# What is the best film by Terry Gilliam? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 18, 2011, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028 "2011-10-18T12:48:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/41 "2011-10-18T22:10:06Z")
I haven’t seen a Gilliam movie I don’t like (though I haven’t seen _Tideland_, and I haven’t seen _The Fisher King_ in a long time). I really love The Brothers Grimm for some reason, though it’s not nearly his best. _Time Bandits_, _Brazil_, _12 Monkeys_ and _The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus_ are all brilliant, but I think _Brazil_ has the edge: it’s dark and funny and twisted and horrific and so very, very true-to-life. Gilliam’s mind is bursting with ideas, and in Brazil, not a second is spared in presenting something whimsical and bizarre. ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/42 "2011-10-18T22:17:58Z")
…I actually love The Adventures of Baron Munchhausen. The rest are good to decent movies… but for some reason Munchhausen just makes me smile the whole time. ---
**Author:** ![drbhoneydew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d78d45/32.png) [@drbhoneydew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drbhoneydew)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/43 "2011-10-18T22:33:50Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > There’s one little part of _Brazil_ that I disagree with. It showed people eating goo in a restaurant, and there were little signs showing what the goo was supposed to be. This implies that in the future food will be tasteless and formless, but still have nutritional content. The exact opposite is what’s really happening. I always pictured Brazil as being set in a dystopian not far-beyond-the-present, but with a divergent point somewhere around 1943. Anyway, today’s food is not non-nutritional - the problem is too much nutrition of the calorific variety either in fat or sugar, or too much salt (which is pretty vital in building neurotransmitters). Needless to say, I voted Brazil. Dark and whimsy go together so well. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/44 "2011-10-18T22:48:52Z")
I put the comedy of Grail on one side of the scale, and the vision of Brazil on the other side, and they were perfectly even. I gave it to Grail, because it will never, ever get old. Ni! ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/45 "2011-10-18T23:28:38Z")
> [@cordylus](#): > > I hope you all filed a B32/6 before voting. I hate to pick nits, but this is both the Dope and one of my all time favourite movies…the form you are looking for is the [27B/6](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0B61_5sRoBI). ETA: Sorry, I’m a bit of a stickler for paperwork. ---
**Author:** ![projectmolcos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ab992/32.png) [@projectmolcos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/projectmolcos)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2011, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/46 "2011-11-04T13:14:26Z")
Wasn’t that Terry Jones? ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2011, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/47 "2011-11-04T14:03:14Z")
Holy Grail. I’ve only seen about half the films because the ones I’ve seen left me cold or annoyed. Loved big hunks of Baron M, but the moon scenes just dragged on and on. Liked parts of Time Bandits, but there were buckets of cutesy slop. Holy Grail was pretty good though. ---
**Author:** ![cordylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dc4da7/32.png) [@cordylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cordylus)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028/48 "2011-11-06T04:36:41Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#): > > I hate to pick nits, but this is both the Dope and one of my all time favourite movies…the form you are looking for is the [27B/6](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0B61_5sRoBI). > > ETA: Sorry, I’m a bit of a stickler for paperwork. Oh dear…:eek: I suppose I can expect a visit from information retrieval. It was nice knowing you all, hope they give my wife a receipt. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-best-film-by-terry-gilliam/600028.md?page=2)