"At one point," Gilliam said, "I was being really pretentious, and pretending I was making a trilogy with Time Bandits, Brazil, and Munchausen--the young boy-as fantasist, the adult-as-fantasist, the old man-as-fantasist--there are connections" (Johnson, "Terry Gilliam's Marvelous" 39). It doesn't seem that pretentious, however, when you consider that The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is one of Gilliam's boldest and most daring pieces--a film which is a children's film and yet it's not just for children. "Like Time Bandits, like Brazil, this picture is about imagination and the power of imagination to conquer that dull, drab place we know as reality," said Joel Siegel about the film. "As Baron Munchausen and his crew hang off the edge of the moon, and as the constellations float by, Gilliam teaches us we don't have to believe things for them to be absolutely true" (Yule 233).

"This is precisely the sort of thing no one ever believes," says the Baron during that self-same sequence, and yet we do believe it because Gilliam is showing it to us. What Baron Munchausen does is it makes the impossible seem possible through the seemingly convoluted story of the exploits of the "legendary teller of tall tales" (Johnson, Life Before 235). It's been called "one of the great fantasy films of all time" (Yule 237) and "a fabulous film for once, adds up to the sum of its special effects" (Yule 238). Jack Kroll, in particular, said, "Much of Munchausen is truly astonishing, as was Gilliam's Orwellian fantasy Brazil ... Terry Gilliam is one of the rare directors who can create an entire world. Munchausen is like a huge, flawed emerald, a real gem that had cracked under pressure" (Johnson, Life Before 242).

The pressure which Kroll refers to was a result of the many problems involved in the production, "ranging from running over budget and threats to replace Gilliam to language problems while lensing in Rome and Spain" (Johnson, "True Facts" 47). Eric Idle, who appeared in the film, said that "Gilliam probably went over budget with the 'Crimson Permanent Assurance' sequence in Meaning of Life, but that was about it. With the Baron, we're dealing with a huge, epic film where there are so many things that can go wrong" (Johnson, Life Before 237). These and other worries over proper distribution are dealt with in Andrew Yule's book Losing the Light, so once again, I will not deal with them here. What I will say is that, through it all, Gilliam was able to fight through and win, creating an extraordinary work, one which encapsulates his vision in all its romantic glory (as opposed to Brazil, which was much more oppressive). "This picture was about the impossible, and going on impossible adventures--and that's what the making of the film is also about," quips Gilliam in another interview with Kim "Howard" Johnson ("Terry Gilliam's Marvelous" 40).

Like all of Gilliam's films, there are many references in Munchausen to works which have come before. One of the most blatant and brilliantly staged is his depiction of the arrival of Venus. "As the music swells, a shell, accompanied by CHERUBS, rises from a pool of water. The shell opens, revealing a beautiful naked GIRL ... standing exactly like Botticelli's Venus. HANDMAIDENS appear, borne on the wind from somewhere in the room and flutter around her with her robes ... and then are gone ... VENUS is now dressed and seated in the great shell" (McKeown & Gilliam 85). It is a magical cinematic moment which not only recalls Botticelli, but also Gilliam's own Jabberwocky, for a similar event happens where a naked girl (in this case, the princess) is discovered and her servants flutter around her, instantly creating a beautiful dress out of nowhere. It's interesting when Gilliam actually borrows from himself.

As for the rest of Munchausen, David McDonnell, in recommending the film, states that, "coupled with the engaging adventure Time Bandits and the downbeat masterwork Brazil, Baron Munchausen confirms Terry Gilliam's place as one of our premier fantasy filmmakers" (74). John H. Richardson said, "For Baron Munchausen Terry Gilliam deserves great praise... Magic and dreams do win in the end, in the story and on the screen" (Yule 235).

After the many problems he had with such an expansive and expensive film, however, Gilliam decided that he needed a change of pace. In his introduction to the Fisher King book, Gilliam wrote, "I had sworn long ago not to work in the States, especially directly for a Hollywood studio. 'Well...,' I thought, 'what are rules for--but to be broken? I made them... I can break them'" (vii). As Kim "Howard" Johnson wrote, "Until Fisher King, Gilliam says he always felt the need to write the screenplay to make a film his" ("The Real Fantasist" 68). Well, for his next film, he thrust himself into the world of directing somebody else's script, making a film which he himself did not initiate, and he didn't make it easy.

"I really just wanted to do something simple and I find that I can't," he tells David Morgan in an interview in the back of the Fisher King book. "No matter how hard I try to simplify it and do it direct, I elaborate it somewhere, and put the camera in a funny position, make it more of this or more of that" (156). David Morgan also has this to say about the making of The Fisher King: "Just as the fight to finish Munchausen mimicked the hero's attempts to brave other universe's, and the struggle to release Brazil in a certain form paralleled Sam Lowry's rebellion against an undaunted bureaucracy, Gilliam again feels a personal stake analogous to the thematic struggle of The Fisher King--to regain a clarity of vision after having wandered from the path which one believed would lead to a state of grace" (153).

Of course, Gilliam could not stray too far away from his usual fare, even if he was directing somebody else's script. As he says, "The themes are similar--there's still the elements of fantasy and reality, and madness and sanity, materialism and romance--they're all here. And there's definitely the search for the Holy Grail in there! It fits the same themes" (Johnson, Life Before 265). Also, David Morgan points out a few other similarities which are more concrete: "Parry is very much like Baron Munchausen, a character who tries to get others to believe in his version of reality. And the romance, in which the woman in real life comes across as more callous than the fantasy image of her which Parry has, is straight out of Brazil" (LaGravenese 161). Whether he's merely retreading the same ground or whether he's building upon past experiences to make a more cohesive film, it's certain that the Gilliam was hard at work creating a few spectacles which stood out against the rest of the film.

One such sequence was the Grand Central waltz, a section which wasn't in the original script but was added during the production of the film. It is one of Gilliam's most breathtaking achievements. As he says, "I think the Grand Central Station waltz sequence in Fisher King is as good as anything I've done. Being my only really contemporary film, that's an amazing way of expressing what fantasy can be" (Johnson, "The Real Fantasist" 68). Another spectacle was that of the Red Knight, a spectre of the past which haunts Parry and searches him out when he is at his weakest points. A stunning visual, the knight is not simply a throwback to the days of Holy Grail and Jabberwocky or Time Bandits, even. It is a powerful statement and symbol which Gilliam uses to let us get inside the character of Parry in a way that is completely detached, yet we can still relate to it.

The Fisher King represents Gilliam's most economical use of fantastic elements and shows a growing maturity in his style. No longer willing to thrash randomly about, trying to be jokey the way he was in Jabberwocky, or trying to be commercial the way he was in Time Bandits. Gilliam has also forsaken the "deep perspective" look of both Brazil and Baron Munchausen in order to make a film which is more about people than it is about ideas--more about relationships than it is about things. It shows much promise, and yet, Gilliam feels that he has yet to make a film which totally satisfies him. "Individual bits within films I think achieve what I want to achieve--I don't think any film in total has achieved it," he says (Johnson, "The Real Fantasist" 68). I, for one, look forward to when he does make a film which achieves, in total, what he wants to achieve. Whatever it is, it's going to be fantastic.