Not a masterpiece, not a disaster, The man who killed Don Quixote has the qualities and faults of what it is, that is to say, basically, a film for one spectator only : Terry Gilliam himself.
Announcing its legend in the opening credits, the film takes pleasure in referring quite openly to the misadventures of Lost in La Mancha, most often through lines put in the mouth of the producer played by Stellan Skarsgard. These winks would be at best anecdotic, at worst narcissistic, if we didn't realize little by little that, we are in the presence of a true cinematic exorcism. Exorcism of this damned project, certainly. Exorcism also, through the character of Toby, of what Gilliam could have become if he had listened to the sirens of advertising and had become a soulless hack. Exorcism finally, and this is the most touching, of what Gilliam is afraid of becoming (and that he may have already become for some), that is to say an old fool who no longer interests anyone, an old dreamer in a materialistic world, a relic from another time, mocked and ridiculed. Thus, despite all its failures (problems of rhythm, lack of breath due to lack of money, episodic structure that works randomly and unfortunately makes Quixote disappear many times), we can only admire this film which bears on its face its testamentary dimension. Transmission, summary of a life, return on his youth, everything is there. Gilliam is Quixote, Gilliam is Toby, Gilliam will die but Gilliam is immortal since his dreams are forever with us on film. This is the bittersweet and somewhat crazy statement of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, a film about films, a story about stories, an endless dream.
144 Reviews
Stop! Stop! This is insane!
jrevans-999-2759129 May 2020
At 1:22:30, the protagonist, Toby, utters this line. So I did stop the film, made a sandwich and cup of tea, then decided to watch to the end, which didn't come soon enough.
As visual art, the film is superb. But as a story, it is confusing. With all its bizarre references self-reflexivity, the central story becomes a side plot.
It was visually beautiful, well-acted, great costumes and music, but thoroughly disjointed and confusing for much of the time. It had me thinking "this movie wasn't made for an audience".
Totally bonkers
schrijvermarcel27 July 2018
Totally bonkers, dreamlike, vintage Gilliam and in the end even Lynchian weird. When it works it's brilliant, when it doesn't, it's baffling and sometimes boring. But even when the script doesn't work, the movie is saved by the incredible cast. It's among both Adam Driver's and Jonathan Pryce best work. Also, I'm in love with Joana Ribeiro.
the gypsy, the writer, the eye
RResende7 June 2018
Warning: Spoilers
As humans, we create stories to represent ourselves, and to grasp the world that we don't understand. Arguably everything that we call art is in the end some sort of narrative, some system created to explain aspects that we didn't understand. Those stories are abstractions, a simplification that we use to reach deeper, to make order out of the apparent chaos.
At the end of the 16th century, a growing number of european unrelated artists were working on novel revolutionary ways to represent ourselves, changing how we explain who we are and actually changing thus "who" we are. Cervantes, Shakespeare, Velázquez, and others, were giving us new modes of abstraction, new modes of (self) presentation. Mirrors.
Quixote is all about that. A story about someone who creates himself based on other stories. A character who wipes the definition of reality by merging it with his own reality, co created by him and all the other storytellers who created the stories that drove him to his paralell reality. Then, the confrontation of his invented world with the reality of the world that surrounds me - the common depiction of this is having the "real" world take Quixote as "crazy". That's an extra simplification, an extra abstraction. Irony.
Cinema could be in theory a fine medium to translate Quixote into, and that has been tried a lot of times. Now we have this Gilliam attempt, and the layers of this project, its own story, add a bit more to the excitment of Cervantes. Some information is required:
Gilliam had tried to do this project before. It failed for a number of pedestrian reasons. That failed project has a story of its own, and generated a film about its (attempted) making. Now he completes it, and the synopsis could go like this:
A filmmaker (Gilliam) is making a film, based on Quixote, after having failed to do it 16 years ago (we are one layer deep from reality). This new film is about a filmmaker (Toby) who is doing a commercial film of Quixote in Spain (film within a film, 2 layers deep). We learn that the first images we see are actually part of a film within by a breaking of the 4th wall Truffaut style. Toby had done a student version of Quixote 10 years before, and that film sort of magically pops back in his life. He watches this other Quixote versions, we get glimpses of it (another film within the film, still 2 layers deep but paralell to the other film). As Toby visits the village where he had made that student film, he finds out that film affected the reality of all the people involved in it: the actor from Quixote believes himself to BE Quixote, Toby's girl/lover had her life pretty much destroyed by having done the film, and so on. This new discovered reality, provoked by Toby's student film, invades the reality of Toby's life, and he is literally taken into the old film (he rediscovers the old actor/Quixote watching his film) and mistaken by Sancho. After this we see the unfolding of superficially Fellini inspired episodes, of reality blurred layers, plays on "what's real", and a Wellesian party on a remarkable building, near the end (more on that soon). In doing that, Gilliam uses a bunch of tricks, some well used, some not so. None of them is completely novel, i think. So we have bits of self-reference, such as when Toby literally removes english language subtitles from the screen. In one scene he claims to have written the lines that Quixote is telling him (that one is masterful as dialogue serving the concept).
The gypsy who give Toby the dvd and keeps coming up is a fundamental character. A wizard of sorts, i believe a kind of surrogate to Cervantes on screen, a master puppeteer who manipulates and drives the narrative, all the way to the end. That's a genius character.
I appreciate that Gilliam is a risk taker. This is a crazy imperfect film, which has some beautiful images. What I think Gilliam did well was to place the reluctant Sancho/Toby as a film director, and apparently the one through whose eyes we watch the story. That is self-referential in the way Cervantes conceived it, i think. So many people have misunderstood Sancho as some sort of "comic sidekick", the validation of Quixote's madness, and so on. But he is in fact the holder of the keys of paradise, the man who chooses to go mad, the character who sees both realities, and chooses to be in both almost always at the same time. He is one of the most powerful fiction characters ever, he is all of us at some moment of our lives, and he truly is the best character of Cervantes, and i believe the one where Cervantes projected his own self more clearly. In the original Gilliam project, Depp was going to play the part. Oh I wish he had... That's my personal film. Watching this new version i was simply imagining how Depp would handle the shifting between realities, between layers of fantasy. Driver is not quite up to the part. Pitty...
I also don't understand why he had to channel the representation of Spain as a "Carmenesque" world. Carmen is after all a collection of spanish (mostly andalusian) clichés filtered through the eyes of a frenchman. They became popular in Europe inthe 19th century and still represent the images that most people associate with the meaningless concept of "spain" (bullfight, hot tempered love, sun, harshness and a certain concept of tragic fate). It is sadly ironic that Gilliam, who has some nice visual intuitions, and solid storytelling complex concepts fell into this so easily avoidable trap. I suppose this won't be such a problem for someone who doesn't now Spain, or watched it only through a touristic gaze (which is shamelessly sponsored by the very spanish government in their promotion of the country).
Visually, he mixes his own well established style, the odd wide angles (often wellesian) with the by now required standard Quixote scenery... that thing about a guy in a horse and another in a mule riding the desert against sun light. But than he brings for his delirious climax his architectural eye, and that's what grabbed me more:
Our characters are taken to an obnoxious russian millionaire's palace. The event is a masquerade ball (Arkadin style), where pretending to be Quixote won't apparently seem so crazy. That palace is a remarkable building. It's a convent and church, in Portugal, built across several centuries, with many of our best architects from each time participating in it. It is a collage of styles, each one integrating in the whole while retaining its own character. He films mostly the central church, a Templary octogonal church, a mystical powerful space, dynamic in that it invites moving around it; and 2 of the four big cloisters. The whole place has always been the center of strong spiritual representations that predate Christianity in Portugal, and it still retains its power. I'm thankful that one of the great film architects that we have got to film it. This is probably the second best use of portuguese architecture in cinema, after Welles filmed his Othello's "sauna scene" in a magical light portuguese cistern in Morocco.
