Terry Gilliam’s latest is a bizarre and imaginative tale that while a bit scatter shot and unclear at times it is still rather entertaining and allows for a great ensemble to have a lot of fun.
Dr. Parnassus is an old man, centuries old in fact, and he is involved in an elaborate betting game with the Devil that has gone back and forth over hundreds of years. Eternal life, women, and countless other stakes have been in play between the two and the fate of Parnassus’ daughter Valentina is currently up for grabs. The game they play revolves around a mirror in the possession of Parnassus who travels around in a mobile stage with a troupe including his daughter, himself, Anton who is a slight of hand artist, and Percy who is a little person that has been with Parnassus for ages, as they perform a show enticing patrons to pass through the mirror which takes them into their own imagination which are than manipulated by both The Devil and Parnassus toward a choice that must be made in their favor to win the game. With only days remaining till Valentina’s sixteenth birthday, the day in which she will become the property of the devil, a game to the first to gain patrons five souls begins and a mysterious young man comes into the troupe’s life when they find him hanging under a bridge, seemingly to his death. [Read more...]