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The Fisher King
Urban Fantasy Comedy Drama / English / 1991
WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Possible pro: It's a fantasy movie starring Robin Williams.
Possible con: It's a fantasy movie directed by Terry Gilliam.
Only thing I know is that it's supposed to be another movie that plays with reality.
WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
Terry Gilliam's movies are very hit-and-miss in my experience. And I suppose the same could be said of Robin Williams' filmography too.
Overall, while I appreciate what this movie was trying to do, I'm going to say that it's execution has been a miss for me.
The premise is Jeff Bridges (who looks and acts like a completely different character that The Dude I associate him with) is a "radio shock jock", which from the opening scene establishes for us what that term means by illustrating him as an incredibly insufferable ********.
For some reason his extremely unlikable persona on-air has made him a wealthy douchebag and just as he's prepared to migrate to television he discovers that his comments towards a frequent caller resulted in a mass shooting that left 7 women and the caller dead. Thankfully this news immediately impacts him, he feels terrible for what he did, and his empire spirals down the shitter as he now mooches off his girlfriend 3 years later.
Fast forward and he finds himself looking to take a concrete jump into the river when he's saved from hoodlums by... a homeless Robin Williams.
Williams' character, unlike Bridges, is unfortunately his usual turbo-autistic hyper-active psychotic with-a-heart-of-gold, only now he's surrounded by other crazy homeless characters and he's filthy too!
Williams saves Bridges and tells him about his quest for the Holy Grail (in a Gilliam movie???) before Bridges discovers that Williams is the husband of one of the women he incited to kill, so now he feels like he owes something to him, but it's kind of difficult to help him because he doesn't respect money... but there is a love interest he's been stalking...
So suddenly the main thrust of this movie becomes Hitch, which I'm not a fan of. Nevermind that the girl he likes is herself an unlikable character and Williams literally trips over himself to appease her, but throughout all of this we get Williams' mad ravings, allusions to the story of The Fisher King which he wrote about when he was a teacher before he disassociated, and this hallucinatory threat of "the Red Knight" which looks appropriately intimidating, but only Williams sees it and it's not like it ever gets him run over or anything (although it gets close).
We're also treated to Bridges' strained love life with his girlfriend which is given a entirely unnecessary slap to the back of the head when after he hooks up Williams, salvages his career, and starts feeling good about himself again, says "I think I should be alone for a while".
The Girlfriend reacts to that in typical (though not entirely unreasonable) Girlfriend ways and it's just unnecessary additional conflict.
Also Williams is attacked by the cartoon thugs he saved Bridges from and is put into a coma until Bridges actually breaks into the random home Williams decided contains the grail and steals it. He does, and of course everything just works itself out in the end for some reason, credits.
It would be a mistake not to credit the fair bit of humanizing character development Bridges goes through, particularly with regard to his attitude toward the miscellaneous homeless characters he comes across. They have their own personalities, own pasts that have hurt them, and we get some nice moments between him and them where their commentary either situates the audience, or serves to inform and enlighten Bridges.
I'm disappointed that Williams never really comes back to reality, he disassociates with his former life as a teacher with a wife, and only after re-associating does he once ask Bridges permission to love again, or something. I don't really get it, but Bridges' character is secretly crying during the scene, so it's an important moment that's lost on me.
If Robin Williams was less Robin Williams,
if Jeff Bridges' girlfriend wasn't a subplot,
if the love interest was less quirk city...
I dunno, I feel like I can imagine a version of this movie that axes the Holy Grail through-plot and isn't attempting to crowbar in some parable about The Fisher King and Bridges attempts to restore Williams' life through more interaction with the homeless friends he's made in the past 3 years, then I could see a more enjoyable movie in this.
As it is, it's just that same weird style you expect from Gilliam movies. A lot of interesting camera shots, a splash of fantastical absurdism, but intercut with extraordinarily dark and sometimes gross or gruesome imagery. And then there's just a random love story or two in there somewhere for some reason.
Not a fan. I didn't expect to be a fan.
Final Verdict: [Meh...]