Anyway Gilliam opposes openness (desert, big landscapes, etc.) to the tragedy of the architectural space, where the most intense plot points happen. First the humilliation and breaking of Quixote's fantasy (check how that is ostensibly show as a film set, with visible lights, artificial props, SD indications, etc.). And than, the inevitable death of Quixote. We close our final (circular) narrative layer here: the shattered Toby, who killed Quixote, assumes his invented reality, and becomes Quixote himself, with his lover as Sancho. They ride with the former Quixote's body to bury him, and the meet the giants that Gilliam had shot for his first failed attempt. We actually see the test footage he had made. We are left there, with our Toby turned Sancho turned Quixote literally entering the film that Gilliam never made. That was masterful.
I will choose Welles and Fellini over Gilliam. This is a flawed uncontrolled film. But Gilliam is all about that: letting his intuition (mostly visual) contaminate all the rest. I respect him. Watch this, but consider all the layers. It will make it richer, i think.
At the end of the 16th century, a growing number of european unrelated artists were working on novel revolutionary ways to represent ourselves, changing how we explain who we are and actually changing thus "who" we are. Cervantes, Shakespeare, Velázquez, and others, were giving us new modes of abstraction, new modes of (self) presentation. Mirrors.
Quixote is all about that. A story about someone who creates himself based on other stories. A character who wipes the definition of reality by merging it with his own reality, co created by him and all the other storytellers who created the stories that drove him to his paralell reality. Then, the confrontation of his invented world with the reality of the world that surrounds me - the common depiction of this is having the "real" world take Quixote as "crazy". That's an extra simplification, an extra abstraction. Irony.
Cinema could be in theory a fine medium to translate Quixote into, and that has been tried a lot of times. Now we have this Gilliam attempt, and the layers of this project, its own story, add a bit more to the excitment of Cervantes. Some information is required:
Gilliam had tried to do this project before. It failed for a number of pedestrian reasons. That failed project has a story of its own, and generated a film about its (attempted) making. Now he completes it, and the synopsis could go like this:
A filmmaker (Gilliam) is making a film, based on Quixote, after having failed to do it 16 years ago (we are one layer deep from reality). This new film is about a filmmaker (Toby) who is doing a commercial film of Quixote in Spain (film within a film, 2 layers deep). We learn that the first images we see are actually part of a film within by a breaking of the 4th wall Truffaut style. Toby had done a student version of Quixote 10 years before, and that film sort of magically pops back in his life. He watches this other Quixote versions, we get glimpses of it (another film within the film, still 2 layers deep but paralell to the other film). As Toby visits the village where he had made that student film, he finds out that film affected the reality of all the people involved in it: the actor from Quixote believes himself to BE Quixote, Toby's girl/lover had her life pretty much destroyed by having done the film, and so on. This new discovered reality, provoked by Toby's student film, invades the reality of Toby's life, and he is literally taken into the old film (he rediscovers the old actor/Quixote watching his film) and mistaken by Sancho. After this we see the unfolding of superficially Fellini inspired episodes, of reality blurred layers, plays on "what's real", and a Wellesian party on a remarkable building, near the end (more on that soon). In doing that, Gilliam uses a bunch of tricks, some well used, some not so. None of them is completely novel, i think. So we have bits of self-reference, such as when Toby literally removes english language subtitles from the screen. In one scene he claims to have written the lines that Quixote is telling him (that one is masterful as dialogue serving the concept).
The gypsy who give Toby the dvd and keeps coming up is a fundamental character. A wizard of sorts, i believe a kind of surrogate to Cervantes on screen, a master puppeteer who manipulates and drives the narrative, all the way to the end. That's a genius character.
I appreciate that Gilliam is a risk taker. This is a crazy imperfect film, which has some beautiful images. What I think Gilliam did well was to place the reluctant Sancho/Toby as a film director, and apparently the one through whose eyes we watch the story. That is self-referential in the way Cervantes conceived it, i think. So many people have misunderstood Sancho as some sort of "comic sidekick", the validation of Quixote's madness, and so on. But he is in fact the holder of the keys of paradise, the man who chooses to go mad, the character who sees both realities, and chooses to be in both almost always at the same time. He is one of the most powerful fiction characters ever, he is all of us at some moment of our lives, and he truly is the best character of Cervantes, and i believe the one where Cervantes projected his own self more clearly. In the original Gilliam project, Depp was going to play the part. Oh I wish he had... That's my personal film. Watching this new version i was simply imagining how Depp would handle the shifting between realities, between layers of fantasy. Driver is not quite up to the part. Pitty...
I also don't understand why he had to channel the representation of Spain as a "Carmenesque" world. Carmen is after all a collection of spanish (mostly andalusian) clichés filtered through the eyes of a frenchman. They became popular in Europe inthe 19th century and still represent the images that most people associate with the meaningless concept of "spain" (bullfight, hot tempered love, sun, harshness and a certain concept of tragic fate). It is sadly ironic that Gilliam, who has some nice visual intuitions, and solid storytelling complex concepts fell into this so easily avoidable trap. I suppose this won't be such a problem for someone who doesn't now Spain, or watched it only through a touristic gaze (which is shamelessly sponsored by the very spanish government in their promotion of the country).
Visually, he mixes his own well established style, the odd wide angles (often wellesian) with the by now required standard Quixote scenery... that thing about a guy in a horse and another in a mule riding the desert against sun light. But than he brings for his delirious climax his architectural eye, and that's what grabbed me more:
Our characters are taken to an obnoxious russian millionaire's palace. The event is a masquerade ball (Arkadin style), where pretending to be Quixote won't apparently seem so crazy. That palace is a remarkable building. It's a convent and church, in Portugal, built across several centuries, with many of our best architects from each time participating in it. It is a collage of styles, each one integrating in the whole while retaining its own character. He films mostly the central church, a Templary octogonal church, a mystical powerful space, dynamic in that it invites moving around it; and 2 of the four big cloisters. The whole place has always been the center of strong spiritual representations that predate Christianity in Portugal, and it still retains its power. I'm thankful that one of the great film architects that we have got to film it. This is probably the second best use of portuguese architecture in cinema, after Welles filmed his Othello's "sauna scene" in a magical light portuguese cistern in Morocco.
Anyway Gilliam opposes openness (desert, big landscapes, etc.) to the tragedy of the architectural space, where the most intense plot points happen. First the humilliation and breaking of Quixote's fantasy (check how that is ostensibly show as a film set, with visible lights, artificial props, SD indications, etc.). And than, the inevitable death of Quixote. We close our final (circular) narrative layer here: the shattered Toby, who killed Quixote, assumes his invented reality, and becomes Quixote himself, with his lover as Sancho. They ride with the former Quixote's body to bury him, and the meet the giants that Gilliam had shot for his first failed attempt. We actually see the test footage he had made. We are left there, with our Toby turned Sancho turned Quixote literally entering the film that Gilliam never made. That was masterful.
I will choose Welles and Fellini over Gilliam. This is a flawed uncontrolled film. But Gilliam is all about that: letting his intuition (mostly visual) contaminate all the rest. I respect him. Watch this, but consider all the layers. It will make it richer, i think.
Some good bits, but overall a mild failure
cherold3 October 2019
The history of the making of this movie is ultimately more interesting than the movie itself. A disaster-prone adaptation of Don Quixote eventually gets made about a movie as a director sucked into the book's world. The script was rewritten, year after year, so it's surprising that the end result feels a little under-baked.
