Grimm and grimmer
Oct. 28th, 2005 09:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustCelebrated our liberation from the obligations of LitFest by going to the preview of The Brothers Grimm, with Gail and Chaz. I was disappointed to realise that the book in which Jakob was writing notes was not, after all, his Deutsche Grammatik, and that Proto Indo European consonant shift did not play a major part in the plot.
Seriously, though, I did not like it. I'd been warned, by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rozk among others (she's since posted this review, but even so, a morning with Terry Gilliam can't be entirely wasted, can it? Yes, rather to my surprise, it can. I wasn't as bothered by busy camera work or disjointed plotting as some commentators seem to have been; I found it all very pretty. Just, there wasn't anything there. It wasn't about anything: it didn't have any ideas, the characters were pure cardboard, the jokes...
Well, OK, there were two jokes that amused me. The first was in the inn; much roistering is in progress when the French arrive. There is an appalled silence and the band strikes up the Marseillaise. Which is a neat Casablanca reference. The other, also at the expense of the French, is a visual gag in which a figure in the background turns out not to be a painting after all. But that's it. The torturer Cavaldi is totally unfunny: torture is not inherently funny (I'm not sure that Gilliam has grasped this), but you can derive a certain black humour from it if you have the courage to take it to the extreme. Having your torturer turn out to be one of the good guys in the end will destroy your chance of getting away with this. Oh, and the French and the Italians are not inherently funny, either.
The destruction of the wicked queen has some fine Magritte moments.
But where was Brother Ben?
Seriously, though, I did not like it. I'd been warned, by
rozk among others (she's since posted this review, but even so, a morning with Terry Gilliam can't be entirely wasted, can it? Yes, rather to my surprise, it can. I wasn't as bothered by busy camera work or disjointed plotting as some commentators seem to have been; I found it all very pretty. Just, there wasn't anything there. It wasn't about anything: it didn't have any ideas, the characters were pure cardboard, the jokes...Well, OK, there were two jokes that amused me. The first was in the inn; much roistering is in progress when the French arrive. There is an appalled silence and the band strikes up the Marseillaise. Which is a neat Casablanca reference. The other, also at the expense of the French, is a visual gag in which a figure in the background turns out not to be a painting after all. But that's it. The torturer Cavaldi is totally unfunny: torture is not inherently funny (I'm not sure that Gilliam has grasped this), but you can derive a certain black humour from it if you have the courage to take it to the extreme. Having your torturer turn out to be one of the good guys in the end will destroy your chance of getting away with this. Oh, and the French and the Italians are not inherently funny, either.
The destruction of the wicked queen has some fine Magritte moments.
But where was Brother Ben?
