Psycho's Movie Reviews #154: Time Bandits (1981)

Time Bandits is a 1981 British fantasy adventure film co-written, produced, and directed by Terry Gilliam. It stars Sean Connery, John Cleese, Shelley Duvall, Ralph Richardson, Katherine Helmond, Ian Holm, Michael Palin, Peter Vaughan, and David Warner.

Gilliam has referred to Time Bandits as the first in his "Trilogy of Imagination", followed by Brazil (1985) and ending with The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988). All are about the "craziness of our awkwardly ordered society and the desire to escape it through whatever means possible". All three films focus on these struggles and attempts to escape them through imagination: Time Bandits through the eyes of a child, Brazil through the eyes of a man in his thirties, and Munchausen through the eyes of an elderly man.

Plot

Eleven-year-old Kevin has a vivid imagination and is fascinated by history, particularly that of Ancient Greece; his parents ignore his activities, having become more obsessed with buying the latest household gadgets to keep up with their neighbours. One night, as Kevin is sleeping, an armoured knight on a horse bursts out of his wardrobe. Kevin is scared and hides as the knight rides off into a forest setting where once his bedroom wall was; when Kevin looks back out, the room is back to normal and he finds one of his photos on the wall similar to the forest he saw. The next night he prepares a satchel with supplies and a Polaroid camera but is surprised when six dwarves spill out of the wardrobe. Kevin quickly learns the group has stolen a large, worn map and is looking for an exit from his room before they are discovered. They find that the bedroom wall can be pushed, revealing a long hallway. Kevin is hesitant to join until the apparition of a floating, menacing head—the Supreme Being—appears behind them, demanding the return of the map. Kevin and the dwarves fall into an empty void at the end of the hallway.

They land in Italy during the Napoleonic Wars. As they recover, Kevin learns that Randall is the lead dwarf of the group, which also includes Fidgit, Strutter, Og, Wally and Vermin. They were once employed by the Supreme Being to repair holes in the spacetime fabric, but instead they realized the potential to use the map that identifies these holes to steal riches. With Kevin's help, they visit several locations in spacetime and meet figures such as Napoleon Bonaparte and Robin Hood. Kevin uses his camera to document their visits. However, they are unaware that their activities are being monitored by Evil, a malevolent being who is able to manipulate reality and is attempting to acquire the map himself so that he can remake the universe to his design.

Through Evil's actions, Kevin becomes separated from the group and ends up in Mycenaean Greece, meeting King Agamemnon. After Kevin inadvertently helps Agamemnon kill an enemy, the king adopts him. Randall and the others soon locate Kevin and abduct him, much to his resentment, and escape through another hole, arriving on the ill-fated RMS Titanic. After it sinks, they are forced to tread water while they argue with each other. Evil manipulates the group and transports them to his realm, the Time of Legends. After surviving encounters with ogres and a giant, Kevin and the dwarves locate the Fortress of Ultimate Darkness and are led to believe that "The Most Fabulous Object in the World" awaits them, luring them into Evil's trap. Evil takes the map and locks the group in a cage over an apparently bottomless pit. While looking through the Polaroids he took, Kevin finds one that includes the map, and the group realises there is a hole in the Fortress near them. They escape from the cage, steal the map again and split: Kevin must distract their pursuers while the others go through the hole.

Evil confronts Kevin and takes the map back from him. The dwarves return with various warriors and fighting machines taken from across time, but Evil has no trouble overpowering them all. As Kevin and the dwarves cower, Evil prepares to unleash his ultimate power. Suddenly, he is engulfed in flames and burned into charcoal; from the smoke, a besuited elderly man emerges, revealed as the Supreme Being. He reveals that he allowed the dwarves to borrow his map and the whole adventure had been a test of his creation. He orders the dwarves to collect all the pieces of concentrated Evil, warning that they can be deadly if not contained, recovers the map and allows the dwarves to rejoin him in his creation duties. The Supreme Being disappears with the dwarves, leaving Kevin stranded behind as a missed piece of Evil begins to smoulder.

Kevin awakes in his bedroom to find it filled with smoke. Firefighters break down the door and rescue him as they put out a fire in his house. One of the firemen finds that his parents' new toaster oven caused the fire. As Kevin recovers, he finds one of the firemen resembles Agamemnon and discovers that he still has the photos from his adventure. Kevin's parents discover a smouldering rock in the toaster oven. Recognizing it as a piece of Evil, Kevin warns them not to touch it. Ignoring him, they touch it and explode, leaving only their shoes. Kevin tentatively approaches the smoking shoes and is seen from above as his figure grows smaller, revealing the planet and then outer space, before being rolled up in the map by the Supreme Being.

Production

Terry Gilliam wrote the screenplay with fellow Monty Python alumnus Michael Palin, who appears with Shelley Duvall in the small, recurring roles of Vincent and Pansy. The London-based independent company HandMade Films was backed by former Beatle George Harrison, who wrote and performed the closing credits song "Dream Away" especially for this film. Harrison and his HandMade co-founder, Denis O'Brien, were credited as executive producers of the film.

In his book Monty Python: The Case Against Irreverence, Scurrility, Profanity, Vilification, and Licentious Abuse, Robert Hewison describes the dwarfs as representing the Monty Python troupe. The nice one, Fidgit, is said to represent Palin; the self-appointed leader, Randall, Cleese; the acerbic one, Strutter, Eric Idle; the quiet one, Og, Graham Chapman; the noisy rebel, Wally, Terry Jones; and the nasty, filth-loving one, Vermin, Gilliam himself. Ruth Gordon and Gilda Radner were considered for the role of Mrs. Ogre.

