The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a 2009 fantasy film directed by Terry Gilliam and written by Gilliam and Charles McKeown. The film follows a travelling theatre troupe whose leader, having made a bet with the Devil, takes audience members through a magical mirror to explore their imaginations and present them with a choice between self-fulfilling enlightenment or gratifying ignorance.
The film stars Heath Ledger, Christopher Plummer, Verne Troyer, Andrew Garfield, Lily Cole, Tom Waits, Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law, though Ledger's death one-third of the way through filming caused production to be temporarily suspended. Ledger completed most of the movie's runtime, and then his role was recast with Depp, Law, and Farrell portraying transformations of his character as he travels through a dream world. The film is Ledger's final performance; it was dedicated to him and co-producer William Vince.
Its world premiere was during the 62nd Cannes Film Festival, out of competition. The film, which cost $30 million to make, grossed more than $60 million in its worldwide theatrical release. It received mostly positive reviews from critics.
It was nominated for two Academy Awards. The first was Best Art Direction with art directed by Dave Warren and Anastasia Masaro, and set decorated by Caroline Smith; it lost to Avatar. The second was Best Costume Design with costumes designed by Monique Prudhomme; it lost to The Young Victoria.
Plot
Elderly sage Doctor Parnassus runs a travelling theatre troupe, which includes his teenage daughter Valentina, barker Anton, and dwarf Percy. The troupe's main attraction is a portal to a magical "Imaginarium", a surreal dream world that transforms according to its participants' desires, offering them a choice between difficult self-fulfillment or easy ignorance.
After a surly drunkard is swayed to the latter, Parnassus comments he has lost "another one" to Mr. Nick, a suave personification of the Devil, who often taunts Parnassus and gloats over his failures. He reminds Parnassus that in three days, upon Valentina's 16th birthday, her soul belongs to him. Hundreds of years ago, Mr. Nick tricked Parnassus into accepting immortality.
As the troupe crosses a bridge, Anton notices someone hanging beneath it. Rescuing the man, he spits out a golden pipe that allowed him to continue breathing while being hanged; the man claims to have amnesia. Mr. Nick visits Parnassus and reveals that the rescued man is disgraced philanthropist Tony Shepard, who was hanged by Russian gangsters for owing them money. Mr. Nick offers Parnassus a new wager: Valentina can stay with him past 16 if Parnassus wins five souls before Mr. Nick.
Tony joins the troupe as a barker and persuades them to remodel the show into a more modern act. He lures a posh, affluent woman into the Imaginarium and follows her; they enter a pastel-coloured dream world representing her imagination. Her imagination changes Tony's face as well. Tony dances with her, and they encounter a motel run by Mr. Nick, but he persuades the woman instead to take a gondola ride that wins the first soul for Parnassus.
Tony falls out of the Imaginarium, his face returning to normal. The woman exits shortly after and gives the troupe a vast sum of money as thanks for her experience. Three other women enter, each re-emerging elated. Mr. Nick claims the souls of four Russian gangsters hunting Tony down for his debts after they chase him into the Imaginarium and fall into a trap laid by Mr. Nick, with Tony's face changing again in the process.
Parnassus reveals to Valentina his past: after aging from normal mortality, he made a pact with Mr. Nick to be youthful again, in order to win the heart of a woman he loved. In exchange, any child he fathered would become Mr. Nick's property at the age of 16. Valentina is horrified by her father's revelation.
Having discovered that Tony stole organs from orphans in developing countries and sold them to wealthy westerners, Anton confronts him, but Tony fights him off, pushes Valentina into the Imaginarium, then joins her. Influenced by Valentina's desires, Tony's face changes to that of her dream lover, and they float along a river in a gondola, fulfilling their shared sexual feelings.
A child in rags disrupts their trip, transitioning the scene to one of Tony as a philanthropist, speaking at a fundraiser for impoverished children. Anton appears in the form of an outspoken child exposing him as a fraud. A mob of angry benefactors pursues Tony. As the landscape disintegrates, Anton confesses his love for Valentina before falling into a void. Distraught over her father's bargain, Valentina gives her soul over to Mr. Nick even as he tries dissuading her.
Disillusioned by the easy victory, Mr. Nick offers Parnassus another bargain: Valentina's soul for Tony's. As the mob approaches Tony to hang him, Parnassus presents Tony with his golden pipe that will allow him to survive the hanging, and also offers him a brittle replica. He then tricks Tony into choosing the replica, so he dies when the mob lynches him. Mr. Nick frees Valentina's soul but does not reveal her location to Parnassus, who is abandoned to wander in despair, trapped in the Imaginarium.
