Heath Ledger gives his final, incomplete performance in "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus."
(Terry Gilliam, 2009)
December 30, 2009
by Joel Crary
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” was the film that actor Heath Ledger had been working on when he passed away at the age of 28. To see him alive and performing once again brings on the sort of heartbroken awe I experienced while watching his performance in last year’s “The Dark Knight.” When audiences last saw Ledger as the Joker, the role that won him a posthumous supporting actor Academy Award, he was cackling maniacally, hanging by his feet from a highrise. The first image of Ledger in “Imaginarium” is both eerie and symmetrical – his character Tony also hangs, by the neck from a bridge, before he is pulled back from the brink of death by Parnassus and his sideshow crew.
Parnassus is embodied by the veteran Christopher Plummer, who at the age of 80 continues to be a warhorse in every appearance. Like most, I best recall Plummer in the role of Captain Von Trapp in “The Sound of Music,” a film made over half of the actor’s lifetime ago. In the last five years alone, Plummer has been credited with over 20 projects, the kind of work frequency a much younger man would find grueling. Ever the consummate professional, Plummer acts alongside the likes of Verne Troyer, himself indeed of carnivalesque stature, and manages to make their longtime kinship believable and endearing. Parnassus and Percy (Troyer) have crusaded with each other for a thousand years. Without him, Percy argues, Parnassus would have to settle for a midget.
A millennium ago, Parnassus was a monk in a congregation dedicated to telling the story of the world from a mountaintop. One day the Devil (Tom Waits) showed up and put a stop to things. He made a wager with Parnassus along the lines of soul recruitment, granting him eternal life. Images of the Christ-like Parnassus wandering the land like a Coleridge protagonist are shown as he and the Devil compete. Their arena is Parnassus’s travelling sideshow, which offers unsuspecting patrons a choice between good and evil.
In modern times, the sideshow looks thoroughly archaic, stumbling around England like a broken down apothecary caravan, offering shows to the drunks who carouse in front of pubs after hours. Its low-budget lighting and dingy costumes are no match for modern entertainments. The amnesiac Tony takes to the show and offers a spruce-up that helps its demonstration immensely. Things begin to operate akin to a self-help seminar as the crew sets up shop in a mall and invites unfulfilled housewives a chance at living out their fantasies. Once they step through the mirror, they are shown magnificent dreamworlds that appeal to both their baser and godly natures. Tony enters alongside and attempts to influence their choices to Parnassus’s gain.
Parnassus’s immortality is conditional. Since he has fathered a child, she will become the property of the Devil on her imminent 16th birthday. Perpetually one for the exploitation of human indecency, the Devil makes one more wager with Parnassus, who can’t seem to say no – the first to five souls will claim the girl. Daughter Valentina is played by the uniquely stunning model-actress Lily Cole, who looks as though she were abandoned on Earth’s doorstep by a beautiful alien culture. She is pursued sincerely by Anton (Andrew Garfield), a young member of the troupe dedicated to the sideshow’s purpose and presentation.
To explain the plot any further would be fruitless, as it would only serve to confuse. Gilliam and collaborating screenwriter Charles McKeown have concocted a visually lush and often intriguing look at notions of free will, good versus evil, life and death and other dualities that pull at humanity. The two men have known each other since the days of Monty Python and collaborated formerly on “Brazil,” one of the films that anointed Gilliam a wildly inventive master of satire. There’s a bit of his “Fisher King” in “Imaginarium,” too; as the troupe call a burnt out tenement lot home, their bright and imaginative designs are overcome by dingy litter browns and the post-apocalyptic glow of garbage can fire flames.
Ledger’s death during production was answered with a rewrite that gave Tony different personae as he entered the mirror worlds. These are played respectively by Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell, who came aboard the film in tribute to their friend. As a narrative device, the personae unfortunately hurt “Imaginarium” and make it even more complex. The completion of Ledger’s performance was needed to fully flesh out a character who is all but utterly lost to distraction. When Tony’s fate is finally decided, it feels as though a hole has been punched straight through the film’s heart.
A shame, because as with most of Terry Gilliam’s fantasy work, a generous amount of “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” appeals to the senses. The film marked another in a line of battles for Gilliam, who seems to have remained affable and dedicated throughout. Eight years ago, the documentary “Lost in La Mancha” chronicled the director’s failed efforts to film the story of Don Quixote. In recent interviews, Gilliam has revealed that he is giving it one more shot. Perseverance will be Gilliam’s legacy. “Imaginarium” will be an important part of Heath Ledger’s.