The film follows a director, Toby, who while filming the windmill scene from Don Quixote discovers a copy of a student film he made on the same topic. He goes in search of his actors, finds his lead has taken on the role permanently, and finds himself floating between reality and fantasy.
Toby is a fairly awful and destructive person, and to some extent the movie follows the trajectory of awful person gets a chance to look at his life. But that part isn't especially convincing. The movie is mainly notable for Jonathan Pryce's spirited take on Quixote, the decadence of the castle scenes, and the shifting realities. But while all these things are good on their own, they never quite fit into a cohesive drama. Joana Ribeiro is appealing as the damsel, but her motivations are murky and she always seems more plot device than fleshed-out character. And the ending is just lazy and unconvincing.
Parts of the movie are enjoyable, but at the end my reaction was a big "so what."
The film follows a director, Toby, who while filming the windmill scene from Don Quixote discovers a copy of a student film he made on the same topic. He goes in search of his actors, finds his lead has taken on the role permanently, and finds himself floating between reality and fantasy.
Toby is a fairly awful and destructive person, and to some extent the movie follows the trajectory of awful person gets a chance to look at his life. But that part isn't especially convincing. The movie is mainly notable for Jonathan Pryce's spirited take on Quixote, the decadence of the castle scenes, and the shifting realities. But while all these things are good on their own, they never quite fit into a cohesive drama. Joana Ribeiro is appealing as the damsel, but her motivations are murky and she always seems more plot device than fleshed-out character. And the ending is just lazy and unconvincing.
Parts of the movie are enjoyable, but at the end my reaction was a big "so what."
Chivalry is not dead (or is it?)
lee_eisenberg30 November 2020
Terry Gilliam's long-gestating adaptation of Miguel de Cervantes's novel almost came to fruition in the early 2000s, before a series of mishaps forced production to shut down. Gilliam eventually managed to restart production and complete the movie. I should note that "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote" is not a direct adaptation of the novel; it depicts a present-day man (Jonathan Pryce) who convinces himself that he's the famous knight-errant, and that his erstwhile director (Adam Driver) is his squire.
You gotta love a Terry Gilliam movie (and yes, that includes the widely reviled "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"). As he often does, he turns out a surreal story with quirky characters. At times the movie is befuddling, with the viewer not totally sure what's real. It's not Gilliam's best by any stretch, but worth seeing. I hope to eventually see the documentary about the failed production of the movie's first attempt.
You gotta love a Terry Gilliam movie (and yes, that includes the widely reviled "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"). As he often does, he turns out a surreal story with quirky characters. At times the movie is befuddling, with the viewer not totally sure what's real. It's not Gilliam's best by any stretch, but worth seeing. I hope to eventually see the documentary about the failed production of the movie's first attempt.
Don Finds the way.. Eventually.
dimitris-kara10 May 2020
Great cast with great performances, wonderful cinematography, nice additions of humor here and there and a movie that finds it difficult to stay in control of its own course.
As we follow Toby through his mind instability progress through the film, so does our understanding of a director's grasp on reality deepens. It is not difficult to be lost in your fantasy world it seems.
That being the case, the movie's flaw is that it takes too long to reach its climax and when it does, it doesn't pay off.
2:12 lost of time
eldenico16 August 2021
Again, Gilliam Takes Us on a Thought-Provoking Wild Ride
Skinshark23 May 2018
Maybe it helps to be familiar with Terry Gilliam's canon of work. But as a whole The Man Who Killed Don Quixote is a multi-layered story of the Ages of Man. The Dreamer and the Raconteur living in parallel lives.
What's fascinating is how the meanings of each of the characters and their story arcs fold into each other from the director, Terry Gilliam's own life to Adam Driver, playing a Gilliam figure all the way to Jonathan Pryce's man who's seemingly lost his mind. Part of me wonders how much of this is a farcical documentary or auto-biography.
Still as heady as it can be it still entertains. The acting is great, the characters are fully realized and the settings, cinematography and production design are signature styles of Gilliam: hand-crafted to bend to the will of his vision...as mad as it may be.
This is not a run-of-the-mill linear movie. It's not a popcorn flick. There's a lot to interpret and involve the audience so, don't expect instant gratification. To a lot of reviewers it seems they were overwhelmed by an unclear story. Which that may be true for those who don't want to be involved in the story. It asks a bit of self-reflection, it asks a bit of trust that the characters, working on several levels of psychosis, dreams, hallucinations and madness will all come to a natural conclusion in their story arcs and bring the global story of the film into one single point of focus:
We all had dreams once and we got lost. We may remember those dreams in our middle-age and yet in our old age we may become consumed by the dream to point of dreaming of our own existence.
If you like BRAZIL or THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS you will like this film.
What's fascinating is how the meanings of each of the characters and their story arcs fold into each other from the director, Terry Gilliam's own life to Adam Driver, playing a Gilliam figure all the way to Jonathan Pryce's man who's seemingly lost his mind. Part of me wonders how much of this is a farcical documentary or auto-biography.
Still as heady as it can be it still entertains. The acting is great, the characters are fully realized and the settings, cinematography and production design are signature styles of Gilliam: hand-crafted to bend to the will of his vision...as mad as it may be.
This is not a run-of-the-mill linear movie. It's not a popcorn flick. There's a lot to interpret and involve the audience so, don't expect instant gratification. To a lot of reviewers it seems they were overwhelmed by an unclear story. Which that may be true for those who don't want to be involved in the story. It asks a bit of self-reflection, it asks a bit of trust that the characters, working on several levels of psychosis, dreams, hallucinations and madness will all come to a natural conclusion in their story arcs and bring the global story of the film into one single point of focus:
We all had dreams once and we got lost. We may remember those dreams in our middle-age and yet in our old age we may become consumed by the dream to point of dreaming of our own existence.
If you like BRAZIL or THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS you will like this film.
I love Terry Gilliam but unfortunately there is a lot wrong with this film
feelinesound5 November 2018
Warning: Spoilers
This guy has made 3 of my favourite films ever in 12 Monkeys, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Brazil, as well as a host of other great films such as Fisher King, Baron Munchausen and the Monty Python stuff, so needless to say I'm a massive fan. Unfortunately that means I came to this movie with high expectations. A lot of the typical Gilliam traits are here, but unlike many of his older films the cinematography and production values are pretty mediocre, the pacing is off, scenes seem to over extend and the shifts between reality and imagination seem, well, cheap, as were the rather inappropriate jumps in location between green hills and desert.
What bothered me most of all though was the language inauthenticity - Jonathan Pryce in particular was a really bad casting choice to play a Spaniard, he clearly could barely speak Spanish if at all, and couldn't even pull off a decent Spanish accent when speaking English. Why not cast a Spaniard, or a Latin American who can do a passable Spanish accent? He's the most prominent but not the only such example in the film, and scenes between native Spaniards speaking in English to each other also made little sense.
There were of course positives, as in every Terry Gilliam movie - visually the movie gets much better once they get to the final act in an old castle setting, and some of the casting choices (e.g. Driver, Skarsgard and Ribeiro) were good. And the same old Gilliamish odes to imagination, innocence and the belief than anything is possible (even when it isn't) never truly get old. But due to the aforementioned issues the emotional impact just wasn't as strong as it could and should have been.
What bothered me most of all though was the language inauthenticity - Jonathan Pryce in particular was a really bad casting choice to play a Spaniard, he clearly could barely speak Spanish if at all, and couldn't even pull off a decent Spanish accent when speaking English. Why not cast a Spaniard, or a Latin American who can do a passable Spanish accent? He's the most prominent but not the only such example in the film, and scenes between native Spaniards speaking in English to each other also made little sense.
