The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009)

Though the film will likely be remembered more for being the last of the promising actor Heath Ledger before his death, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus should hold significance as the first collaboration of its creators (Terry Gilliam and Charles McKeown) since the excellent The Adventures of Baron Munchaussen 21 years ago. Like most Terry Gilliam pictures, it is a visual feast, complementing his colorful aesthetic for stage settings and props with some very interesting alternate worlds that the audience will visit through the mental powers of the titular character. As far as the story, it's rather weak...essentially a loose plot which serves for little else than driving forward the parade of gorgeous scenery and creating a less than compelling conflict between its representative forces of 'good and evil'.

***SPOILERARIUM OF AUTODOCTOR THRALL***

Doctor Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) is a traveling mystic, who once lived in a temple of aesthetics that told the stories of the world. He meets the Devil (a real scene stealer courtesy of Tom Waits), and the two begin a long series of bets to outwit one another, ending up in Parnassus' immortality, which he gradually begins to see a a curse rather than a blessing. In today's world, Parnassus runs a traveling sideshow in which the audience can enter his magic mirror and experience their imagination. His troupe is rounded out by Anton (Andrew Garfield), Parnassus' daughter Valentina (Lily Cole), and Percy (Verne Troyer doing a decent turn as the all wise and useful stage hand/assistant). The troupe eventually discovers and rescues the high class criminal Tony, who is hanging himself from a bridge and has apparently lost his memory.

Of course, there is quite a lot more to Tony, as his questionable past gradually leaks out. He's a con man and exploiter with a certain magic trick allowing him to survive execution. But for most of the film, he fits in with the troupe as a smooth talking charlatan who Valentina takes an interest in. As it turns out, though, Parnassus is only a few days away from losing his daughter to the Devil, in one of their many bets. But they will make one more bet, and this serves as the driving 'plot' that attempts to string together the shambles of a film we have been presented. The Doctor and the Devil will race to claim 5 souls through the visionary worlds created in Parnassus' mirror, and whoever wins gets to keep Valentina. There's a little twist or two in the film which are not surprising and not all that interesting, but I'm going to be honest...the story is pretty much a throwaway comedy errors, a slightly dark fairy tale.

So if there's a reason to go and see this film, it's the all around great cast and the imagination sequences, which provide some mind blowing special effects and often abstract scenery. The flashback to Parnassus' monastery is fantastic, as are the kid's candy dream and the sequence in which Tony is fleeing Russian mobsters on a giant ladder split into stilts. In fact, these visions are so interesting that they make the remainder of the film feel rather drab, as your desires race towards hoping for a glimpse of the next bizarre world. Not all of these are perfect; for example the rich old lady's dream, in which Valentina floats around awkwardly making innuendos at Tony, is pretty dumb, and some of the imaginary backgrounds are just barren stretches of rock and decay behind the actors. At the end of each imaginary sequence, the 'dreamer' is given a choice or enlightenment or sin/desire (the Devil's domain, which is generally a neon-lit whorehouse or bar). It's all a little too obvious, but the design at least is fetching and fits Waits' character.


The score from Mychael & Jeff Danna is rousing and not subtle, and the actors mostly do a good job with what they are given. Since Ledger passed away before the film's completion, other actors were cast to finish his parts, and Gilliam did a nifty job of putting them in the various dream sequences, where the face of Tony is altered but the dashing rogue personality remains. Johnny Depp, Jude Law & Colin Farrell make the transition seamless, which is not so difficult as Ledger's portrayal of Tony is not much more than a typical scoundrel with an accent. Of the three, Law probably sparkles the brightest. I liked Verne Troyer here, and Andrew Garfield, but I think the cake has to be given to Plummer and Waits. The former turns in his typically good performance, though a little more reckless and drunken than you may be used to. The latter simply rocks every scene he appears in, and is one of the more memorable portrayals of the Devil in recent films. This is the kind of Devil we'd all probably like if he were a real figure.

The Imaginarium reminds me of Hellboy II: The Golden Army as far as it being a shoddy story used by a skilled director to connect a sequence of unique, dazzling visual effects and scenes. Although it's a decent film worth seeing once, it has absolutely nothing on Gilliam's wealth of classics like Time Bandits, Brazil, Munchausen, The Fisher King, the Python films or his amazing Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. But it's a little better than The Brothers Grimm...

Verdict: Win [7/10] (get a midget)

http://www.doctorparnassus.co.uk/

Ray Bradbury - From the Dust Returned (2001)

Sifting through a body of work like Bradbury's is a long but rewarding experience. The man is responsible for a great number of timeless short stories and novels, and any properly organized list of recommendations would involve dozens of titles. But were I to whittle this list down, it might end up at one collection...

