01-24-2020, 01:38 PM
(This post was last modified: 01-24-2020, 01:42 PM by MercuryZap.)
The Man Who Killed Don Quixote - A Personal Appreciation
The legendary, turbulent 30 year production history of director Terry Gilliam’s idiosyncratic and mysterious re-contextualisation of Cervantes monumental literary/cultural cornerstone both informs and is transcended by this bold reinvention.
Playing with audience expectations of not only the source material but general, contemporary narrative/character structure with an often breathtaking and occasionally elliptical audacity the film lights a fresh, liminal space among the tentpole shadowed movie landscape.
Far from a petulant, mechanical assault but perhaps an organic call back to the revolutionary, meta-textual leanings of the source material this invigorated charge at the status-quo is written with the unique deftness of a seasoned artist and is rich with insights into the travails of the art life from the trenchant perspective of one who has lived deeply.
The film's combination of sweeping land and dream scapes coupled with lyrical and often moving character detail and occasional philosophical inquiry brings to mind the 60s/70s explosion of artistic, intellectual, personal cinema within a mainstream context.
It also made me laugh.
I sincerely hope it is a rousing rallying cry and not an elegiac trumpet call for such cinema.
The legendary, turbulent 30 year production history of director Terry Gilliam’s idiosyncratic and mysterious re-contextualisation of Cervantes monumental literary/cultural cornerstone both informs and is transcended by this bold reinvention.
Playing with audience expectations of not only the source material but general, contemporary narrative/character structure with an often breathtaking and occasionally elliptical audacity the film lights a fresh, liminal space among the tentpole shadowed movie landscape.
Far from a petulant, mechanical assault but perhaps an organic call back to the revolutionary, meta-textual leanings of the source material this invigorated charge at the status-quo is written with the unique deftness of a seasoned artist and is rich with insights into the travails of the art life from the trenchant perspective of one who has lived deeply.
The film's combination of sweeping land and dream scapes coupled with lyrical and often moving character detail and occasional philosophical inquiry brings to mind the 60s/70s explosion of artistic, intellectual, personal cinema within a mainstream context.
It also made me laugh.
I sincerely hope it is a rousing rallying cry and not an elegiac trumpet call for such cinema.