Gilliam discussed aspects of the film in an interview included in the 2013 Arrow Blu-ray release of Time Bandits. He recalled that the production came about because he was unable to start on Brazil, and discussed casting decisions, working again with his fellow Pythons, and the story's downbeat ending. Gilliam also recalled O'Brien pressuring him to include some of Harrison's songs and said that the lyrics of "Dream Away" contained Harrison's comments on Time Bandits and on Gilliam's behaviour during the making of the film.

Reception/Box Office

Time Bandits received critical acclaim. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a 90% rating based on 49 reviews, with an average rating of 7.90/10. The consensus states: "Time Bandits is a remarkable time-travel fantasy from Terry Gilliam, who utilizes fantastic set design and homemade special effects to create a vivid, original universe".

Christopher John reviewed The Time Bandits in Ares Magazine #12 and commented that "Gilliam paid attention wherever necessary. Not relying on any of the "safe", popular conventions of the genre, Gilliam has made an enviable film. Time Bandits is the kind of movie audiences will recommend to their friends, and that is the best kind of movie of all".

The film was released in the US on 6 November 1981 and opened at number one at the box office for the weekend, grossing $6,507,356 from 821 theatres. The film remained number one for 4 weeks and grossed $36 million in the United States and Canada on a budget of $5 million (£2.2 million), making the film Gilliam's breakthrough hit in the United States.

The film was re-released in the US on 12 November 1982 and grossed a further $6 million to take its gross to $42.4 million in the United States and Canada.

Budget $5 million

Box office $42.4 million (United States and Canada)

My Review

After submerging myself finally into Time Bandits, perhaps too late (or too soon, if I had kids maybe it would've been a different experience), I found it reminded me of a live-action version of one of these animated adventures I would watch on TV as a kid, where a child would be brought into a fantastical universe away from his dull, ordinary existence, with strange friends/characters, and then go on adventures. In a couple of small ways its even palatable to the Terry Jones/Jim Henson collaboration Labyrinth. But the difference here is that it is fused with some more mature humor and some darker elements. In a way this is what the college-age fans of Monty Python in the 70's must have seen as the perfect film to take their kids to see in the 80's. Terry Gilliam, co-writer/director (co-written with fellow Python Michael Palin), knows how to entertain, and many sequences are terrific. It's a shame that some of them were not as much, and a little spotty. The sheer zaniness though, and the will for Gilliam to keep throwing visual gags and intense, fun imagery, keeps it never boring.

It's without a doubt that Time Bandits is in a sense a more 'mainstream' (err, accessible) picture than many of Gilliam's other works, mostly because it tries to reach into the imagination in all people, young and old. Kevin (Craig Warnock, a good straight-character for the audience amid all the ruckus), is in a land of his own imagination, until a group of pillaging dwarfs (played by the likes of David Rappaport and Kenny 'R2-D2- Baker) traveling through time with a stolen map with gaps through time provided by a crazed 'supreme being'. They visit Napoleon (Ian Holm, an ingenious role), Robin Hood (John Cleese), and by accident King Agamemnon (Sean Connery, an unexpectedly cool role). But when the Evil Genius (David Warner, one of the funniest performances of the film) knows they have it, he'll do anything to lure them in to get it from them.

This leads to a climax that in a darker, more scrambled way, reminded me of the climax of Blazing Saddles. There, like in this film, the story almost runs off the tracks, as many parts of history come into play with the forces of good versus evil. It does come to a satisfying conclusion, but in a small way is almost too much. Pauline Kael's comment that "the film suffers from a surfeit of good ideas" is not without some truth. There are so many jokes, so much imagination, so much creativity, its like a tipping scale that balances back and forth, rarely in the middle, of how affecting it is. For children, therefore, it is a sure bet, because children (for all of the modern corporate grabbing and testing of material) thrive on material like this, where the appearance of a comedian like Michael Palin in two separate, hilarious roles, doesn't matter as much as the sheer one-of-a-kind nature of everything put together. Some of the film is violent (as when the Evil Genius blows things up randomly), but always like a cartoon; one can sense the animation influence in the style's bones.

And that is what separates this film from the other films and shows I saw as a child, that there is this need on the part of the filmmaker not to stick to anything really expected, while still in a 'once upon a time' framework. Some jokes may not be funny to kids until they get older, but images like the giant trudging slowly through the water, the dwarfs in a peril in the cages, the pageantry of the Greek sequences. It's all delightful, but also a little overwhelming, and of course a bit much on the first go-around.

As a director, Terry Gilliam is a very unpredictable and inventive director, and Time Bandits is no exception. The film may be a tad too long perhaps, but Time Bandits does move briskly and overall is a hugely enjoyable fantasy adventure with a huge amount to like about it. It does have a brilliant concept, and the story is always engaging with a rare dull moment. The sets and costumes are wonderfully imaginative, the cinematography is beautiful and the special effects were surprisingly very good. The script is deliciously witty and smart, and the direction is unpredictable pretty much.

The film is filled with astonishing sequences particularly the climax and likable characters, as well as a fun and wondrous soundtrack. On top of all the things that made Time Bandits work so well, the cast is marvellous, Michael Palin, Craig Warnock, Shelley Duvall and Katherine Helmond are all entertaining and appealing, David Warner was great as the Evil Genius and the Time Bandits are a sheer delight, but the four standouts were John Cleese who was hilarious as Robin Hood, Ian Holm who made for a superb Napoleon, Sean Connery who was suitably imposing and charismatic and I loved the eccentricity that Ralph Richardson gave to the Supreme Being.

Overall, hugely enjoyable and in my opinion a must watch for fans of the genre. 8.5/10