Though it was released in 2001, much of the content in From the Dust Returned dates back decades, as far as the 40s. Bradbury wrote many short stories about vampires and other supernatural beings that appealed to a younger core of readers in that period. This book takes a number of such stories and assembles them into a 'fix-up', or a novel that puts together previously unrelated content into a streamlined continuity. This is not the first of Bradbury's collections to do so (see Dandelion Wine, or Green Shadows White Whale).

From the Dust Returned includes a prologue and over twenty tales of the Elliott family, and if they seem a little different, it's because they're vampires, mummies and other supernatural beings. Some of the tales are short stories, some very brief. Some of the characters were co-conceived with Charles Addams, who would later use them as inspiration for his famous Addams Family. The Elliotts have been around for over four millenia, so you can imagine that the 'family get together' takes on an entirely different light, as their concept of history is far removed from our own, more finite existence. Each of these stories is beautiful, but I'll warn you...they're not the kind of vampires or creatures you may be accustomed to. They're a family, with a great love for one another, but they all face doom at the hands of the modernized world, a world of skeptics which no longer finds the time to believe in them. They also face the fear of the local townsfolk.

The stories are woven throughout the Great Event, a homecoming in which the far flung members of the Elliott family converge on the October Country (Illinois). A few examples are "The Traveler", which concerns John the Unjust, the family's 'black sheep', a violent vampire who has cast a great shadow upon them in the eyes of mortals. "The Wandering Witch" involves a 'positive' use of possession. "Make Haste to Live", one of the newer tales, is like an abbreviated version of Benjamin Button, only better.

Through the stories, and the meetup, we are introduced to unforgettable beings like A Thousand Times Great Grandmère, who has existed since the days of Ancient Egypt; Cecy, the eternal sleeper, who visits others through their thoughts, and can possess them; Anuba the cat; Uncle Einar, a winged bat-vampire, and even a pet spider, Arach. Though many of the tales are reprints from earlier stories, the nature of this collection makes it all the better to just read straight through. The prose is often delightful, but plain enough that older children and adults alike can approach it.

From the Dust Returned is only 'horror' in that it encompasses classic elements like ghost stories, and the invovlement of supernatural beings which are often the antagonists of horror films, games, and literature. It lovingly evokes the vibes of autumn and Halloween, coincidentally the best time to 'dust it off' and read it. There are a few 'innocent' sexual moments in the story, so it may not be suited for younger children. It's a wonderful book that you can share with your loved ones, and wonder at the strange congruity between the relationships of both mortal and immortal.

The collection also has a really swank title, possibly the best of any book ever, wouldn't you agree?

Verdict: Epic Win [10/10] ("Now", came the whisper across four thousand years, "here's how it was...")

Nochnoi Dozor: Night Watch (2004)

Night Watch is an urban horror fantasy film based on the novel by Russian author Sergei Vasilievich Lukyanenko. This film adaptation was quite popular when it was released, even earning a limited opening in US theaters, and like any adaptation it takes liberties from the source material. In fact, both the Night Watch and Day Watch films are adapted from the first of Lukyanenko’s novels, Night Watch, which makes it all the more confusing… but screenwriters, directors and studios have never been known for making decisions that actually make sense, so the audience is left to sort it out.

You’ve probably heard the mythology of this universe before: there are ‘Light Others’ and ‘Dark Others’ who once warred over the fate of the world. These two factions consist of all manner of supernatural figures: hedge wizards, shapeshifters, clairvoyants, vampires. Sounds pretty similar to…many other properties, including the original World of Darkness game universe from White Wolf. In the reality of the film, the two sides have created a truce, since they realized their endless fighting would only result in their mutual genocide. Since that time, the Night Watch was formed to monitor the Dark Others, and the Day Watch to monitor the Light Others. If the Light vs. Dark theme wasn’t already derivative enough, there are various events that take place involving ‘prophecies’ and a ‘chosen one’ Other who will one day tip the favor of the balance between the Light and the Dark. During the events of this first film, a series of conflicts and clues leads the two sides to converge over the cursed ‘Virgin’, who is unknowingly responsible for the summoning of a Vortex of Damnation which could destroy the human world. It is up to the Others to resolve their differences and cease this from happening. Along the way, there is a twist.

That’s all I’m going to tell you about the story, because frankly, it’s weak. So I’ll tell you what’s good about Night Watch: it is very successful in taking its arcane customs and various supernatural oddities and placing them in conjunction with the reality of our 21st century world. The various rituals and abilities of the Others are very low key, and they have the ability to remain unseen in a supernatural realm known as The Gloom (sort of like The Umbra from the World of Darkness). This results in a rather seamless and slick moving series of events as we are quickly introduced to the characters and shuffled along towards the climax.

