Yes, yes, yes. We all get the metaphor of the fabricated lives of the brothers’ tales representing the artificiality of the authors’ own existences and the morally uplifting premise that their own spiritual hollowness will ultimately be filled if they manage to triumph by the end of the day. And yes, we get the timely synchronicity between the current state of politics and the presentation of a set of charlatan leaders profiting off their own tales. Yes, yes, yes. But even though cinematic girth has been gauged, this doesn’t automatically produce a masterful work for the cumbersome issue of execution must still be addressed, which is what Terry Gilliam failed to do with The Brothers Grimm.
Brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm (Heath Ledger and Matt Damon respectively) supplement their authorial incomes as nomadic faux exorcists, traveling con artists who stage hauntings only to conveniently rid villagers of their plight. When the duo are confronted by an actual enchanted forest, replete with demons and the like, they find themselves less than aptly prepared for the task.
Refreshingly, Gilliam reminds us that the Grimms’ tales, in their original, unDisneyized versions, are harrowing snippets of horror after the director sets some of their better known tales to the screen in all their gothic glory. However, this is one of the primary downfalls for Gilliam and the screenwriter, Ehren Kruger, in that they attempt to pull a Charlie Kaufman by presenting a metafictional realm in which the authors are confronted by their own inventions as the titular duo are forced to become 19th century ghostbusters after disabling a prefab possession in which the viewer can almost smell Ted Raimi’s “basement demon” from Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead II, who plagiaristically manifests itself–get ready–as a “barn demon.” However, Gilliam’s narrative faux pas occurs when Hansel and Gretel, Little Red Riding Hood, and Rapunzel slam headfirst into Elizabeth Bathory. The union of these figures never occurred in the Grimms’ writings and, unfortunately for the director, the writers abstained from so doing not without purpose.
Aside from the chaotic disorder of the film, epitomized by the incessant reminder of Gilliam’s love affair with his wide angle lenses which pack way too much into a frame (not to imply that this automatically results in a cinematographic mishap, Gilliam has had vast success with this approach in the past, however, by cramming his sets with layer upon layer, the viewer is literally crowded as one attempts to fight one’s way through each frame), The Brothers Grimm is a very interesting PG-13 movie in that rookie teenagers are able to enter a world which houses graphic impalements, a decapitation, a human severed at the torso, a horse who literally consumes a small child, all before a frog–after being licked–rolls over, nether regions forward, asking for more. In 1999, when David Cronenberg challenged review boards by having a character lick another’s hole onscreen (that is, an electronic port fashioned in one’s lower spine which will grant one access to another dimension), it was strangely erotic and coyly satirical. When Gilliam jocosely presents a scene of bestiality, it is somewhat disturbing which, in and of itself might not be bad, but considering the director was aiming for laughs, the rating designation of “frightening sequences and brief suggestive material” becomes an unintentional understatement.
However, the most disgruntling aspect of the film (and its rating) is the copious scenes involving animal abuse which, by and large, is extraneous and, unnervingly, comes across as the director’s own speciesism unabashedly set forth in all its unapologetic maliciousness.
What can be said of a film which the original production company abandoned and the successive backers came in and forced their own demands upon in hopes of creating a salvageable product which a multitude of actors, including Robin Williams, Nicole Kidman, and Anthony Hopkins, had the sound mind to flee in their own best interests?
-Egregious Gurnow
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
