The Imaginative New Videos of 'Doctor Parnassus'

Ah, the brilliant, bizarre mind of Terry Gilliam. The American Monty Python member who became one of the most assured and unique film directors in the 1980s and 90s has not enjoyed much success lately, but his Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus debuted at Cannes and will be in theaters this fall, and will almost certainly engage moviegoers in more conversations about Gilliam's films and perhaps his place in history. The film, of course, has made more headlines about being Heath Ledger's last film than it has for anything else. It got some good reviews at Cannes, but didn't win awards or anything. The movie also stars Colin Farrell, Jude Law, and Johnny Depp, all of whom stepped in for Ledger, plus Christopher Plummer as Doctor Parnassus. Here's a couple minutes of the making of The Imaginarium of Doctober Parnassus, from Tout le Cine, where we also found three clips from the film. As you would expect, Gilliam has quite a visual landscape to work with: There's still no official U.S. release date for Parnassus, though I would suspect it will get a run at Toronto in early September and lock up a distributor either between now and then or during that ten-day period.