Review of Lost in La Mancha (2002) by David N — 03 Apr 2008

Directed by: Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe.

Starring: Terry Gilliam, Johnny Depp, Jean Rochefort, Jeff Bridges, Vanessa Paradis.

<<"The budget of this thing is about $32.1 million dollars...which by European standards without American investment is a big chunk of change...for what we're trying to do, its half the money we need.">>.

The tragic story of Terry Gilliams film 'The Man Who Killed Don Quixote', from its battles through pre-production and later problems that ended up forcing the production to shut down after only six days of production.

Such a tragic yet fascinating documentary. I'm not usually a fan of them at all but after hearing so much and knowing that Terry is such a genius, I had to find this. What the documentary manages to achieve is the right sense of every emotion that happened on set. By the end of the film, I was heartbroken to see all this shit that had happened to such a potential project that I want to see it pick up and finally get made...and throughout the film, I found myself to be laughing and feeling strangely hurt, the fact that a man with such amazing qualities and a great interaction with everyone he works with, a man who has had nothing but bad luck in his career is once again getting shafted by not only the acts of god, but the situation of illnesses, unexpected happenings and ultimately a battle with the insurers which lead to everything being abandoned.

If you love film you should certainly watch this...if you love Terry Gilliam...why the hell have you not seen this yet? I strangely compelling documentary that delivers the emotions felt on the set of this film and such a fascinating look into the ways of this director, even through the terrible things that happened. Highly recommended.