someguy
08-27-2006, 04:24 PM
Minor spoilers
Tideland is Terry Gilliam's latest movie, and unlike the Brothers Grimm there was no real studio involvement so he was able to get full control on this movie. Unfortunately, after seeing it I wished that there was a lot of studio involvement because it would explain a lot.
Jeff Bridges plays an old strung out musician with a heroin addiction, and his wife is even more strung out and worse looking (who is played by Jennifer Tilly in what really is a cameo). Their daughter, most likely trying to escape from how bad her life really is, goes wild with her imagination. Her name is Jeliza-Rose and she acts like a southern belle type, even speaking in a fake southern drawl. Her mom dies from a heroin overdose and Jeliza along with her father panic. They go out to a farmhouse that Jeliza's dad purchased for her grandmother years ago.
The house itself is pretty much a piece of crap. It's dirty, infested with insects among other things and is vandalized on the inside. Her dad 'goes on a vacation' and soon dies, leaving Jeliza-Rose and her imagination to herself.
The movie was shot out in the praries (western Canada) and is pretty much like the praries. Boring as hell. Jodelle Ferland shows that she can act, and for a kid of her age she carries the movie on her shoulders nicely. The problem is that I really don't care for Jeliza-Rose and the people she encounters. One of Jeliza's friends is a mentally retarded man named Dickens, and to say that he's annoying is an understatement. I didn't give two shits about their relationship in the movie, and the same goes with the woman Dell.
To just sum it up in one word, Tideland is boring. It doesn't work as a more adult themed Alice in Wonderland type of story, it doesn't work as a drama of a child coming to terms with her parents deaths, it doesn't work as anything really. Even when it takes a turn towards darker subject matter, that doesn't do much to help the movie either. The ending is pretty dumb also, and it seemed like the film wanted to wrap up quickly (which is odd considering the running time is almost two hours).
There were two parts that I did like about the movie though. Gilliam does what he does best, working the camera excellently. The imagination sequences like the underwater house are highlights of the movie, and he does a great job with the camera overall. The second thing is Jodelle Ferland. Her role is most likely polarizing, I can see people thinking that she's annoying as hell in the movie. I thought she was great, and it's pretty much a huge feat for her to do that well in a movie where she's pretty much in every scene.
Unfortunately, Tideland has a truckload of faults to make the direction and acting try to save it. Parts of it make no sense, and some of the events in the movie could have been part of Jeliza-Rose's imagination which lead to some frustration, and it bored me to tears at points. A huge disappointment.
4/10
Tideland is Terry Gilliam's latest movie, and unlike the Brothers Grimm there was no real studio involvement so he was able to get full control on this movie. Unfortunately, after seeing it I wished that there was a lot of studio involvement because it would explain a lot.
Jeff Bridges plays an old strung out musician with a heroin addiction, and his wife is even more strung out and worse looking (who is played by Jennifer Tilly in what really is a cameo). Their daughter, most likely trying to escape from how bad her life really is, goes wild with her imagination. Her name is Jeliza-Rose and she acts like a southern belle type, even speaking in a fake southern drawl. Her mom dies from a heroin overdose and Jeliza along with her father panic. They go out to a farmhouse that Jeliza's dad purchased for her grandmother years ago.
The house itself is pretty much a piece of crap. It's dirty, infested with insects among other things and is vandalized on the inside. Her dad 'goes on a vacation' and soon dies, leaving Jeliza-Rose and her imagination to herself.
The movie was shot out in the praries (western Canada) and is pretty much like the praries. Boring as hell. Jodelle Ferland shows that she can act, and for a kid of her age she carries the movie on her shoulders nicely. The problem is that I really don't care for Jeliza-Rose and the people she encounters. One of Jeliza's friends is a mentally retarded man named Dickens, and to say that he's annoying is an understatement. I didn't give two shits about their relationship in the movie, and the same goes with the woman Dell.
To just sum it up in one word, Tideland is boring. It doesn't work as a more adult themed Alice in Wonderland type of story, it doesn't work as a drama of a child coming to terms with her parents deaths, it doesn't work as anything really. Even when it takes a turn towards darker subject matter, that doesn't do much to help the movie either. The ending is pretty dumb also, and it seemed like the film wanted to wrap up quickly (which is odd considering the running time is almost two hours).
There were two parts that I did like about the movie though. Gilliam does what he does best, working the camera excellently. The imagination sequences like the underwater house are highlights of the movie, and he does a great job with the camera overall. The second thing is Jodelle Ferland. Her role is most likely polarizing, I can see people thinking that she's annoying as hell in the movie. I thought she was great, and it's pretty much a huge feat for her to do that well in a movie where she's pretty much in every scene.
Unfortunately, Tideland has a truckload of faults to make the direction and acting try to save it. Parts of it make no sense, and some of the events in the movie could have been part of Jeliza-Rose's imagination which lead to some frustration, and it bored me to tears at points. A huge disappointment.
4/10