U.K. Publicists Say Terry Gilliam’s ‘The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus’ Now Coming In The Fall

According to an feature story on Heath Ledger in EW, two weeks ago, Terry Gilliam’s “The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus,” was set for a June release in the U.K.

This piece followed the news that U.S. distributors were having potentially cold-feet about the potentially too-weird film and were adopting a wait-and-see attitude with the release and whether to buy it.

However, one of our keen readers from Heathheathens.net (a Ledger fansite), noted that the U.K. June release date simply came from IMDB (as did the rumored September 24 US release date). Did EW simply grab the release date from that site? They talked to Gilliam, wouldn’t the information come from him?

And then shortly after our “Parnassus, June U.K. Release?” piece went up, both the U.S. and U.K. dates were removed from IMBD.

A March 2009 feature on ‘Parnassus’ and Gilliam from Empire magazine (that’s not online) says the Fall is actually when Heath Ledger’s last film is coming out.

“[Gilliam’s interested to see what audiences, and critics, will make of the film, to the extent that he’s frustrated its release date has been pushed back from spring — when he’d have preferred to get it out there — to autumn. But he’s not particularly concerned about the film drawing an audience for the wrong reasons.”

According to Empire, as of early January 2010, ‘Parnasuss,’ the film was in good shape and had been, “cut for a couple months. The sound has been done. All that remains is for the 647 visual effects shots needed to realize the [film’s] interior to be pulled off.”

But since Empire is a U.K. magazine, does that mean Fall for the U.K. only?

According to the webmaster for HeathHethens who has spoken to the U.K. publicists for the film, “they foresee no problems finding a distributor and are looking at a 4th quarter release in the U.S.” Also, the original Hollywood Reporter piece has been a bone of minor contention as the picture has not even been shopped for any U.S. distributor at this point. The film won’t be ready until sometime in April and it’s the intention of the filmmakers to only shop it after it’s completed.

Update: In fact, all the above info we’ve been told was actually reiterated and emailed out to the U.K. Independent by the Parnassus production team for clarity [via Dreams a fansite].

I should like to correct the report filed by Guy Adams which ran on page 23 of today’s newspaper. Your correspondent has reproduced large chunks of the erroneous and misleading content of a blog posted by Steven Zeitchik, a contributor to a Los Angeles film trade newspaper, about Terry Gilliam’s film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, featuring Heath Ledger’s final performance. Since his source material is an internet blog and was not first printed in The Hollywood Reporter, to which Mr Adams attributes it, the details were not subject to that publication’s scrupulous fact-checking and research, nor has there been any contact with the film’s producers.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is still in post production and will not be completed until early/mid April. As soon as there is a finished film, it will be screened, for the first time, to US distributors. There has been no search for a US distributor to date, as the producers felt that it was better to wait for Terry Gilliam’s vision to be fully realized on screen, so that the distributors can see exactly what they are acquiring. That said, the film was pre-sold in 90+% of the rest of the world and we are envisaging a release in the fourth quarter of this year.

There you have it. The fall/fourth quarter is where the film will likely land in the end.