2006 Terry Gilliam surreal fantasyRating: 14/20
Plot: A little girl, already living in a world with heroin, bad lighting, and flatulence, flees with her father after her mother dies. More bad things--including more flatulence--occur, things become really weird, things become disturbing, somebody throws up, and somebody turns into caramel. The little girl retreats into her imagination to escape harsh realities, meets a mentally challenged man and a woman who may or may not be a ghost, and a phallic symbol explodes.
Utterly bizarre and one-of-a-kind, and definitely one of those movies that is hard to have a firm opinion of after a single viewing. I grumbled to my lovely wife (Cousin It) that it was too weird-for-the-sake-of-weird and over-the-top and that Terry Gilliam was shock directing to get a reaction and that too much of this was just disturbing and that I love when film makers are daring but that there were just too many chances taken here. But after I finished watching and tried to put the pieces together on what I think is probably entirely allegorical, the more I think I liked it. For one, the little girl (Jodelle Ferland) was fantastic, giving a versatile and award-worthy performance as the young protagonist.
Jeff Bridges is always good, and the other co-stars (especially Brendan Fletcher) were great, too. And the disturbing and surreal imagery, gorgeous sets, and cinematography will make this one easy to watch again, something I'll definitely need to do again to figure out if it's entirely brilliant or a complete crapfest.
A special note...I see a lot of strange movies and a lot of my favorite movies are strange movies. This has to be a top five strangest for me though. Utterly bizarre!
Here's chilly me trying to figure out what is wrong with Terry Gilliam:
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