The special effects in Night Watch are pretty interesting. The film does not shy away from uncomfortable scenes like a witch performing a remote abortion, or the lead character Anton getting a pair of scissors through his hand. There are also some beautiful scenes which
create a nice balance between the urban Moscow environment and this supernatural otherworld (the raven scenes in particular are quite good). The score is reasonable, though the use of chugging, shitty nu-metal reminds me of bad videogames from the 90s. The actors are decent, in particular the faction leads Geser and Zavulon, performed by Vladimir Menshov and Viktor Verzhbitsky. But I didn’t really feel a connection to any character in the story.

The world of Night Watch is one that I’d like to explore further, but unfortunately that wasn’t to happen in this film, as it races pretty quickly to resolve its silly prophetic conflict. As far as urban horror fantasy films, I do prefer this to the fashion-first, retarded Underworld series. The characters here feel much more real than the gothic horror archetypes of those films, and this creates a better atmosphere.

Also, DO NOT WATCH THIS IN ENGLISH. Trust me.

Verdict: Indifference [6.5/10]

http://www.foxsearchlight.com/nwnd/

Scott Lynch - The Lies of Locke Lamora (2006)

A good fantasy yarn is difficult to come by. I find that few authors have the chops to immerse me in such a work, but Scott Lynch is apparently one of them. That The Lies of Locke Lamora is his first novel is surprising, it has a polish and sophistication which put many more experienced authors to shame.

The trait I find recurrent (and perhaps most important) in quality fantasy is world building. Some schools of thought shun this in favor of pure character development, but the very best fantasy evokes a rich sense of place. You'll find this in George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, or China Mieville's 'New Crobuzon' novels. Even Tolkien was excellent at re-packaging old Europe into a finely tuned fiction, and Lynch is no exception. The novel is set in the city-state of Camorr, a retread of early Venice, divided by waterways into a great many districts against the backdrop of the enigmatic Elderglass towers, left behind by an ancient race. Camorr is given much attention in the novel, and we learn about its various districts through the exploits of the primary characters, a troupe of thieves and confidence men known as the Gentleman Bastards.

The story centers on the garrista (street boss) of the Gentleman Bastards, who operates by the name Locke Lamora (named for the Final Fantasy VI character, according to Lynch). Numerous chapters detail the boy's origin and the events leading to his current situation, though Lynch has wisely left a few holes where further stories might be set. While 'flashback' or out of sequence chapters can occasionally annoy or distract, these are paced perfectly throughout the current events of the book. Lamora and his gang are thrust into a deadly tale of revenge between the current criminal overlord Capa Barsavi and a mystery assassin known as the Gray King. In addition to some entertaining stories of Lamora's various schemes, this is a tale of murder and betrayal. Without spoiling much, I will tell you here that the plot is for the most part reasonable and satisfying. There may be a bit of Hollywood in the various close escapes of the main characters, but not as tactlessly plotted as you would find many inferior fantasy works.

Locke isn't a disagreeable character, but he does feel outclassed by much of the supporting cast. In particular, I enjoyed the boastful 'Eyeless Priest', the scornful sorcerer known as 'The Falconer', and Don Salvara's henchman Conté. All colorful folks that one might populate his or her D&D campaigns with. Lynch has admitted he's an avid gamer, a fact which is apparent through this richness of setting. The most IMPORTANT character, however, is the city of Camorr. Beautifully realized, from the Italian-derived language to its geographical layout. The wonder of its noble-inhabited Elderglass spires to the seedy underbelly of its criminal underground, where traitors are fed to various sea creatures. Not only is the city fleshed out well, but plenty of hints are dropped towards the world at large. Karthain. Tel Varrar. This is a world we want to explore. A world we WILL explore (Lynch has already published the 2nd novel, Red Seas Under Red Skies, and promises 5 more in this saga...with the possibility of a second 7-book series ... no shortage of ambition.)

The action is taut and sufficiently brutal. The prose is well developed if not too lyrical. The cussing and street talk of the characters highlights the immediacy of their situation, the thread of fate they all hang from. There are a few surprises and hints at ominous future rivalries with a rather deadly caste of villains. This is relatively low-fantasy, comparable to Martin's saga. Sorcery and alchemy exist but they are performed by few, and in many cases for cosmetics, herbs and lighting fixtures. I have few gripes at all. I'm not a huge fan of the central character, I feel he's one of those hero types who gets beaten on endlessly but always manages to turn the fight around. The end of the novel isn't quite the best it could have been, feeling mildly rushed, especially after such a labour of love in building up this setting.

It's pretty much a given that readers of urban centric fantasies like Perdido Street Station or the surreal City of Saints & Madmen will enjoy this, but it might also be fun for historical or crime fiction addicts. I am eager to get started on the second novel, and this is the type of fantasy world I'd like to explore further. Lynch is a young talent. I admit a little envy here, but the good kind.

Verdict: Epic Win [9/10] (I can choke all day if I have to.)

http://www.scottlynch.us/