes part of the point of Ledger's character. Indeed, if you didn't know it was done out of necessity, you'd probably think it was intentional.

I've kinda running out of things to say, because I really don't want to give any spoilers, but I also really enjoyed the film, so I can't really criticise it. As such I'll just leave it here.