Man, can’t Terry Gilliam catch a break?
Is it possible for the beloved and beleaguered director to just get a script, get a cast and shoot the damn thing without having to move heaven and earth to get it done? What Werner Herzog experienced with Fitzcarraldo, Gilliam seems to have been dealing with for his whole career. As if the road for “The Imaginarium Of Dr. Parnassus” hasn’t been difficult enough, now comes word that in advance of the film’s TIFF premiere troubles continue to haunt the picture. First, at the press screening of the film, used to generate buzz as entertainment writers get their pieces together in the run-up to the festival, the fourth and fifth reels were shown out of order, so a second screening had to be arranged. Of course, we weren’t there, but how many critics and writers do you think bothered to show up for the second screening? Our guess is not many.
Further baffling, Canadian distributors E1 Entertainment have put a review embargo on the film until September 10th, the start of the festival, effectively killing the entire point of having an advance screening to begin with. So let’s just do a quick recap: E1 bungled the first screening, went to the trouble of organizing a second screening only to tell anyone who bothered to come again that they couldn’t write about it until the festival was started. Brilliant. Of course, the film already screened out of competition at Cannes, and there are plenty of reviews already online for anyone even mildly curious about the film to seek out. E1 clearly have no confidence in the film, which makes the charade of even bothering to set up a press screening all the more confounding.
Sony Pictures Classics will be releasing the film on — or around — Christmas Day. Let’s just hope it makes it to December 25th with as few disasters as possible.