There were of course positives, as in every Terry Gilliam movie - visually the movie gets much better once they get to the final act in an old castle setting, and some of the casting choices (e.g. Driver, Skarsgard and Ribeiro) were good. And the same old Gilliamish odes to imagination, innocence and the belief than anything is possible (even when it isn't) never truly get old. But due to the aforementioned issues the emotional impact just wasn't as strong as it could and should have been.
The the fact, that famous film-maker completes his passion project in 29 years, doesn't mean it was worth the wait
kaptenvideo-8987514 October 2018
This is the shambling zombie godfather of all vanity projects, and a living testament to the notion that true magnum opus just can't be forced into existence, although a creative mind should always aim for his/her best.
Terry Gilliam tried to pull this project together for 29 (!) years, and while he succeeded in finally finishing and releasing it, the result sucks so hard that it took me considerable strength to just stay with it for more than 10 minutes.
The "Monty Python" legend - director and one of the two screenwriters of this misfire - has given life to his fair share of interesting movies. But none of them were released during current century, and this is definitely the new all-time low.
The best that can be said about the movie is that it's a sad, sad example of how people sometimes refuse to let go things that are clearly failing.
It is not mediocre or unpolished diamond in search of a better form. The movie just doesn't work, on any level - and to add insult to the injury, it looks and feels cheap and outdated, as if done ages ago and then forgotten until now.
The result is purposeless, obscure, dull, and way too long. And the limp, graceless attempts at humor are too obvious to be funny. I didn't even smile once.
In Gilliam's head, the concept for all this surely must have sounded intriguing. The blending of real life and fantasy, magic and mundane, literature and popculture, drama and comedy - what could go wrong, right? Well, almost everything as evidenced here.
There is no emotion, no proper story - only outlines of it - or fleshed-out characters.
To put it bluntly, "Don Quixote" is filled with cartoonish situations supposed to feel wacky and funny, and people used as pawns to move the scenes along, more decorations than real figures that we could somehow relate to.
We have some interesting actors here - Adam Driver, Stellan Skarsgård, Jonathan Price - but they are not able to compensate for the material's obvious lack of wit and charm.
Like many failed comedies, the result might have worked as a sketch - or series of sketches -, but not as a coherent stroy lasting over two hours.
Actually, "Don Quixote" does not really work even in short doses. It takes about 45 minutes to see the first moments hinting at the creative chaos Gilliam has aimed at, but the content is never inspired enough to lift the veil of dullness and detachment which covers everything as a shroud.
Whoever's interested in this is probably better off just reading about the making of it, which is said to be one of the most cursed film projects in history.
By the way, Gilliam's old "Monty Python"-era colleague and co-fighter Terry Jones' latest is almost equally terrible and unfunny.
But compared to current fiasco, 2015's "Absolutely Anything" at least resembles a professionally put together movie.
Terry Gilliam tried to pull this project together for 29 (!) years, and while he succeeded in finally finishing and releasing it, the result sucks so hard that it took me considerable strength to just stay with it for more than 10 minutes.
The "Monty Python" legend - director and one of the two screenwriters of this misfire - has given life to his fair share of interesting movies. But none of them were released during current century, and this is definitely the new all-time low.
The best that can be said about the movie is that it's a sad, sad example of how people sometimes refuse to let go things that are clearly failing.
It is not mediocre or unpolished diamond in search of a better form. The movie just doesn't work, on any level - and to add insult to the injury, it looks and feels cheap and outdated, as if done ages ago and then forgotten until now.
The result is purposeless, obscure, dull, and way too long. And the limp, graceless attempts at humor are too obvious to be funny. I didn't even smile once.
In Gilliam's head, the concept for all this surely must have sounded intriguing. The blending of real life and fantasy, magic and mundane, literature and popculture, drama and comedy - what could go wrong, right? Well, almost everything as evidenced here.
There is no emotion, no proper story - only outlines of it - or fleshed-out characters.
To put it bluntly, "Don Quixote" is filled with cartoonish situations supposed to feel wacky and funny, and people used as pawns to move the scenes along, more decorations than real figures that we could somehow relate to.
We have some interesting actors here - Adam Driver, Stellan Skarsgård, Jonathan Price - but they are not able to compensate for the material's obvious lack of wit and charm.
Like many failed comedies, the result might have worked as a sketch - or series of sketches -, but not as a coherent stroy lasting over two hours.
Actually, "Don Quixote" does not really work even in short doses. It takes about 45 minutes to see the first moments hinting at the creative chaos Gilliam has aimed at, but the content is never inspired enough to lift the veil of dullness and detachment which covers everything as a shroud.
Whoever's interested in this is probably better off just reading about the making of it, which is said to be one of the most cursed film projects in history.
By the way, Gilliam's old "Monty Python"-era colleague and co-fighter Terry Jones' latest is almost equally terrible and unfunny.
But compared to current fiasco, 2015's "Absolutely Anything" at least resembles a professionally put together movie.
Wonderful film gets thrashed for imaginary reasons
scaradu30 March 2019
I don't know what people were expecting from this movie and I really don't get the low scores. This movie was fun, adventurous, well acted and above all else very different and unique, with a brilliant twist on the Don Quixote story. This film did not come out of Hollywood's movie spewing machine so I would guess audiences nowadays are too dumb to comprehend a good work of art. A metaphor. An analogy. An intricate story that blends fantasy and real, history and present, fact and fiction.
This film was wonderful and I smiled all throughout. It is similar to films such as Holy Motors (2012), The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014) so if these ring a bell please give this film a chance. You will thank me later.
I rated it a 9 because so many people rated it so low and, honestly, it's at least a 7. Considering the fact I smiled all throughout the film I give it a 9 but objectively it as an 8.
This film was wonderful and I smiled all throughout. It is similar to films such as Holy Motors (2012), The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014) so if these ring a bell please give this film a chance. You will thank me later.
I rated it a 9 because so many people rated it so low and, honestly, it's at least a 7. Considering the fact I smiled all throughout the film I give it a 9 but objectively it as an 8.
Dreamlike
ferguson-622 April 2019
Greetings again from the darkness. When watching, discussing or reviewing a movie from filmmaker Terry Gilliam, it's often best to relax one's expectations for a linear story line, and maybe even the hope for a coherent one. He's the creative force behind such diverse and divisive films as THE FISHER KING (1991), THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN (1988), BRAZIL (1985), TIME BANDITS (1981), and of course, comedy classic MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL (1975). We've seen his movies described as crazy, confusing, and messy - and also brilliant, unique, and creative. Mr. Gilliam himself would likely agree with all of those descriptions, while adding a few colorful terms of his own.
Despite the oddball career he's had, none of his movies have had the topsy-turvy, on-again/off-again path to production as THE MAN WHO KILLED DON QUIXOTE. Gilliam's first attempts at getting the movie made date back to 1989 (yes, 30 years ago), and the first round of financing was secured in 1998 with Johnny Depp in a lead role. By 2002, there was a fascinating documentary, LOST IN LA MANCHA, which chronicled the reasons the film failed to get made and would never be finished. Mr. Gilliam has proven, 17 years later, that he should never be counted out.
Gilliam co-wrote the screenplay with Tony Grisoni, and the two have previously collaborated on TIDELAND (2005) and FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS (1998). As you might guess, it's not a typical screenplay or story, and one certainly need not be an expert on the original Cervantes book or character to find value (or not) in this tale.
"I am Don Quixote de la Mancha." There is something distinctly prideful about the proclamation, but it's also used somewhat ironically at least once in this film. Adam Driver plays hotshot and cynical filmmaker Toby, and things change abruptly for him when he returns to the Spanish town where he shot his student film ten years prior. In that film, he had cast locals, including the town cobbler as Don Quixote. A bootleg DVD of the film drags Toby into the fallout that has occurred over the past decade.
