TIDELAND

site | trailer | BFFF2006Man, I'm glad I had company for this one (Thanks, Fania =). That was rough. Not the feel-good hit of the season, but a solid rebound from the lameness of BROTHERS GRIMM (wtf happened there?). It's a twisted not-for-children child's story, an ALICE in which the Wonderland exists in Alice's mind, and filters a reality of drug abuse, sketchy family relationships, inappropriate tongue kissing, and an f'd up pseudo-religous take on taxidermy as resurrection.

The film follows Jeliza-Rose, the child of two junkies, one a rock guitarist, the other a harpie bitch, as she moves from an apartment in the city to her grandmother's farmhouse in the prairies. Not surprisingly, she doesn't have any friends her age. Instead, she talks to fireflies and squirrels, and creates friends, advisors, and confidantes in the form of her doll-head companions. Together they explore the wideopen-yet-small world of her new home, encountering neighbors who may have a mysterious connection to her family. An innocent girl who fixes her dad's works for him while talking to her doll heads, there's not a lot that will faze her. As her family disappears around her and she uncovers some disturbing secrets about her new neighbors, her biggest concern is meeting her new ghost friend for a picnic in the afternoon.

You, however, will be sketched out.

Seriously sketched out.

I don't know the source material novel at all, but I'm very curious about it now. I dig FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS, an earlier Gilliam adaptation of a very twisted bit of reading, but do feel that it had a few great moments (and performances), separated by not-so-successful or compelling stretches. That's what TIDELAND feels like, too, only with drug-induced frenzy dialed-down significantly. There's probably an argument for the pace and prolonged discomfort as being faithful to the source, but I think Gilliam's hurting the movie by not editing down to reduce the endurance test feel of it for a movie theater audience?

I recognized Jodelle Ferland, who plays the lead, Jeliza-Rose, from a SciFi Channel marathon of the American KINGDOM series. In the Stephen King adapted series she played Mary, the ghost girl. I do believe that I also saw her recently as the daughter who goes missing in the SILENT HILL movie. (A mother is god in the eyes of a child, right, Jess?)

In those roles, it was easy to see that she was well cast for spook factor as a haunting or haunted little girl. But seeing her in TIDELAND, I can see that she may have the potential to be a dangerous young starlet, in the same constellations as Natalie and Scarlet and probably MIRRORMASK girl (whatever happened to Minuet, the little toughgirl from CITY OF LOST CHILDREN?). She holds her own opposite some very well-played craziness, from bipolar paranoid schizo Dell to lobotomized man-child Dickens. She also delivers the dangerously naive whimsy and fantasy logic of a little girl raised in a home that's fueled by heroin and methadone.

Alas, Jeliza-Rose's parentals don't get a lot of screen time in this story. Mom Jennifer Tilly gets to simmer and explode for a few minutes, and Dad Jeff Bridges rocks in onstage, jamming in a club, and floats out on a wave of heroin.

The cast and the craft are excellent. The camerawork is masterful and dynamic, as always, and there are a couple of truly magic visual moments. The busride from the city to the prairie has this one knockout gorgeous transition... An opening shot looking down on the high grass of the prairie, swaying in waves with the wind, is breathtaking and vertigo-inducing.

It will be opening at Kendall Square later in October. Alas, I can't recommend it for a *fun* movie night out. But it will certainly give you some disturbing thoughts and magickal screen moments to talk about, and Gilliam fans, especially those who appreciate FEAR AND LOATHING, and want to see what he's been up to to cleanse his palate of GRIMM, should check it out.

October 22. Percolating and re-reading this post, I find I've neglected some TIDELAND goodness. The ending of this film is beautiful. Took me back to TIME BANDITS. And I need to temper my negative words on the pacing of the film with my great appreciation for Gilliam's amazing ability to move us in and out of Jeliza-Rose's fantasy and "reality," and creating and consistently maintaining the view of the world thru her eyes, colored by her feelings, and governed by her logic. Still, it *is* long, and the problem is, you can FEEL it way too often. But, I wanted to say that while you're bored, you'll probably have a pretty picture to look at. Granted, that's not why you're at the movies, but, I'm just sayin...

Oh, you know just as well as I do that I just WANT this to be Terry Gilliam BRAZILian Greatness...

*sigh*

It isn't.

Keep on keepin on~

p.s. After TIDELAND, Fania tagged out and Paris Jen tagged in to partner with me for DARK REMAINS, a home-grown American new-wave horror flick. Not quite as together a backstory as the Japanese JU-ONs, but full of some very good screen scares. Maybe I'll find some time tomorrow to put together a decent ramble on it, if I'm not too saturated in SEVERANCE and AUTOMATON... =)