THE FISHER KING
We do a Blu waltz with one of Gilliam’s greatest.
1991 Out 19 JunE BD Extras Commentary, Featurettes, Interviews, Deleted scenes, Costume tests
Terry Gilliam’s high-octane imagination often threatens to melt down right off the screen, and it more than once comes close to that in The Fisher King – a gloriously baroque mash-up of Arthurian myth, New York squalor, alcoholism, romantic obsession and Robin Williams cavorting around Central Park stark bollock-naked. Not to mention a flashback to a mass shooting that even now carries a charge of chilling anguish.
Williams plays a deranged former history prof whose wife died in said bloodbath. He’s now a motormouth bum on the streets of Manhattan. Jeff Bridges is a guilt-ridden former shockjock whose taunting of a phonerin sparked the killing. Williams, tormented by a vision of a monstrous Red Knight whose helmet spouts flame, latches on to Bridges, telling him he must retrieve the Holy Grail (shades of Python) immured in a billionaire’s castle-like mansion on Fifth Avenue.
The plot sprawls in multiple directions, and scenes (and monologues) go on way too long. But it’s redeemed by some inspired design (not least that nightmare-apparition Red Knight), by Mercedes Ruehl’s Oscar-winning performance as Bridges’ long-suffering girlfriend, and by the fevered exhilaration of Gilliam’s vision. Plus, a sweet moment of sheer lyrical magic when all the bustling commuters in Grand Central Station suddenly break off to waltz together. Philip Kemp