Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 102 posts

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#51

Post by puzzle »

pbk1 wrote: post #45
puzzle wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was another good interview in NYC on US premiere day: https://youtu.be/zH982kFXMuM I had to make sure to be in NY for it. Last time I saw him live (at IFC for The Zero Theorem), he mentioned that he can only spend 29 days per year in the United States after giving up his American citizenship. His days are counted, in a way...

Weird - this German language source [0] from around the time of his citizenship renunciation indicated the 29 day cap last for ten years - so it would've stopped 3 years ago.. [0] https://www.tagesspiegel.de/kultur/kopflos-am-potsdamer-plat...

Interesting, I didn't know about the ten years. The relevant rules seem to be here:

https://www.irs.gov/individuals/international-taxpayers/expa...

He mentioned it in 2013. So he's probably not affected anymore, but he still tends not to spend a lot of time in the US.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#52

Post by oknenavin »

lisper wrote: post #27

Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don Quixote. When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985, before 9-11, before the inte…

One of the finest movies for me too. Perfectly depicts our society.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#53

Post by pmoriarty »

monocasa wrote: post #33
neves wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May you elaborate?

There was a lot of bad blood over the US studio's reedit of Brazil to give it a happy ending (which was atrocious). Following that Baron Munchausen was a flop (and while I like it, def not his best work to be fair). After that he was sort of written off from the establishment as it were (including the critics who know to pay the piper). But while that would have killed off the careers of most directors, Terry Gilliam…

I'm a big Gilliam fan, but in my opinion his movies have gotten worse and worse since Time Bandits, Brazil, 12 Monkeys, and The Fisher King.

There's something of his charming sensibility in even the worst of his films, and they're worth watching for die-hard Gilliam fans like myself, but even the best of his later films (like the Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus) are a pale shadow of the brilliance of his early output.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#54

Post by pmoriarty »

npsimons wrote: post #47
monocasa wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a lot of bad blood over the US studio's reedit of Brazil to give it a happy ending (which was atrocious). Following that Baron Munchausen was a flop (and while I like it, def not his best work to be fair). After that he was sort of written off from the establishment as it were (including the critics who know to pay the piper). But while that would have killed off the careers of most directors, Terry Gilliam…

> You can see this most clearly in the Metacritic for Tideland which is pretty positive as far as user submitted reviews go, but is one of the worst movies ever if you were to go off the critics reviews. The problem is, critics are usually right, and the audience usually isn't. This is because critics have studied film, often went to film school, and can point out just exactly how a film fails. That being said, Gilli…

I enjoyed the beginning of Zero Theorem, but the movie tanked after the love interest and super annoying whiz kid showed up.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#55

Post by Quekid5 »

lisper wrote: post #27

Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don Quixote. When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985, before 9-11, before the inte…

Fantastic and fantastical yet so so so bleak. I find the bleakness beautiful in a weird way, but I think it's a film that presupposes a certain mental fortitude.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#56

Post by Quekid5 »

willtim wrote: post #35
lisper wrote: post #27

Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don Quixote. When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985, before 9-11, before the inte…

It's one of my all-time favourites too. The Criterion Collection edition I believe contains the final directors cut. The ending is superb, it beggars belief that Hollywood tried to butcher it.

Now I'm worried that I haven't seen the right version. Is there a breakdown of the different versions floating around somewhere?

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#57

Post by satori99 »

lisper wrote: post #27

Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don Quixote. When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985, before 9-11, before the inte…

> It is one of the most prescient films ever made.

"People think I am a prophet and that Brazil described the world we’re living in now a few years ago. But we were living in that world then; people just weren’t paying attention the way they do now."

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/magazine/terry-gilliam-is...

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#58

Post by matt4077 »

tomohawk wrote: post #36

Also very entertaining: Lost in La Mancha. Its a documentary about the making of this movie. It showcases some of the epic bad luck. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_La_Mancha

On a similar note, Hearts of Darkness (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102015/) is among my top movies of all times.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#59

Post by lisper »

satori99 wrote: post #57
lisper wrote: post #27

Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don Quixote. When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985, before 9-11, before the inte…

> It is one of the most prescient films ever made. "People think I am a prophet and that Brazil described the world we’re living in now a few years ago. But we were living in that world then; people just weren’t paying attention the way they do now." https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/magazine/terry-gilliam-is...

Interesting. I'm not sure I agree though. I was in my early 20s in 1985 and so I can tell you from personal experience that things were really very different back then than now. In 1985 it was possible to escape surveillance without to much difficulty. Nowadays it's nearly impossible.

Also, in 1985 the stock villains weren't terrorists, they were Russians.

Re: Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote film finally hits the big screen after 25 years

#60

Post by tomohawk »

lisper wrote: post #27

Gilliam's "Brazil" is still my favorite film of all time. If you haven't seen it, you should. Note that there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Comparing them makes a very interesting study in film editing. The story of the making of "Brazil" is almost as interesting and fraught as Don Quixote. When watching Brazil it's important to keep in mind that it was made in 1985, before 9-11, before the inte…

Great movie. When you watch it, you need to pay attention to every little thing. For example, the movie opens with an advertisement for government services. The dittie is hysterical, but its easy to miss. That theme gets expanded quite a bit in the film culminating in a fantastic scene with Robert De Niro as a rogue heating engineer.
Post reply on HN