The Fisher King
Urban Fantasy Comedy Drama / English / 1991
WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Possible pro: It's a fantasy movie starring Robin Williams.
Possible con: It's a fantasy movie directed by Terry Gilliam.
Only thing I know is that it's supposed to be another movie that plays with reality.
WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
Terry Gilliam's movies are very hit-and-miss in my experience. And I suppose the same could be said of Robin Williams' filmography too.
Overall, while I appreciate what this movie was trying to do, I'm going to say that it's execution has been a miss for me.
The premise is Jeff Bridges (who looks and acts like a completely different character that The Dude I associate him with) is a "radio shock jock", which from the opening scene establishes for us what that term means by illustrating him as an incredibly insufferable ********.
For some reason his extremely unlikable persona on-air has made him a wealthy douchebag and just as he's prepared to migrate to television he discovers that his comments towards a frequent caller resulted in a mass shooting that left 7 women and the caller dead. Thankfully this news immediately impacts him, he feels terrible for what he did, and his empire spirals down the shitter as he now mooches off his girlfriend 3 years later.
Fast forward and he finds himself looking to take a concrete jump into the river when he's saved from hoodlums by... a homeless Robin Williams.
Williams' character, unlike Bridges, is unfortunately his usual turbo-autistic hyper-active psychotic with-a-heart-of-gold, only now he's surrounded by other crazy homeless characters and he's filthy too!
Williams saves Bridges and tells him about his quest for the Holy Grail (in a Gilliam movie???) before Bridges discovers that Williams is the husband of one of the women he incited to kill, so now he feels like he owes something to him, but it's kind of difficult to help him because he doesn't respect money... but there is a love interest he's been stalking...
So suddenly the main thrust of this movie becomes Hitch, which I'm not a fan of. Nevermind that the girl he likes is herself an unlikable character and Williams literally trips over himself to appease her, but throughout all of this we get Williams' mad ravings, allusions to the story of The Fisher King which he wrote about when he was a teacher before he disassociated, and this hallucinatory threat of "the Red Knight" which looks appropriately intimidating, but only Williams sees it and it's not like it ever gets him run over or anything (although it gets close).
We're also treated to Bridges' strained love life with his girlfriend which is given a entirely unnecessary slap to the back of the head when after he hooks up Williams, salvages his career, and starts feeling good about himself again, says "I think I should be alone for a while".
The Girlfriend reacts to that in typical (though not entirely unreasonable) Girlfriend ways and it's just unnecessary additional conflict.
Also Williams is attacked by the cartoon thugs he saved Bridges from and is put into a coma until Bridges actually breaks into the random home Williams decided contains the grail and steals it. He does, and of course everything just works itself out in the end for some reason, credits.
It would be a mistake not to credit the fair bit of humanizing character development Bridges goes through, particularly with regard to his attitude toward the miscellaneous homeless characters he comes across. They have their own personalities, own pasts that have hurt them, and we get some nice moments between him and them where their commentary either situates the audience, or serves to inform and enlighten Bridges.
I'm disappointed that Williams never really comes back to reality, he disassociates with his former life as a teacher with a wife, and only after re-associating does he once ask Bridges permission to love again, or something. I don't really get it, but Bridges' character is secretly crying during the scene, so it's an important moment that's lost on me.
If Robin Williams was less Robin Williams,
if Jeff Bridges' girlfriend wasn't a subplot,
if the love interest was less quirk city...
I dunno, I feel like I can imagine a version of this movie that axes the Holy Grail through-plot and isn't attempting to crowbar in some parable about The Fisher King and Bridges attempts to restore Williams' life through more interaction with the homeless friends he's made in the past 3 years, then I could see a more enjoyable movie in this.
As it is, it's just that same weird style you expect from Gilliam movies. A lot of interesting camera shots, a splash of fantastical absurdism, but intercut with extraordinarily dark and sometimes gross or gruesome imagery. And then there's just a random love story or two in there somewhere for some reason.
Not a fan. I didn't expect to be a fan.
Final Verdict: [Meh...]