Last we checked up on Terry Gilliam’s “Carnival: At the End of Days,” the filmmaker was telling Czech outlet Novinky that he didn’t have the sufficient funds and that he would have to creatively compromise his vision to make it happen. Gilliam added that the film would be his “swan song.”
Here’s an update, ‘Canrival’ is now going to the EFM Berlin Film Market in search of buyers. Italian producer and entrepreneur Andrea Iervolino, who has now boarded the project, says the film could shoot as early as April. Iervolino will also help finance Gilliam’s passion project.
Iervolino describes ‘Carnival’ as “an epic and visionary work” and a “live-action film that makes unprecedented use of CGI”: “Carnival is an extraordinarily complex film for an independent production. It is a project that blends live-action aesthetics with an unprecedented amount of CGI. It is, without a doubt, one of the most expensive independent projects ever undertaken in cinematic history.”
Last year, Gilliam confirmed Johnny Depp would play Satan and that the rest of the cast would be composed of Jeff Bridges, Adam Driver and Jason Momoa (Premiere). Gilliam went on to add that he was “negotiating with the Saudis” to bankroll the project, and that he was willing to shoot ‘Carnival’ in Saudi Arabia if it meant they were able to fund it.
In a recent French interview, Gilliam revealed that the budget for ‘Carnival’ would have to be around $30M dollars. Gilliam co-wrote the screenplay with newcomer Christopher Brett Bailey, 34.
Here’s Gilliam describing the plot of ‘Carnival’:
This is a simple tale of God wiping out humanity for fucking up his beautiful garden Earth. There’s only one character who’s trying to save humanity and that’s Satan, because without humanity he’s lost his job and he’s an eternal character and so to live without a job is terrible. So he finds some young people and he tries to convince God that these young people are the new Adam and Eve. God still gets to wipe out humanity. It’s a comedy.
The last time Gilliam directed a feature was 2018’s “The Man Who Killed Don Quixote,” a film he was trying to make for more than two decades. It came and went without much excitement, although I thought it was his, de facto, best film since the late ‘90s. The lack of commercial success on ‘Don Quixote’ is essentially the reason why Gilliam couldn’t find funding for ‘Carnival.’ His films of the last 25 years have been both critical and commercial misfires.
Many forget just how important and vital a cinematic voice Gilliam was during his peak years, especially when he was battling Universal for the final cut of his 1985 masterpiece, “Brazil.” He’s given us many great films over the years, including “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” and “12 Monkeys.”