Review: The Brothers Grimm

Allison Willmore noted on the IFC Blog that when she was walking out of her screening of The Brothers Grimm, she heard Rex Reed remark, "Who is that film for, exactly? Can someone tell me what kind of audience that film is for?" Funny, because that’s more or less what I wondered outloud whilst waiting for the elevator. Actually, I think my exact words were, “Why are films like this even made? And who are they expecting to show up on opening day?” These are not rhetorical questions, exactly – if you’ve got the answers, I’d honestly like to hear them – but they are certainly not queries for which I can give you a pithy bon mot right off the bat. I'm simply not sure.

As you’ve probably heard by now, Terry Gilliam’s latest had a hell of a time making its way off the Miramax shelf, and it might not ever have had it not been for the vault dump that’ll soon bring us long-anticipated shoulda-beens such as John Madden’s Proof and Lasse Hallstrom’s An Unfinished Life. I haven’t seen that curious pairing of diva and indie shepherd as of yet, but I have seen Proof, and whilst it's no masterpiece either, I can somewhat sadly report that it’s far more deserving of air than this soggy Gilliam dross. I won’t go as far as calling The Brothers Grimm a complete waste of celluloid, but I’ll say right off the bat that anyone with any sort of vice to speak of can come up with a better way to spend $10 and two hours this weekend. In fact, I’ll get the obvious pun out of the way right this instant: this is grim business.


 
The film starts with a brief prologue, in which we learn a), that magic bean business was real (and to call it a lasting trauma for the titular Brothers would be to drastically undermine everything the pop psychology industry has taught us about repression), and b) this is definitely a Gilliam film, because no other director would Dutch-angle the hell out of a formative family scene, right down to the rocking horse knocked artfully askew next to a dying relative. We soon jump ahead about twenty years: brothers Jacob and Will (Heath Ledger and Matt Damon, both unrecognizable, but more on that later) now travel the countryside, creating problems straight out of fairy tales (often involving witches or ogres), which they then charge a generous amount to heroically solve. Will insists that this is all the natural order of things, that the simpleton peasants really need to be exploited for their superstitions, and that the Brothers deserve to take a profit. "It's a short brutish struggle, and then you die. Life's little subterfuges make it all worthwhile." Right. The oldest story in show business: any man not on one or another side of a con isn't really alive.

Of course, if it were all about exposing the machinery behind fairy tales, then anybody with a working knowledge of Into the Woods might start to wonder, what's the point? And in that regard, Sondheim fans have little to worry about – as far as deconstruction goes, Gilliam's got nothing to match "Maybe They're Magic". But maybe that's too bad. The fact remains: I dilligently sat through The Brothers Grimm, and I don't think I dozed off for more than five minutes or so, but I can't for the life of me tell you what Gilliam was trying to do, or what this film is *really* about, or who might actually enjoy it. It should probably be said right away that it's not a kids movie, with its hints towards mead soaked threesomes and general CGI-basted scariness. But I can't imagine anyone with anything more interesting to worry about – like, say, the fine print on the cell phone bill, or the calorie count in a handful of Belgian frites – getting it up to care.

It's technically competant, I'll give it that. In fact, the shots that aren't oppressively CGIed are actually quite impressive. There's a quality of light and texture to Gilliam's landscapes that hasn't been seen since the Brueghels were rocking Antwerp.  So it's certainly not an eyesore, but it is boring, and I'm afraid that's a worse offense. There's just no wit to this enterprise. Not a single joke comes off, to the point where every successive attempt seems increasingly sad. Will keeps reminding the haters that he and Jacob are rockstars in their field, and I'm pretty sure the serving wenches and stable boys on the other end of his admonitions are fairly concerned that they'll never eat lunch in this town again.

The first hour of the film is mostly expendable, and once the plot kicks up a bit and the narrative's true menace is revealed, you'll wish that more of the first act had been expended. Because there is a marvelous sequence, right smack dab in the middle of the film, in which a truly inspired digital creep-out pops up out of a well to commit an act of quick and brutal violence. It clears the palette and quiets the mind; you might even find yourself thinking, "Well - if the rest is going to be like that, we might be on to something here." But funnily enough, whilst this is all going on in the town square, where are our heroes? They're off doing something idiotic in the woods. It's truly telling that The Brothers Grimm doesn't actually need the Grimm Brothers to produce its most compelling scenes.

Is that the fault of the actors who play them? I'm not sure exactly. Matt Damon wears a silly wig and chirps his lines in a smokers singsong. I actually mistook him for Eddie Izzard until, five minutes in, I got bored enough to flip through the press kit. But annoying as he is, that's some kind of acting, the kind that Damon does fairly well. Damon's found a way to disapear into a character, into a film, into the fabric of stardom that his buddy Affleck would (and probably should, at this point) kill for. And it wasn't until a glimmer of romance popped up like shrapnel that I recognized Heath Ledger behind twitchy glasses and a scruffy non-haircut; much like Julia Roberts at her best, he seems to be an actor that can slip into earth-shaking star mode with the simple toggle of his grin.

But that romantic non-plot is itself troubling enough, not just because it seems at turns incongruous and sorely needed, but because Gilliam himself clearly has no idea what he wants to do with it. There's been some cattiness in the press about Lena Headey, the actress that the film falls over itself to fall for; apparently, Gilliam had originally cast Samantha Morton in the role, but in an unusual move, that actress was forced out by The Brothers Weinstein in favor of the lesser star. Headley is certainly worth looking at, but she's got this thing going on that reminds me of Katherine Ross in the original Stepford Wives – that sort of insolence that we're suppossed to mistake for strength and/or intelligence. Morton, whose exterior is just as lovely, if considerably quirkier, would have softened things up from within.  Put it this way: Morton could have let the film borrow a believeable emotional core; Headley could very well get a Brothers Grimm tie-in spread in Maxim if she plays her cards right, and I guess when you're Harvey Weinstein, that's what really matters.

Even knowing just that behind-the-scenes squabble, it's impossible to watch The Brothers Grimm without speculating on all the other ways in which things might have been different had Gilliam had his way. That's not to say it would have necessarily been a better film. But Grimm as it stands plays like the work of eight screenwriters, four or five editors and at least two or three Alan Smithees. It's so lacking in cohesive vision that just a little drop of auteurism might have made for a miracle.