Dreams News Bulletin 12: October 1998

In Dreams news bulletin 12...

• Gilliam speaks about life after Fear and Loathing...
• Gilliam visits Edinburgh International Film Festival to Launch Fear and Loathing in the UK
• Book launched at Gilliam retrospective at San Sebastián
• Gilliam honoured by Greek Government
• Gilliam to visit Minnesota and NYC
• Grim Reaper collects Mortality CD-ROM
• Python Latest
• Devices hits the North
• BFI to publish Brazil Modern Classic

Gilliam speaks about life after Fear and Loathing...
Speculation has begun about Terry Gilliam’s next project. "Life at the moment consists of running around Europe promoting Fear and Loathing - I haven't even had the time to sit down and read the 2 foot high pile of scripts that is waiting", he told PythOnline on 2 September.

It has been difficult for Gilliam to be freed from the Fear and Loathing project. "I keep thinking it’s over and then I’ve got to come up to Edinburgh and start selling it again. It’s like I can’t quite get rid of it yet and I probably won’t until the UK release. I’m stuck with it. I’ve reached the point now where I hate the film because it won’t let me get on with my life. I really need to start thinking about another project but on the other hand I don’t seem to be motivated to rush out there and do something. We’ll see. It always a post natal depression you get", he told Dreams recently.

Gilliam has been offered tons of scripts but, he continued, "I haven’t read any of them. I’ve just been hiding from everything. I still haven’t got this one out of my system and there’s this side of me that has been feeling more and more that I just want to do something in Europe. I want to put Hollywood away for a bit - I don’t know if that's going to happen, but that’s what it feels like right now."

Gilliam visits Edinburgh International Film Festival to launch F&L in UK
Edinburgh being just a couple of hundred miles from Wetherby on the A1 gave Dreams an excellent opportunity to cover first hand the launch of Fear and Loathing onto an unsuspecting British public. Gilliam arrived on Tuesday 25 August to introduce the UK premiere of the movie (which is not to be fully released until 13 November in the UK). The movie was, of course, well received. The following text is his introduction.

"It’s a film not for everybody, I hope you are the people that’ll like it because there’s a lot of people who don’t like it. And that’s one of the reasons we made it...

"Because we’re living in a time where there pretends to be a lot of consensus. I think differences are what’s interesting and I think the more differences in the world the better we are. There was a time when we used to believe this: when we could live life to extremes and actually survive. That’s when this book was written and it's one of the reasons I wanted to make the film because I’ve been feeling more and more constricted, claustrophobic and constipated by the limited discussions that we have with the world today. We seem to be being treated more and more like children and everything’s explained to us.

"So it’s a kind of an inoculation against the very end of the 20th century. I think for us making it, it was an interesting project because the idea of taking a book that so many people are familiar with and also a book that’s written by an author who’s still alive who’s a very good shot and has the weaponry to deal with people who waltz in…

"It was a terrible kind of responsibility and a weight put on our shoulders. We then spent the next several months trying to lift this weight off. So hopefully we made a film that’s true to the book but didn’t try to compromise the book, that didn’t try to turn it into just one more movie, but try to translate what that book was about: the energy of the book, the madness of the book, the intensity and the extremes of the book, and get them up on film and see if we can make a cinema audience experience what I felt when I first read the book. You can tell me all about it later if we’ve achieved it or not. So thanks for coming and good luck, and the people in the front row - you’re in for a really ugly evening. You people back there are fine. But it’s real hell down here [pointing below to the front row].

"So please enjoy it. Relax. Use your brain if you want to, but don’t worry if you don’t... just go for the ride. Buy the ticket, take the ride. Thankyou."

On the next day, Gilliam was interviewed by Mark Kermode at a Film Festival event in front of an audience, about his career and, in particular, about Fear and Loathing. A transcript of this is soon to appear in Dreams. For full photo coverage of the event, please click on the Dreams 1998 Edinburgh Festival page.

Book launched at Gilliam retrospective at San Sebastián
An excellent new book on Gilliam has been published. Entitled Terry Gilliam: el Soñador Rebelde, written by Jordi Costa and Sergi Sánchez - details on the Gilliam Books page. It is in dual Spanish and English, within the same book. It describes Dreams as "the most spectacular and complete website dedicated to Gilliam’s figure."

Terry Gilliam: el Soñador Rebelde

Says Gilliam, "The book is terrific. It’s an extraordinary achievement… It almost seems as if I have lived an interesting life." The book is an official tie-in to the San Sebastián Film Festival, where Gilliam made an appearance. This Spanish festival, held in late September, showed a complete run of his films. Below are two photos of Gilliam at the festival.

