Time Bandits

John Cleese Director: Terry Gilliam Terry Gilliam

Overview

A young boy joins a group of renegade dwarves on an unpredictable journey through time in this humorous fantasy. Monty Python animator Terry Gilliam mostly achieves a tricky balancing act in his second feature as sole director, creating a dark, irreverent comedy disguised as a family adventure. Particularly amusing are the boy's encounters with various historical figures, including an entertainment-starved Napoleon (Ian Holm), a powerful Agamemnon (Sean Connery), and a surprisingly stuffy Robin Hood, embodied by Gilliam's Python cohort John Cleese. Episodic by nature, the film is less successful when dealing with the larger narrative, which concerns the pursuit of the dwarves and their time-traveling map by the Supreme Being. However, the combination of Gilliam's visual exuberance and the witty script (by Gilliam and Michael Palin) ensures an entertaining, if erratic, journey.

Product Details

Release Date:	09/29/2014
UPC:	0715515133210
Original Release:	1981
Source:	Criterion Collection
Region Code:	A
Presentation:	[Wide Screen, Color]
Time:	1:56:00
Sales rank:	73

Special Features

New 2K digital restoration, supervised by director Terry Gilliam, with uncompressed stereo soundtrack; Audio commentary featuring Gilliam, cowriter-actor Michael Palin, and actors John Cleese, David Warner, and Craig Warnock; New piece, narrated by film writer David Morgan, featuring production designer Milly Burns and costume designer James Acheson discussing the creation of the film's historical periods and fantasy worlds; Conversation between Gilliam and film scholar Peter von Bagh, recorded at the 1998 Midnight Sun Film Festival; Appearance by actor Shelley Duvall on Tom Snyder's Tomorrow show from 1981; Gallery of rare photographs from the set; Trailer; PLUS: an essay by David Sterritt

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

John Cleese	Robin Hood
Sean Connery	Agamemnon
Shelley Duvall	Pansy
Katherine Helmond	Mrs. Ogre
Ian Holm	Napolean
Michael Palin	Vincent
Ralph Richardson	Supreme Being
Peter Vaughan	Ogre
David Warner	Evil Genius
David Rappaport	Randall
Kenny Baker	Fidgit
Jack Purvis	Wally
Malcolm Dixon	Strutter
Tiny Ross	Vermin
Craig Warnock	Kevin
David Daker	Kevin's Father
Michael Edmonds	Og
Irene Lamb	Actor
Frances de la Tour	Salvation Army Major
Martin Carroll	Baxi Brazilla III
Sheila Fearn	Kevin's Mother
Jim Broadbent	Compere
John Young	Reginald
Myrtle Devenish	Beryl
Leon Lissek	Refugee
Terence Bayler	Lucien
Preston Lockwood	Neguy
Charles McKeown	Theater Manager
David Leland	Puppeteer
Derrick O'Connor	Robber Leader
Neil McCarthy	2nd Robber
Declan Mulholland	3rd Robber
Peter Jonfield	Arm Wrestler
Derek Deadman	Robert
Jerold Wells	Benson
Marcus Powell	Horse Flesh
Winston Dennis	Bull-headed Warrior
Del Baker	Greek Fighting Warrior
Mark Holmes	Troll Father
Andrew Maclachlan	Fireman
Tony Jay	Supreme Being
Edwin Finn	Supreme Being's Face

Technical Credits

Terry Gilliam

John Cleese

Eric Idle

Michael Palin

Terry Gilliam	Director,Producer,Screenwriter
James Acheson	Costumes/Costume Designer
Peter Biziou	Cinematographer
Millie Burns	Production Designer
Patrick Cassavetti	Set Decoration/Design
John Cleese	Screenwriter
Julian Doyle	Editor
Graham Ford	Production Manager
Norman Garwood	Art Director
George Harrison	Score Composer,Songwriter,Executive Producer
Eric Idle	Screenwriter
Irene Lamb	Casting
Mike Moran	Score Composer
Denis O'Brien	Executive Producer
Michael Palin	Screenwriter
Neville C. Thompson	Associate Producer

Editorial Reviews

A delirious action-adventure fantasy directed by Monty Python's Terry Gilliam, Time Bandits is in some ways an updated version of The Wizard of Oz. The surreal tale follows a wee lad as he hops through time, accompanied all the while by a band of six hyperactive dwarves who harbor the "Supreme Being's" map of the universe and its hidden time portals. Together the boy and his compatriots tour Agamemnon's Greece, Robin Hood's Sherwood forest, and the Titanic as it cruises toward its destiny. But the so-called Evil One (David Warner) wants the map too; his epic pursuit results in a dazzling showdown involving cowboys from the Old West and knights from the Middle Ages. Time Bandits also features a superb supporting cast that includes Ralph Richardson as the Supreme Being, Sean Connery as Agamemnon, and Monty Python member John Cleese as Robin Hood. (Cleese also cowrote the film with Gilliam and Python mainstay Michael Palin.) Gilliam's phantasmagoric imagery is highly theatrical and riveting. Time Bandits is a fine precursor to the director's later, even more visually stunning work in Brazil.

Barnes & Noble - Monica McIntyre

Terry Gilliam's 1981 children's fantasy film is a curious mixture of adventure, farce, and satire that is intermittently entertaining -- if occasionally eccentric to a fault. With a camera perched at knee level, Time Bandits is told from a child's point-of-view, but rather than adopting a sickeningly sweet sentimentality, Gilliam opts for an acerbic and often nasty tone that risked offending the very audience at which it purported to be aimed. The script's indebtedness to childrens' author Roald Dahl can be seen most obviously in the relationship between the main character and his parents, particularly in the amusingly explosive conclusion. Gilliam's state-of-the-art special effects are used, ironically enough, to attack a consumer society infatuated with the latest in technological advances -- a theme he would develop more convincingly in his next (and arguably best) film, Brazil. The dozen-or-so high profile cameos are not always effectively blended into the time-tripping storyline, but when they are, Gilliam's film takes on aspects of both the surreal and existential. David Warner is the most interesting of the adult-sized performers; his devilish charms are incessantly irresistible.

All Movie Guide - Dan Jardine

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