Gilliam Kick

Last week I picked up 12 Monkeys on Blu-Ray and as I hadn't seen it in over 8 years and I wasn't surprised at how much better I understood the plot, even though I had no issues at the time. I enjoyed the style and slight lunacy so much, that it led me to watch a few other Terry Gilliam films, Brazil and Tideland. The first thing I noticed about these films is how different they were in terms of scope; Brazil being a futuristic nightmare played out through these elaborate sets while Tideland enacted a girls dream world but in the most minimalistic way. Both were very powerful films but I feel Brazil's political underton-- well actually they weren't undertones, it's message was about as subtle as a taser... But either way I feel it leaves viewers with more to ponder after the credits roll. Tideland leaves us with little sense of hope (somewhat like the beginning of the film where we see a young girl prepare and inject her father with heroin just as casually if she was bringing him the paper) and even though my desire for a happy ending is about as strong as it is for Justin Bieber to perform at my next birthday, my first instinct was to group it with other films where the journey hardly justifies the lack of a conclusion. Then again there are other films which critics have labelled as such but I did not agree with. Maybe it's all just subjective..?