Terry Gilliam chatting with Jason Patric

"Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones arrived in Athens on Friday 9 October in order to receive a medal (or something like that) from the Greek Ministry of Culture for being members of the Monty Python squad.

"On Saturday 10 October at 22:00 Greek time (+1CET) at the cinema Palace, Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones received their medals. I was there. They fought like silly kids each one wanting the other’s medal - if you can understand the phrase above, then I'll must be proud of my English! After this fight, Terry Jones came to the podium thanking everybody and said that it is nice to be recognised rather than banned as almost all of their films were banned in various countries. Especially "Life of Brian" who was banned in many, many, many countries and especially Sweden (here they go again about Sweden!). Then he said something very funny about Swedish people and Norwegian which I did not hear as the microphone was not correctly installed. Must have been funny though because many people laughed at that time. After Terry Jones finished, Terry Gilliam came to the podium and all he said was thankyou and goodbye (?!). I forgot to write you that when the silly person gave them their medals, Terry Gilliam gazed at it like it was something mysterious - you know the expression "what is this shit?".

"An enormous crowd was there - I personally had to wait for an hour and a half in queue to get myself a ticket but it was worth it. Apart from the two Terrys, Emir Kusturica and M.Antonioni were presented with medals and they were there too. After the ceremony, the lights dimmed and White Cat - Black Cat began. This is the latest feature of Kusturica and it was absolutely marvellous!! Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones got the most claps (for about 2 minutes!). As soon as I have my photos developed (of Terry G. and J.) I shall have them e-mailed to you. Because my camera is no more a camera than a pink elephant is (Kodak 400 - ha ha) I don't trust the photos to be of any artistic value. But as the press was not absent in this event I'll scan some good pictures from the local press and I'll send them both... That was the news from Athens/Greece and the 11th Festival of European Cinema Awards.

Anthony's memorable quotes of the evening...

• Terry Jones: "I love Woody Allen's films, I hate him for constantly doing such a good job!"
  
• Terry Gilliam: "Don Quixote is still a considerable project. I would also like to do the Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur in a film"
  
• Terry G. & J: "All we 've got left is fantasy. Don't let yourself on other people's fantasies, use your own!"

Getting Awarded from the General Secretary of Greek Ministry of Culture!

Drinking some wine with a bunch of other guys including Emir Kusturica!

Grim Reaper collects Mortality CD-ROM
Alas, the long-awaited CD-ROM of Gilliam’s Animations of Mortality book is not to come out after all. Gilliam told Dreams, "The company I was involved with working on it basically fell apart. It was very irritating because we spent quite a lot of time working on it. The company couldn’t decide which direction it was going to go in. Whether it was an educational CD or a game? It went in circles and it ended up being nothing. Pity."

Python Latest
On 31 August, Terry Jones announced on PythOnline that the Python tour, announced at the Aspen summit, was not going to take place after all. The original idea was to have a worldwide tour to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Python in late 1999. However, it now appears that the tour has been axed. Wrote Terry Jones to PythOnline, "something will happen next year but not a world tour. An announcement will be made, but maybe in a few months time." Gilliam was most antipathetic to a tour. "I don't think about Python anymore. It feels like another person. It feels like a different life", he was quoted as saying earlier this year to Giles Smith of the New Yorker.

The software company 7th Level are no longer to support the official Python website, PythOnline. It is trying to find a new home. However, some excellent news is that Hans ten Cate’s Daily Llama website (not updated for over a year) is making a comeback in a new improved version. Find it at www.dailyllama.com. Good luck Hans with the new site!!

Devices hits the North
Devious Devices has moved from Wolverhampton to the world's finest city. Catch it at Manchester's Museum of Science and Industry until the end of this year. For more information on this Gilliam-related exhibition, please click on the Devious Devices page.

BFI to publish Brazil Modern Classic
The British Film Institute is to publish a book in its Modern Classics series dedicated to Brazil. It is likely to appear in 1999.

Contributions are welcome! If you wish to send letters, analysis, news or any information regarding Terry Gilliam and his work, then email me!

Dreams is stored by the witty, attractive and stylish people at Franklyn Press Multimedia, whose corporate HQ is situated in the glorious town of Macclesfield, Cheshire. These people know a thing or two about design, print and multimedia, so in the unlikely event that you have plenty of money to spend on design (regardless of media), give them a call.

Phil Stubbs - Wetherby, UK. October 1998.