Jonathan Pryce co-stars as Javier, the former cobbler who now lives his life believing he is actually Don Quixote. He then sees Toby, and "recognizes" (mistakes) him as Sancho Panza, his trusty and loyal sidekick. This kicks off a series of adventures/misadventures that is a blend of fantasy, reality and imagination. Paths are crossed with Jacqui (Olga Kurylenko), Angelica (Joana Ribeira), and the head of the studio (Stellan Skarsgard). At times, it's a movie within a movie, and a key is the name of the town: Suenos means dreams. Dreamlike or surreal is the best description for many of the best sequences.
Mr. Gilliam dedicates the film to Jean Rochefort and John Hurt, both cast in early versions and both now deceased. Somehow the film is simultaneously smart and goofy; thought-provoking and confusing. It's definitely not for everyone - more for those who enjoy digging in to philosophical meanings, and less for those who prefer to kick back and be entertained. There is a lot here about how we see ourselves, how our dreams impact us, and of course, the lost art of chivalry. Above all, we admire the outlook: "This is a marvelous day for an adventure. I feel it in my bones."
Despite the oddball career he's had, none of his movies have had the topsy-turvy, on-again/off-again path to production as THE MAN WHO KILLED DON QUIXOTE. Gilliam's first attempts at getting the movie made date back to 1989 (yes, 30 years ago), and the first round of financing was secured in 1998 with Johnny Depp in a lead role. By 2002, there was a fascinating documentary, LOST IN LA MANCHA, which chronicled the reasons the film failed to get made and would never be finished. Mr. Gilliam has proven, 17 years later, that he should never be counted out.
Gilliam co-wrote the screenplay with Tony Grisoni, and the two have previously collaborated on TIDELAND (2005) and FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS (1998). As you might guess, it's not a typical screenplay or story, and one certainly need not be an expert on the original Cervantes book or character to find value (or not) in this tale.
"I am Don Quixote de la Mancha." There is something distinctly prideful about the proclamation, but it's also used somewhat ironically at least once in this film. Adam Driver plays hotshot and cynical filmmaker Toby, and things change abruptly for him when he returns to the Spanish town where he shot his student film ten years prior. In that film, he had cast locals, including the town cobbler as Don Quixote. A bootleg DVD of the film drags Toby into the fallout that has occurred over the past decade.
Jonathan Pryce co-stars as Javier, the former cobbler who now lives his life believing he is actually Don Quixote. He then sees Toby, and "recognizes" (mistakes) him as Sancho Panza, his trusty and loyal sidekick. This kicks off a series of adventures/misadventures that is a blend of fantasy, reality and imagination. Paths are crossed with Jacqui (Olga Kurylenko), Angelica (Joana Ribeira), and the head of the studio (Stellan Skarsgard). At times, it's a movie within a movie, and a key is the name of the town: Suenos means dreams. Dreamlike or surreal is the best description for many of the best sequences.
Mr. Gilliam dedicates the film to Jean Rochefort and John Hurt, both cast in early versions and both now deceased. Somehow the film is simultaneously smart and goofy; thought-provoking and confusing. It's definitely not for everyone - more for those who enjoy digging in to philosophical meanings, and less for those who prefer to kick back and be entertained. There is a lot here about how we see ourselves, how our dreams impact us, and of course, the lost art of chivalry. Above all, we admire the outlook: "This is a marvelous day for an adventure. I feel it in my bones."
Sadly not worth the wait
eddie_baggins3 October 2019
There's no doubt in my mind that Terry Gilliam's fabled 29 year journey to bring The Man Who Killed Don Quixote to the big screen is more intriguing than what we have sadly got hear as an end product, as while Gilliam's oddball adventure features all of his usual kooky eccentricities and wild visuals, there's something alarmingly amiss in this messy and lethargic trip into the mind of madness.
That we have any cinematic version of Gilliam's long time pet project is quite the feat of moviemaking and for anyone that laid witness to the incredibly eye-opening documentary Lost in La Mancha, that offered a behind the scenes look of Gilliam's first cursed attempt at bringing this tale to life, it will be a pleasure to see the credits begin to roll here but that excitement and anticipation soon gives way to a sad realisation that it once more feels like the best of Gilliam has long since disappeared, with nothing more than pale imitations left in its stead, although thankfully for all this is a huge step up from Gilliam's last feature misfire The Zero Theorem.
The Terry Gilliam of the 80's and early/mid 90's would've made an amazing version of this tale, that sees Adam Driver's arrogant and lost filmmaker Toby go on a wild journey with Jonathan Pryce's delusional cobbler turned madman that believes wholeheartedly that he is the esteemed Don Quixote incarnate, born to live a life of immortality, upholding chivalry and ridding the world of bad guys and giants but the older more self-parodying filmmaker we have at present is unable to draw out the films potential in a meaningful way here.
Don Quixote is a film with messages, being true to one's self, living out your dreams and doing the right thing etc. but none of those themes have time too breath here despite the films overly generous two hour plus runtime and while they play out amongst zany Gilliamism's such as medieval dressing terrorists or off-kilter protagonists, nothing here feels fully formed or that imaginative to make the films cold and tiresome scenarios work out to great effect.
You can't help but feel for Driver and Pryce who do a lot of heavy lifting for the film, with both actors giving it a red hot crack but neither of the two get gifted characters that are overly endearing, with Toby mostly just a self-loving bore and Quixote too loopy to love despite being too innocent to hate.
Driver and Pryce get a lot of screen time together and form the foundation of Gilliam's plodding affair but there never allowed to spark the real magic that can be found in other Gilliam outings such as The Fisher King or Brazil, films where talented ensembles banded together to bring Gilliam's wild imagination to life in colourful, energetic and unexpected ways.
Don Quixote is a film you wish you could love more, especially when considering where it's come from and the verve it must of taken for Gilliam to stick to his guns but with $2 million in box office takings across the world and with middling to poor reviews from most film fans and critics, it appears as though the lacklustre experience we have been given, was not worth the effort all along.
Final Say -
There's something special about this story, a reason why Gilliam has been so obsessed with bringing it to life but sadly for all, this version of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote is an unfortunately lacking affair, devoid of any of the magic of Gilliam's past triumphs in the cinematic landscape.
2 student films out of 5
That we have any cinematic version of Gilliam's long time pet project is quite the feat of moviemaking and for anyone that laid witness to the incredibly eye-opening documentary Lost in La Mancha, that offered a behind the scenes look of Gilliam's first cursed attempt at bringing this tale to life, it will be a pleasure to see the credits begin to roll here but that excitement and anticipation soon gives way to a sad realisation that it once more feels like the best of Gilliam has long since disappeared, with nothing more than pale imitations left in its stead, although thankfully for all this is a huge step up from Gilliam's last feature misfire The Zero Theorem.
The Terry Gilliam of the 80's and early/mid 90's would've made an amazing version of this tale, that sees Adam Driver's arrogant and lost filmmaker Toby go on a wild journey with Jonathan Pryce's delusional cobbler turned madman that believes wholeheartedly that he is the esteemed Don Quixote incarnate, born to live a life of immortality, upholding chivalry and ridding the world of bad guys and giants but the older more self-parodying filmmaker we have at present is unable to draw out the films potential in a meaningful way here.
Don Quixote is a film with messages, being true to one's self, living out your dreams and doing the right thing etc. but none of those themes have time too breath here despite the films overly generous two hour plus runtime and while they play out amongst zany Gilliamism's such as medieval dressing terrorists or off-kilter protagonists, nothing here feels fully formed or that imaginative to make the films cold and tiresome scenarios work out to great effect.