Years later, Parnassus finds himself a beggar back in London, when Valentina walks by. She is married to Anton, has a daughter with him, and lives an affluent life. Percy dissuades him from interrupting Valentina's new life. Parnassus and Percy team up again, selling toy theatres of the Imaginarium and the troupe on a street corner. As Mr. Nick appears and beckons him, Percy tells Parnassus to return to work.
Cast
Heath Ledger as Tony Shepard. When Ledger died during production, the latter duration of the role was recast for certain scenes to show "physically transformed versions" of the character within the Imaginarium: Johnny Depp as Tony (first transformation) Jude Law as Tony (second transformation) Colin Farrell as Tony (third transformation) Christopher Plummer as Doctor Parnassus Andrew Garfield as Anton Verne Troyer as Percy Lily Cole as Valentina Tom Waits as Mr. Nick Paloma Faith as Sally Gwendoline Christie as Shopper Peter Stormare as The President Charles McKeown as Fairground Inspector Maggie Steed as Louis Vuitton Woman Mark Benton as Dad Simon Day as Uncle Bob Richard Riddell as Martin Montserrat Lombard as Sally's friend
Production
Writing Director Terry Gilliam and screenwriter Charles McKeown wrote the script, their first collaboration since The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988). When he was approached with the basic concept by Gilliam, McKeown thought of the central character of Parnassus "as a semi-eastern medicine man evolved", and in retrospect he further said about the script's sensibilities, "It is about the theme of imagination, and the importance of imagination, to how you live and how you think and so on. And that's very much a Terry theme. [...] I like the idea of storytelling being the thing that sustains the universe." Gilliam described the premise as a "fun and humorous story about the consequences of our personal choices in life", and explained his goal for the film: "It's autobiographical. I'm trying to bring a bit of fantasticality to London, an antidote to modern lives. I loved this idea of an ancient travelling show offering the kind of storytelling and wonder that we used to get, to people who are just into shoot-em-up action films." Gilliam and McKeown based the character of Tony on former British prime minister Tony Blair, who "would say the most insane things and probably he'd believe them himself".
Gilliam repeatedly said in interviews that the character of Parnassus was meant autobiographically, a tale of an aging man with a vivid imagination in a world that does not listen anymore. He was still caught in depression over the disruption of his last self-written project, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, his constant struggle with the established studio system, and of becoming aware of his progressing age, worried that he was going nowhere with his latest projects and that he might not have much time left. He had already put several references to sudden, tragic, and premature death into his script before Ledger's death. He was compelled to emphasise that upon the film's release many things might be mistaken as references to Ledger's fate but that the script wasn't changed apart from re-casting Tony with Depp, Farrell, and Law.
Filming The film received an initial budget of $25 million, but its final budget was about $30 million. Gilliam and his cinematographer Nicola Pecorini went wider than ever before on focal length with a new 8mm Zeiss lens, unusual even for Gilliam movies which are known for wide-angle imagery. The widest lens on a Gilliam film had been a 9.8mm Kinoptik. Production of the remaining computer generated imagery effects shots were done in Vancouver.
London filming Production started in December 2007, beginning with various shots of the Imaginarium wagon moving about the London suburbs, such as Bounds Green, on the evening of 9 December. The carnival scenes were shot at Potters Field between 10 and 11 December; shooting then moved to the abandoned Battersea Power Station for three days, where the production had set up offices nearby. After a full day of set-up, the hanging scenes at Blackfriars Bridge were shot for three hours on the evening of 17 December.
At the same time that an intimate early scene between Andrew Garfield and Lily Cole was being shot on top of the travelling Imaginarium wagon, second unit work around London was also being done for several more nights, until 20 December; this change in schedule was to allow Heath Ledger a break to travel back to Australia to visit his family. After the entire cast returned from Christmas break, the production resumed shooting for 2008 back at Battersea for one full day; this was Tom Waits's first day on set, as he would mainly be required for the subsequent Vancouver shoot, not the London section. From 5 to 6 January, the production filmed scenes with the Imaginarium at Leadenhall Market; shooting on this sequence managed an average of 70 set-ups a day. The production had originally planned to shoot the Leadenhall scenes at Bond Street, but this was scrapped, due to security concerns.
Effects of Heath Ledger's death Production was halted by the death of Heath Ledger in New York City on 22 January 2008. Ledger's involvement had been a "key factor" in the film's financing. Gilliam was presiding over concept art when he was informed by a phone call that Ledger had died. His initial thought about the production was: "The film's over, it's as simple as that." Although production was suspended indefinitely by 24 January, Gilliam initially wanted to "salvage" the film by using computer-generated imagery to make Ledger's character magically change his appearance, perhaps into another character. He also wanted to dedicate the film to Ledger. The imagery would have been similar to transformation techniques seen on Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and those employed on Roy Scheider's performance in his posthumous release Iron Cross.