Movie maverick

Oliver Good

• Last Updated: December 15. 2008 11:00AM UAE / December 15. 2008 7:00AM GMT

The director Terry Gilliam says he is working on a project with the Oscar-winning producer of Driving Miss Daisy, Richard D Zanuck. Paulo Vecina / The National

It might seem to make perfect sense for the filmmaker Terry Gilliam, 68, to receive a lifetime achievement award at the Dubai International Film Festival. As part of the comedy troupe Monty Python and the director of some of the most powerful and beguiling films in recent history, he has been a household name since the 1960s and seems like a pretty safe bet.

But “safe” is not a word usually ­associated with Gilliam. Some even believe he is the closest thing Hollywood has to walking Kryptonite.

From his aborted The Man Who Killed Don Quixote project to the untimely death of Heath Ledger midway through the filming of his latest work, Gilliam’s road to becoming a “lifetime achiever” has certainly been perilous.

His first career troubles came in 1985 amid a dispute with Universal Studios over his dystopian future-epic Brazil. The company put his film on ice when he refused to ­reshoot it with a happy ending.

Instead, Gilliam took out a full page advert in Variety addressed to the president of Universal, which read, “Dear Sid Sheinberg, when are you going to release my film Brazil?” The movie was duly relinquished with its original ending intact.

After Gilliam won that bout, Hollywood struck back, blaming him for gross overspending on The ­Adventures of Baron Munchausen. The film ended up costing $46 million (Dh16 million) to produce and only recouped $8m (Dh29m) at the box office. Despite positive reviews, some believed Gilliam would never work again.

Even in the new millennium, ­Gilliam rarely gets an easy ride. For his track record of taking on ­unfilmable projects and sometimes coming a cropper, the reputedly cursed filmmaker was denied the chance to direct the first Harry ­Potter movie, despite being the ­author JK Rowling’s first choice.

“They felt I wasn’t a safe pair of hands, let’s put it that way,” says ­Gilliam, whose films 12 Monkeys and Brazil are playing at the Dubai festival.

Despite his widely documented difficulties, the US-born British moviemaker takes the idea of a curse lightly.

“Yes, yes, I’m cursed – with incredible talent and beautiful looks. It’s a terrible burden I carry,” he jokes.

“I don’t do easy things, and sometimes things go wrong. But I think I’m one of the luckiest people on the planet, frankly. I’ve gotten away with murder for years.”

He also believes that his reputation as a maverick has led to a level of scrutiny that many of his ­colleagues would not receive.

“With Brazil, I took on the studio and won. You’re not supposed to do that. Now, when anything goes wrong, like Munchausen going over budget, it’s framed as the revenge of Hollywood after Gilliam’s success against the studio.”

But with the director’s latest obstacle, the death of Ledger, perception does not enter into it. After working with the Australian star in 2005’s The Brothers Grimm, Gilliam cast ­Ledger in his upcoming fantasy epic The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.

“He had done about 45 per cent of what he needed to do,” Gilliam says quietly, before stopping himself suddenly.

“Heath was actually extraordinary, the world had only seen the tip of the iceberg. He was capable of anything. He would have been the best actor around, not just of his generation. He was fearless. He also wanted to be a director and was starting work on a project at the time.”

Gilliam was in a Vancouver film studio when he learned that his star had been found dead. The 27-year-old actor is believed to have accidentally overdosed on sleeping pills.

“The real sadness is that he was an extraordinary human being, but also a talent that’s just not going to have a chance to be seen. It doesn’t quite compute. It doesn’t make sense. I feel like he can’t be dead because there was so much life in this guy.”

However, Gilliam says his relationship with Ledger has continued ­after the actor’s death.

“The interesting thing for me is that I get to work with him every day in the cutting room, so he’s still there,” he says.

Even when Gilliam discusses the death of a close friend, humour is not far away from his thoughts. When describing the moment he discovered his friend had died, he says, “There it was on the BBC website, ‘Heath Ledger found dead’. I said, ‘Warner Brothers will do anything for publicity for Batman!’” he laughs.

Despite early reports that the late actor’s participation in the film was key to its financing (and that his death could mean the plug being pulled), Gilliam has not let the incident derail the project.

Instead, the actors Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell and Jude Law were ushered in to portray transformations of Ledger’s character as he travels through a dream world. The actors opted to donate their wages for the production to Ledger’s young daughter, Matilda.

“It was a bit of a glitch, but the weird thing is that it has created a different film,” says Gilliam. “It’s not the one we set out to make. Some people think it’s even more extraordinary now, thanks to the involvement of Johnny, Colin and Jude. You end up with three other people playing Heath’s character. You don’t see too many films like that.

