TERRY GILLIAM

“You know what is real now?” – (Twelve Monkeys, 1995)

If Terry Gilliam had not become a filmmaker he surely would have ended up working as either an architect or a pathologist, such seems to be his interest in the internal workings of everything from people to buildings. Every film seems to contain imagery designed to reveal the ‘guts’ behind the façade. He’s got a few visual tricks up his sleeve. There are a number of scenes, more so high action sequences, that have a very jerky feel to them. This is deliberate in that Gilliam will purposely remove a frame or two of film to ‘fool’ the eye into thinking that there’s something not quite right with the world you’re watching.

“He’s got away from us, Jack” – (Brazil, 1985)

Terry Gilliam, born in Minnesota (the same place as the Coen Brothers, there’s clearly something in the snow) left the US as a student and first met the other members of the Monthly Python team dressed in a full length fur coat with a glamorous female on his arm, somewhat at odds with the dark-suited Oxbridge types. This tendency not to conform sums up why I think he’s the most interesting film director working today. Although Hollywood has produced some of my favourite films I still have a certain admiration for anyone who works outside the Hollywood system. It’s more to do with sticking to their own vision than me having anything against Hollywood films as such. Take the following:-

“I think it’s got something to do with free will” – (Time Bandits, 1981)

Just like ABBA, one day Terry Gilliam had a dream. In this dream, which some would designate a nightmare although Gilliam would probably claim was an idle thought, he was sitting on a deck chair on a beach. Not just any beach but one that had been polluted beyond belief, the sand blackened to the deepest black and the sea likewise. However, from over the sea and across the horizon came a sound, in fact a song, totally out of place with the desolation – “Brazil, when hearts were entertained in June, we stood beneath an amber moon and softly murmured ‘some day soon’…” This environment, coupled with the promise of something far happier but just out of reach, led Gilliam one day to create the dark and threatening world of ‘Brazil’ the film.

For the record, Brazil the country has absolutely nothing directly to do with the film but Gilliam clearly thought the song (from the 1930s) and therefore the title too good to waste. Other, thankfully abandoned, titles included 1984½! This film was funded by Hollywood and needless to say they insisted on a ‘Hollywood’ ending. For ‘Hollywood’ read ‘happy’. Gilliam felt that the whole point of the film, like it or not, was that the main character Sam Lowry (played by Jonathan Pryce) would never escape from his nightmare, or in fact real-life, world and indeed would never be able to. An upbeat ending would have rendered the film meaningless in Gilliam’s eyes. Columbia stood their ground and refused to grant a release date until Gilliam relented. So with a stalemate in place Gilliam took his film to the Canne film festival where it won the Critic’s Award. Upon returning to Hollywood, Gilliam took out a full-page advert in Variety, the Hollywood trade bible – ‘Dear Columbia, when are you going to release my movie Brazil?’. The movie execs finally saw sense.

“Everyone, who had a talent for it, lived happily ever after” – (The adventures of Baron Munchausen, 1988)

To sum up then, will someone please convince Terry Gilliam that his next film should be a movie version of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. I can think of no better choice. 

Ian.