Heath Ledger Still Lives in ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’

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CHICAGO – Bogart, James Dean and Heath Ledger are not dead, they’re just stuck in the Netflix queue. And Ledger, with a little help from some friends, gets one more theatrical release in “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.”

In this Terry Gilliam directed fantasy, Heath Ledger portrays Tony, who becomes part of an “Imaginarium,” a traveling show featuring the mysterious Doctor Parnassus (Christopher Plummer). Parnassus has the gift of being able to guide a person’s imagination and uses his medicinal show for flights of fancy that can magically become broader than the small stage on which it is presented.

The daughter of Parnassus, Valentina (Lily Cole), becomes involved in an old-time promise between Dr. P and Mr. Nick (an oily Tom Waits), who is actually the devil. Parnassus had exchanged his immortality for youth through Mr. Nick, so better to woo his former one true love. Lily became the result of this pairing and now Mr. Nick has come to collect her soul – per agreement – on the occasion of her 16th birthday.

Through the Glass Lightly: Heath Ledger as Tony in ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’
Through the Glass Lightly: Heath Ledger as Tony in ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’
Photo credit: © Liam Daniel for Sony Pictures Classic

Dr. Parnassus now has to scramble to ward off the ultimate evil, and agrees to a yet another contest with Mr. Nick. Whoever can get five souls first will be declared the winner of Valentina, but first an ever-evolving Tony, Dr. P and a cast of bizarre characters must journey themselves through the consequences of the Imaginarium to assure that this will be done.

The “ever-evolving” Tony refers to the technique that director Terry Gilliam conjured up to replace Heath Ledger (he had not completed the film at his untimely death). There is invented a narrative device through which a series of “Tony Substitutes” confront the Imaginarium, and are portrayed by Ledger admirers Colin Ferrell, Jude Law and Johnny Depp. This flashy technique works fine with the weirdness of Depp, not so much with Law and Ferrell.

This is Terry Gilliam territory, familiar since his days as a Monty Python animator, through his checkered career as a film director of distinction. The Imaginarium scenes are explicitly designed, and since it is imagination it doesn’t have to make any sense. Again, weird Johnny D. seems most at home in this undiscovered country.

Each of the Imaginarium pathways were strewn with the Gilliam sensibility and perspective – think of his Python days and films like “Brazil” – but it wasn’t as awe-inspiringly visionary within the context of the photoplay as those other examples.

Pictures of Lily: The Character of Valentina filtered through Lily Cole in ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’
Pictures of Lily: The Character of Valentina filtered through Lily Cole in ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’
Photo credit: © Liam Daniel for Sony Pictures Classic

What works best in the film is the traveling aspect of the Imaginarium. It is truly out of time and place set against a modern backdrop, and is peppered by the cool enigma of the good doctor and his rolling cast the includes little people (probably Verne Troyer’s most complete character), aide-de-camps and a perfectly alluring daughter. It even attempts a performance outside a modern London Pub and gives quite a comeuppance to a drunken heckler.

There is a self consciousness in the knowledge that the film had to change due to Ledger’s demise, and it is a distracting element that never quite resolves itself. This is coupled with a confusing series of events that the screenplay doesn’t manage to clearly sort out. It’s as if Doctor Parnassus himself has summoned this addled solution to an actor’s disappearance, but doesn’t care to give any more clues as to what it means.

Yet it was quite ironic that Terry Gilliam was helming Ledger’s swan song, given his famous production bad luck documented in “Lost in La Mancha.” This fact actually evoked a slight chill in the film industry after the shock of Ledger’s death. However, the end result is a fine testimony to the late actor, even amid the vagueness and thespian drifts.

It is this unclear and messy world that Heath Ledger has escaped, leaving behind an Imaginarium called the movies, where he continues to live on, whether stuck in an electronic queue somewhere or at home on the shelf of memories.

”The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” continues its limited release on January 8th. Check local listings. Featuring Heath Ledger, Jude Law, Johnny Depp, Colin Farell, Lily Cole, Christopher Plummer, Verne Troyer and directed by Terry Gilliam. Rated “PG-13”

HollywoodChicago.com senior staff writer Patrick McDonald

By PATRICK McDONALD
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

© 2010 Patrick McDonald, HollywoodChicago.com

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