One thing we missed in the EW report on the L.A. screening of Terry Gilliam’s “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.”
Apparently Heath Ledger — who obviously died midway through filming — is still in most of the picture, or is at least seen, “throughout” the film.
When it was announced that Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Ferrell would be replacing Ledger in the film, it was unclear, at the time, what shots were missed and what they would need the trio of actors for, but now it all makes sense.
EW says his three replacements, “only pop up in dream sequences,” which figures. The film shot in London when Ledger was alive and then after he died, the production moved to Vancouver to shoot the greenscreen work. So ostensibly, everything that wasn’t a “dream sequence,” scenes in the beginning, middle and end were shot and covered with Ledger and then Depp, Law and Ferrell, just had to come and save the day for the imaginative and ambitious dream sequences, which are so great in the otherwise so-so script, they could end up being the pièce de résistance if done correctly (and or at least perhaps compensate for some concerns that the narrative is clunky).
As for the actor we get to see the most out of from the replacements? “Colin Farrell’s sequence is the longest, says one person who attended the screening,” writes EW.