“In a strange way, it makes perfect sense. That’s what is so frightening about it. It’s very weird that Heath’s been co-directing with me posthumously.”

With Doctor Parnassus now ­slated for a 2009 release, Gilliam has ­begun digging around for his next project. With his popular surrealistic style bringing immediate kudos to any production he is associated with, rumours are never far away.

Gilliam has confirmed that his Don Quixote biopic is back on. However, some would question the director’s willingness to reopen old wounds.

He first tried to shoot the movie in 2000, with Depp staring alongside the French actor Jean ­Rochefort (cast for the title role). However, production stopped within a week due to an eerie series of mishaps, which were witnessed by a film crew and led to the 2002 documentary Lost in La Mancha.

Military flyovers drowned out the dialogue, flash floods washed away the set and Rochefort was ­eventually hospitalised for a double hernia, putting the final nail in the coffin.

The actor, who had spent seven months learning English for the title role, had to be helped off his horse by three men before being airlifted to hospital in Paris. Lost in La Mancha presented Gilliam’s ­perilous quest to make the movie as a parallel to Quixote’s fictional quest to become a hero.

After production ceased, an insurance claim was filed on behalf of the film’s numerous investors. A sum of $15m (Dh55m) was reportedly paid, and the rights to the screenplay passed on to the insurance companies. Until now.

“The producer Jeremy Thomas has got the rights back and I am going to start doing rewrites after the Christmas season. I hadn’t read the script in seven years. It’s been tied up in legal things. When I got it back I ­decided I needed to do some work to get the thing up and running.”

Gilliam also says he plans to re-enlist Depp, who has become one of Hollywood’s biggest draws in the intervening years.

“When Johnny will be ready to do it is the unknown quantity. He’s a busy boy these days.”

With Rochefort, now 78, ­unlikely to jump back into the saddle, rumours have been circulating that Gilliam would cast his fellow ­Python alumnus Michael Palin for the title role.

The actor-turned-travel-broadcaster has appeared in several projects by the director, who is well known for using recurring actors. As well as all of the Pythons, actors including Depp, Robin Williams and Jeff Bridges have appeared in more than one Gilliam project. However, the filmmaker said expectations of a mini-Python reunion in Quixote are baseless.

“I don’t know where the rumour that Michael was going to play Don Quixote came from,” Gilliam says. “He’s not quite the right shape and he’s not old enough. Mike is wonderful but he’s not quite Quixote.

“There’s so much nonsense whenever I go on the web. Where does this stuff come from? I don’t even care about denying it half the time because it at least makes me sound interesting,” he laughs.

In addition to the movie’s on-set problems, financing for the ­cancelled 2000 version was also a ­disaster. As the director ­approached a number of European ­financiers for the project rather than Hollywood studios, a lengthy battle of wills against aspects of European (particularly French) film-financing practices ensued.

With Quixote back afloat, there has been speculation that Gilliam’s first visit to Dubai could be about more than just awards.

The Hollywood Reporter quoted Gilliam as saying he plans to “check out (the city’s studios) attitude ­toward funding.”

He even suggested to the movie trade paper that Don Quixote could be filmed in Dubai, reportedly saying “at least there are mountains here”.

However, he insists that he was lured to the emirate with the promise of a free flight.

“They invited me and said, ‘first class travel’. How could I say no? I’m very curious about this place and if someone is going to pay for me to come down here, I’ll do it. It’s freezing in London and wet.”

More than many of his peers, ­Gilliam has seen several planned projects fail to leave the ground. He planned to make a sequel to Time Bandits in the early 1990s, but the project came to an end when it was deemed that too few of the original cast were still alive.

He has also long been associated with adapting Alan Moore’s Watchmen comics into a film. Two attempts, in 1989 and 1996 ­respectively, were unsuccessful. The film has now been shot by the director Zack Snyder and is scheduled for an early 2009 release.

One of the more bizarre projects with which the Gilliam has been ­associated is a proposed Gorillaz movie. The director was approached by Damon Albarn, the musical mind behind the cartoon band.

“About a year and a bit ago, ­Damon Albarn was talking to me about co-directing an animated film they were doing. I still haven’t seen a script. I saw that Blur (Albarn’s original band) are getting back ­together, though, so I’m not holding my breath. Damon is a busy boy, so he can’t do as many things as he would like to do.”

Although he keeps his cards close to his chest, the director offers a snippet of what might be to come.

“I have another project I’m ­playing around with Zero Theorum that Dick Zanuck (the Driving Miss Daisy producer) is producing. It’s a small film, but it’s a very smart script. I tend not to solicit anything, to be quite honest, so don’t ask any more questions!”


ogood@thenational.ae