Terry Gilliam is known for three things: his directing career, his animation and occasional acting for Monty Python, and taking nearly 20 years to get The Man Who Killed Don Quixote made. The influence his time in Monty Python has had on the rest of his career cannot be understated. He’s one of a handful of directors that have a distinct surrealist visual style and leans into magical realism in all of his works. Some of his most notable works are Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Time Bandits, Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, this one, 12 Monkeys and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. The Fisher King is probably one of his less surreal works, but even it has its moments.

Jeff Bridges plays a Howard Stern-like shock jock named Jack. On his radio show, he brushes off a long-time caller who commits a murder-suicide, and it sends him spiraling into depression and alcoholism. He falls so low, he nearly commits suicide, but is stopped by a group of thugs who beat him, thinking he’s a homeless person. He’s rescued by an actual homeless person, Parry (Robin Williams), who tells Jack he’s searching for the Holy Grail and in turns asks for his assistance. Jack discovers that Parry is actually a former college professor named Henry, who had a psychotic breakdown after witnessing his wife die right in front of him during the murder-suicide. Jack, feeling partially responsible, helps Parry woo a shy woman named Lydia. Things are going well until Parry has another psychotic episode manifested as a Red Knight that chases after him, which sends him into another catatonic state. Jack decides to sneak into the building containing what Parry believes to be the Holy Grail and steal it. He does so, and simultaneously saves the life of the man inside. Bringing Parry the grail saves him and helps him both overcome the loss of his wife and profess his new love for Lydia.

It seems a lot darker when you type it all out like that, but I promise watching the movie doesn’t feel so dark. Everything I described is true, but that Gilliam magical realism bleeds through and you somehow know the film will have a happy ending. The highlights of the movie are the performances of Jeff Bridges and Robin Williams. They both put in some of their best work and the balance between these two men trying to save each other carries the movie. Be warned: if you’re going to watch the movie, as I would recommend that you do, you’ll see more of Robin Williams than you ever wanted to.

Bonus Review: The Adventures of Baron Munchausen

Another of Gillian’s better films, but a significantly lighter fare than The Fisher King, to the point where it’s a little cartoonish. One of the early scenes requires Eric Idle’s character to carry a message halfway across the world and he Scooby-Doo runs until his feet have dug halfway to China before he shoots off like a rocket. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is also strange for its narrative within a narrative. The Baron character interrupts a play of his exploits to decry its inaccuracies and then proceeds to have adventures in real time that are more fantastical than that of the play.

As I said, the Baron interrupts a play occurring and tells the audience a story of when he wagered with the Grand Turk, putting both their lives at stake. After the story, the play is canceled and through a few minor events, the Baron escapes the Angel of Death. To escape the city, the Baron takes a hot air balloon to the moon. The King of the Moon is jealous of the Baron’s previous relationship with the Queen and so expels him back to earth and into the volcano of the Roman god, Vulcan. He is subsequently kicked out of there after dancing with Venus, Vulcan’s wife. He’s then swallowed up by a sea creature and upon his release, save the city where the play took place from the Turkish army. The Baron is shot by the man who put on the play, but at the funeral, it is revealed that this was just another story the Baron was telling the play’s audience from the beginning.

Like I said, it’s very strange, but it’s very fun and revels in its confusing the audience into believing or not believing the stories that are told. Gilliam uses this device in multiple films, and never has the unreliable narrator been so enjoyable a device. I’d recommend giving this a watch, especially as a palate cleanser to The Fisher King.