You can't help but feel for Driver and Pryce who do a lot of heavy lifting for the film, with both actors giving it a red hot crack but neither of the two get gifted characters that are overly endearing, with Toby mostly just a self-loving bore and Quixote too loopy to love despite being too innocent to hate.
Driver and Pryce get a lot of screen time together and form the foundation of Gilliam's plodding affair but there never allowed to spark the real magic that can be found in other Gilliam outings such as The Fisher King or Brazil, films where talented ensembles banded together to bring Gilliam's wild imagination to life in colourful, energetic and unexpected ways.
Don Quixote is a film you wish you could love more, especially when considering where it's come from and the verve it must of taken for Gilliam to stick to his guns but with $2 million in box office takings across the world and with middling to poor reviews from most film fans and critics, it appears as though the lacklustre experience we have been given, was not worth the effort all along.
Final Say -
There's something special about this story, a reason why Gilliam has been so obsessed with bringing it to life but sadly for all, this version of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote is an unfortunately lacking affair, devoid of any of the magic of Gilliam's past triumphs in the cinematic landscape.
2 student films out of 5
Outstanding if you like mixing insane comedy and touching tragedy and being confused a lot
vchimpanzee6 December 2020
Along with the opening credits, Don Quixote delivers a speech explaining who he is and why he is such a great man. This is the first of several fine performances of the character. Don't get the idea this film will be easy to follow or understand.
Don Quixote No. 2 attacks a windmill. Again, a great job and very funny.
There's nothing normal or predictable about this movie, and what else would you expect from a member of Monty Python? I discovered their brilliant work some years ago on PBS, long after they were still popular as a group. I wasn't actually thinking about who wrote this until I saw the credits at the end. But it's a brilliant job if you're not looking for logic.
I've heard of Jonathan Pryce, and I've heard he is quite a good actor. What he does here is Oscar caliber, not just because he is quite funny, but because later in the movie Javier comes to realize people laugh at him, and not in a good way, and yet he struggles to keep his dignity. He even seems to realize that he is in fact not Don Quixote. It's a brilliant job.
Adam Driver does a fine job as well as Toby, having to go through so many different situations and emotions, and doing all of this admirably.
If I have to single out any other actors, it would be Joana Ribeiro as Angelica and Olga Kurylenko as Jacqui.
And I didn't quite know where to include this, but there is one funny scene where one of the Don Quixotes attacks a trio of giants. That's quite a funny scene, actually.
There were so many locations listed in the credits, which were too small for me to really read, but wherever this was filmed, it looked great. Wonderful outdoor scenery, an impressive castle, even what appeared to be the ruins of a once fine church. Set decoration should have been considered at Oscar time.
And the costumes! So much of this movie looked like it took place when Don Quixote lived. I won't explain why but it will all eventually make sense. You should find out on your own whether someone was dreaming or fantasizing or whether you were seeing a film or something else.
And let's not forget the music. This was supposed to be Spain, and it had plenty of flamenco guitar which was quite good. Background music was appropriate for an adventure and sometimes sounded like a circus. And in the castle, there were even African drummers and dancers which didn't get shown nearly enough.
Is this family friendly? Even cleaned up for TV, I doubt it. There was one scene where so much was bleeped there wasn't really anything left. But what violence there was didn't have a lot of blood, and some was just funny. A few people die, but in some scenes it's not certain what happened. And one person is shown being burned and then from another angle it's just fabric and what must be fans making it look like flames.
My only explanation of why this movie wasn't mentioned at Oscar time is to compare it to Carrie Underwood in "The Sound of Music". A fine job, but so many others in that production were so much better. And I guess this happens when movies get Oscar nominations. There are just so many great ones.
Don Quixote No. 2 attacks a windmill. Again, a great job and very funny.
There's nothing normal or predictable about this movie, and what else would you expect from a member of Monty Python? I discovered their brilliant work some years ago on PBS, long after they were still popular as a group. I wasn't actually thinking about who wrote this until I saw the credits at the end. But it's a brilliant job if you're not looking for logic.
I've heard of Jonathan Pryce, and I've heard he is quite a good actor. What he does here is Oscar caliber, not just because he is quite funny, but because later in the movie Javier comes to realize people laugh at him, and not in a good way, and yet he struggles to keep his dignity. He even seems to realize that he is in fact not Don Quixote. It's a brilliant job.
Adam Driver does a fine job as well as Toby, having to go through so many different situations and emotions, and doing all of this admirably.
If I have to single out any other actors, it would be Joana Ribeiro as Angelica and Olga Kurylenko as Jacqui.
And I didn't quite know where to include this, but there is one funny scene where one of the Don Quixotes attacks a trio of giants. That's quite a funny scene, actually.
There were so many locations listed in the credits, which were too small for me to really read, but wherever this was filmed, it looked great. Wonderful outdoor scenery, an impressive castle, even what appeared to be the ruins of a once fine church. Set decoration should have been considered at Oscar time.
And the costumes! So much of this movie looked like it took place when Don Quixote lived. I won't explain why but it will all eventually make sense. You should find out on your own whether someone was dreaming or fantasizing or whether you were seeing a film or something else.
And let's not forget the music. This was supposed to be Spain, and it had plenty of flamenco guitar which was quite good. Background music was appropriate for an adventure and sometimes sounded like a circus. And in the castle, there were even African drummers and dancers which didn't get shown nearly enough.
Is this family friendly? Even cleaned up for TV, I doubt it. There was one scene where so much was bleeped there wasn't really anything left. But what violence there was didn't have a lot of blood, and some was just funny. A few people die, but in some scenes it's not certain what happened. And one person is shown being burned and then from another angle it's just fabric and what must be fans making it look like flames.
My only explanation of why this movie wasn't mentioned at Oscar time is to compare it to Carrie Underwood in "The Sound of Music". A fine job, but so many others in that production were so much better. And I guess this happens when movies get Oscar nominations. There are just so many great ones.
An odd movie that yields the mixed results of its long development cycle
MrDHWong25 July 2019
The Man Who Killed Don Quixote is an adventure comedy film directed and co-written by Terry Gilliam (12 Monkeys, Brazil, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas), Starring Adam Driver and Jonathan Pryce, it is an odd movie that yields the mixed results of its long development cycle.
In Spain, TV commercial director Toby (Adam Driver) is filming an advertisement featuring the famous literary character Don Quixote. One day, Toby visits a nearby area where he directed a student film ten years earlier which also featured Quixote. While there, he meets the same person he cast as the title character (Jonathan Pryce), who has since become so disillusioned with reality that he now believes he actually is Quixote and that Toby is his loyal squire Sancho Panza. Deciding to play along, Toby follows "Quixote" to see where he takes him on his so called adventure.
Fast-paced but disjointed, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote frequently suffers from its apparent 29-year-long development hell, so much so that it hardly feels like it was worth all that wait. Often times, it seemed like the filmmakers hastily cobbled together scenes written decades ago with newer ones in an effort to pan out the film's runtime, assuming the audience wouldn't notice. With that said, the film certainly isn't without its enjoyable moments. Being a Terry Gilliam film, it feels set in its own quirky and unique world, much in the vein of his previous efforts like Brazil and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. In addition to this, the main cast were quite fun to watch. Adam Driver is his usual straight-man self, reacting humorously to the bizarre goings on around him, and Jonathan Pryce is clearly having a great time chewing the scenery as "Don Quixote". While this film certainly does not live up to its lengthy expectations, it nonetheless remains a curious part of director Terry Gilliam's filmography and is worth checking out for those who enjoyed his previous work.
I rate it 6/10
In Spain, TV commercial director Toby (Adam Driver) is filming an advertisement featuring the famous literary character Don Quixote. One day, Toby visits a nearby area where he directed a student film ten years earlier which also featured Quixote. While there, he meets the same person he cast as the title character (Jonathan Pryce), who has since become so disillusioned with reality that he now believes he actually is Quixote and that Toby is his loyal squire Sancho Panza. Deciding to play along, Toby follows "Quixote" to see where he takes him on his so called adventure.
Fast-paced but disjointed, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote frequently suffers from its apparent 29-year-long development hell, so much so that it hardly feels like it was worth all that wait. Often times, it seemed like the filmmakers hastily cobbled together scenes written decades ago with newer ones in an effort to pan out the film's runtime, assuming the audience wouldn't notice. With that said, the film certainly isn't without its enjoyable moments. Being a Terry Gilliam film, it feels set in its own quirky and unique world, much in the vein of his previous efforts like Brazil and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. In addition to this, the main cast were quite fun to watch. Adam Driver is his usual straight-man self, reacting humorously to the bizarre goings on around him, and Jonathan Pryce is clearly having a great time chewing the scenery as "Don Quixote". While this film certainly does not live up to its lengthy expectations, it nonetheless remains a curious part of director Terry Gilliam's filmography and is worth checking out for those who enjoyed his previous work.
I rate it 6/10
The Man Who Killed Don Quixote
henry8-313 August 2020
A regarded film director (Driver) is having trouble with his version of Don Quixote and then accidentally comes across a clip from a film he made as a student featuring a man who played Quixote before (Pryce). He seeks him out and finds he now lives believing he Is the real Quixote - Pryce sees Driver as Sancho Panza and they head off on adventures much to Driver's chagrin.
Whilst there is undoubtedly plenty that is wrong with this, Gilliam's unique take on place, fantasy and adventure does frequently draw you in - indeed there are some scenes that are amongst his best. Driver is fun and Pryce a good Quixote and occasionally the pathos that Quixote's madness brings about works well. So whilst much is still rambling and rather standard fare, there remains touches of Gilliam's genius which are still worth catching.
Whilst there is undoubtedly plenty that is wrong with this, Gilliam's unique take on place, fantasy and adventure does frequently draw you in - indeed there are some scenes that are amongst his best. Driver is fun and Pryce a good Quixote and occasionally the pathos that Quixote's madness brings about works well. So whilst much is still rambling and rather standard fare, there remains touches of Gilliam's genius which are still worth catching.
Wonderful movie drags a little in the middle
paramounthomeschool23 March 2022
A fun movie that will have you laughing and catching some feels at the same time. The story is entertaining and engaging however I feel like the movie maybe has a little bit too long of a run time it kind of drags a little bit in the latter half of the middle of the movie.
Half baked waste of time
jolum-837064 February 2019
I'm a long term fan of Gilliam's work but this is nowhere near the quality we as fans expect. The film makes no sense. The actors try hard with what they're given but the story is poorly written, the swap between reality and fantasy is so minor and irrelevant that you hardly notice it - the way this was promoted I was expecting transitions the like of my favourite Gilliam film Brazil but this is so far away from a Brazil that it's hard to believe it was made by the same film maker.
In conclusion, I'm sorry Terry but this is utter toss.
I don't understand some of the hate the movie has gotten.
davidmvining21 November 2019
I've been tracking the interesting production history of this movie since I saw Lost in La Mancha, the intended behind the scenes documentary for the inevitable DVD release of Gilliam's first concentrated effort at bringing his version of Don Quixote to the screen. After the disastrous first week of filming led to Gilliam and his producers agreeing to shut down production, the insurance company ended up with the rights to the script, and Gilliam spent the next 15 years or so trying to get them back.
Once he finally did, he rewrote the script, and, from what I can tell, it was a drastic rewrite. Our purported Sancho Panza no longer falls through time, and it looks like the fantastic elements ended up getting reduced significantly. In the documentary, there's view of some suits of armor walking on their own that I was really hoping to see Gilliam work into the film, but alas, they did not make it.
Reviews began to come out, and they were largely what I would have expected. Gilliam's best days are behind him, especially in terms of critical opinion. It's largely self-inflicted after disasters like Tideland and The Zero Theorem, but critics aren't as enthralled with Gilliam as they used to be when he was putting out Brazil and Twelve Monkeys. Reaction to Don Quixote was largely mixed, but I ended up seeing Kyle Smith's review at National Review where he completely trashes the film (determining that Gilliam needs a studio to keep him focused, seemingly forgetting about the existence of The Brothers Grimm) and felt a bit dispirited. I'd been looking forward to this film for years, and I didn't want it to be bad.
Well, I think a lot of people are missing something with the film, because I kind of loved The Man Who Killed Don Quixote. Gilliam probably would be helped by hiring writers with stronger senses of narrative structure and focus, but then something would get lost. Part of Gilliam's appeal, to me at least, is how he is willing to follow any random thought. Sometimes that fails, but often enough it succeeds, and I think it succeeds here largely because it's obvious that he both knows the original text by Cervantes, but he also understands it.
Don Quixote is actually two books written ten years apart, and I've always preferred the second. The first is the famous one that includes the fight against the windmill and the slaughter of the army of sheep, but it's the second one where the real heart of the book comes through. To be honest, as I prepared to see the movie in the months up to its release, I never even considered the idea that Gilliam would approach that second half, but one of the trailers included a shot of a woman, dressed in medieval finery, saying, "This is going to be fun." I saw that and knew that Gilliam wasn't going to ignore the actual heart of the book.
Toby, a commercial director who's cynicism has overtaken him completely, is in Spain shooting an insurance commercial that has a take on Don Quixote. At dinner, a peddler has a copy of his student film for sale, a black and white adaptation of Don Quixote. He's fascinated by the journey back in time and decides that, since where he's staying is so close to where he had filmed that student project, he's going to take some time in the middle of the day to visit. He finds the place changed. The town feels less lively. The girl who played Dulcinea has vanished and her father is angry at Toby for it. And, most importantly, the old cobbler he had hired to play the titular role has gone mad and thinks himself to be the knight errant. Through a series of accidents and bits of craziness, Toby finds himself as Quixote's Sancho Panza, a role which Toby takes up reluctantly.
Fantasy and reality begin to mix (a common theme in Gilliam's work). First there are dreams that we and the character think are real for a time. Then come waking moments when reality bends (especially around a saddlebag of gold Toby finds on the side of the road). There are scenes that call back to moments in the book like when the citizens of the town find Toby and Quixote and challenge him to a joust as a knight in shining armor made of cut up DVDs reflecting the sun (which mirrors a similar scene in the book). They eventually come across a parade of medieval dressed people, and Toby doesn't know if it's real or not. Awkwardly, he acts as though it is, but the reality is somewhere in between. It's not that he's traveled back in time, but that these are modern people playing dressup. They're people Toby knows, including his boss's wife who are playacting at the behest of a Russian financier and vodka tycoon that Toby's boss is trying to win an advertising contract from.
And this is where the meat of the original book's second half comes in. In the book, Quixote and Panza are invited in by some rich people who have read the first half of the story (in universe, as they say, everyone's read the first half of the real world book) and decide to have some fun with the errant knight. Panza sees through it all, but Quixote gladly becomes the butt of every joke. Pretty much the same thing happens in the movie, and it works really really well. It culminates in Quixote mounting a mechanical horse with a blindfold on as he travels to the moon to fight the enchanter and then continues on to the sun. He's convinced it's all real, but everyone around him is merrily laughing at him, all except Toby.
And that's where the real heart of the movie is, because the movie's central theme is the role of wide-eyed optimism and the place of chivalry in the modern world. Yes, it may be out of place. Yes, the world we've created may naturally push it away, but there's still place for it. Quixote's place was to try to right the wrongs of the modern world, and when he dies a bit later, Toby can't seem to imagine a world without the old man, and the process of blending reality and fantasy continues until we end the movie with the most famous episode from the original book, the attack on the giants, led by Toby who has become Don Quixote himself.
Seriously, the movie is wonderful, I thought, but wonderful in a way that Gilliam is known for, which is unfocused storytelling with visual tangents that don't always go anywhere. However, the central two characters, Toby and Quixote, are wonderful, and the journey shockingly well realized within the messy box that Gilliam works.
I thought it was his best movie since Twelve Monkeys.
Once he finally did, he rewrote the script, and, from what I can tell, it was a drastic rewrite. Our purported Sancho Panza no longer falls through time, and it looks like the fantastic elements ended up getting reduced significantly. In the documentary, there's view of some suits of armor walking on their own that I was really hoping to see Gilliam work into the film, but alas, they did not make it.
Reviews began to come out, and they were largely what I would have expected. Gilliam's best days are behind him, especially in terms of critical opinion. It's largely self-inflicted after disasters like Tideland and The Zero Theorem, but critics aren't as enthralled with Gilliam as they used to be when he was putting out Brazil and Twelve Monkeys. Reaction to Don Quixote was largely mixed, but I ended up seeing Kyle Smith's review at National Review where he completely trashes the film (determining that Gilliam needs a studio to keep him focused, seemingly forgetting about the existence of The Brothers Grimm) and felt a bit dispirited. I'd been looking forward to this film for years, and I didn't want it to be bad.
Well, I think a lot of people are missing something with the film, because I kind of loved The Man Who Killed Don Quixote. Gilliam probably would be helped by hiring writers with stronger senses of narrative structure and focus, but then something would get lost. Part of Gilliam's appeal, to me at least, is how he is willing to follow any random thought. Sometimes that fails, but often enough it succeeds, and I think it succeeds here largely because it's obvious that he both knows the original text by Cervantes, but he also understands it.
Don Quixote is actually two books written ten years apart, and I've always preferred the second. The first is the famous one that includes the fight against the windmill and the slaughter of the army of sheep, but it's the second one where the real heart of the book comes through. To be honest, as I prepared to see the movie in the months up to its release, I never even considered the idea that Gilliam would approach that second half, but one of the trailers included a shot of a woman, dressed in medieval finery, saying, "This is going to be fun." I saw that and knew that Gilliam wasn't going to ignore the actual heart of the book.
Toby, a commercial director who's cynicism has overtaken him completely, is in Spain shooting an insurance commercial that has a take on Don Quixote. At dinner, a peddler has a copy of his student film for sale, a black and white adaptation of Don Quixote. He's fascinated by the journey back in time and decides that, since where he's staying is so close to where he had filmed that student project, he's going to take some time in the middle of the day to visit. He finds the place changed. The town feels less lively. The girl who played Dulcinea has vanished and her father is angry at Toby for it. And, most importantly, the old cobbler he had hired to play the titular role has gone mad and thinks himself to be the knight errant. Through a series of accidents and bits of craziness, Toby finds himself as Quixote's Sancho Panza, a role which Toby takes up reluctantly.
Fantasy and reality begin to mix (a common theme in Gilliam's work). First there are dreams that we and the character think are real for a time. Then come waking moments when reality bends (especially around a saddlebag of gold Toby finds on the side of the road). There are scenes that call back to moments in the book like when the citizens of the town find Toby and Quixote and challenge him to a joust as a knight in shining armor made of cut up DVDs reflecting the sun (which mirrors a similar scene in the book). They eventually come across a parade of medieval dressed people, and Toby doesn't know if it's real or not. Awkwardly, he acts as though it is, but the reality is somewhere in between. It's not that he's traveled back in time, but that these are modern people playing dressup. They're people Toby knows, including his boss's wife who are playacting at the behest of a Russian financier and vodka tycoon that Toby's boss is trying to win an advertising contract from.
And this is where the meat of the original book's second half comes in. In the book, Quixote and Panza are invited in by some rich people who have read the first half of the story (in universe, as they say, everyone's read the first half of the real world book) and decide to have some fun with the errant knight. Panza sees through it all, but Quixote gladly becomes the butt of every joke. Pretty much the same thing happens in the movie, and it works really really well. It culminates in Quixote mounting a mechanical horse with a blindfold on as he travels to the moon to fight the enchanter and then continues on to the sun. He's convinced it's all real, but everyone around him is merrily laughing at him, all except Toby.
And that's where the real heart of the movie is, because the movie's central theme is the role of wide-eyed optimism and the place of chivalry in the modern world. Yes, it may be out of place. Yes, the world we've created may naturally push it away, but there's still place for it. Quixote's place was to try to right the wrongs of the modern world, and when he dies a bit later, Toby can't seem to imagine a world without the old man, and the process of blending reality and fantasy continues until we end the movie with the most famous episode from the original book, the attack on the giants, led by Toby who has become Don Quixote himself.
Seriously, the movie is wonderful, I thought, but wonderful in a way that Gilliam is known for, which is unfocused storytelling with visual tangents that don't always go anywhere. However, the central two characters, Toby and Quixote, are wonderful, and the journey shockingly well realized within the messy box that Gilliam works.
I thought it was his best movie since Twelve Monkeys.
Good movie
jrelvi11 October 2019
Don Quixote Lost in Translation
elephantpressbooks-4192513 April 2019
Now I know it's tough being different but I went last night wanting to like this and I didn't at all. To me Terry Gilliam's writing is the problem - he needed a Tom Stoppard to rewrite it (remember how Stoppard gave us intelligent sharp comedy in his rewrite of Shakespeare in Love ). To me Terry Gilliam was always the Monty Python member who laughed at his own jokes, the at times unfunny absurdist cartoonist who wanted to be more. I remember not liking Brazil and yet I liked The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (probably less than I remember but I liked it). I love magic realism and pomo reflexive comedy but don't cheat me/your audience with bad writing - poor dialogue. I don't how many expletives and general FU's there were (I'm no prude) but it was tiresome, boring and in the end soooo unimaginative. Why not after tilting at windmills, have a scene inside the windmill where at a tea party the woman serving Don Q harangues him about chilvalry in the 21st century. Anything but what we got - Angelica, Angelica, Angelica at the end - I seen better TV for kids do better end scenes than that. The love/sex scenes were really tiresome. I like the dream quality of it but it felt laboured. so early 'look at me mum' 1990s pomo (when Gilliam began his odyssey with Cervantes )....Really, I think we should get our money back.
What a pleasure
rayres070810 December 2019
This movie is weird and wonderful. Adam driver is absolutely hilarious. The scenery is fantastic. It's like a story within a story within a commercial within a movie. It's creative and wacky and fun. Some people may not like it simply because they don't get it. Just go into it expecting silliness and adventure, and you'll be pleased.
Full of funny, adventure and fantasy scene! Surprisingly good!
kwenchow10 July 2019
Warning: Spoilers
This film is about an adventure of a director "Toby" and his former student film cast who fancy himself as Don Quixote! Entire film full of laughable scene! Such as, Toby found Don in a container house and a woman electrocuted him and the house exploded! Don accidentally kill a police officer while saving Toby from the detention of the police! Toby fall into an animal dead body full of gold coin and later found out is fake! While he hiding the gold coin, he fall down into a cave and met Angelica! Toby decide to runaway with Angelica from her boss "Alexei"! Toby push Don away because he mistaken Don is his own boss and Don slip from the balcony and kill himself! After Don died, Toby also fancy himself as Don Quixote! He encounter with a few giant but turnout just a windmill! That's it! An entertaining comedy fantasy film! Should watch it!
Bad, Bad, Bad
milesgodbey7 September 2019
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