Directed by: Terry Gilliam
Starring: Jodelle Ferland, Jeff Bridges, Brendan Fletcher
I'm going to tell you what the director himself will tell you in a short introduction before the movie: Many of you are not going to like this film. A Southern Gothic yarn about a young girl named Jeliza-Rose, the movie goes to many dark places in a very realistic manner. So, without further ado:
At its core, Tideland is a story of innocence, of the horrific world of Jeliza-Rose's reality refracted (as it so often is) through the lens of childhood. Everything is full of wonder and danger, and imagination rules all. Her only friends are a quartet of Barbie doll heads, which she puts on her fingers and goes on adventures with. Jeliza-Rose is taken by her washed-out, junkie/rock star father to an old, run-down farmhouse in Texas. She meets a strange woman and her mentally damaged brother, and from there, things get weirder and weirder. The increasingly disturbing events wash over Jeliza-Rose as she reinvents her world to better serve her need for escapism. The story is draws parallels to the more recent Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, as a girl with no stake or power in the real world becomes the heroine of her daydreams. That having been said, Tideland is far more realistic than Labyrinth for the most part, and much more unsettling. The apocalyptic finale is one of the best endings to a movie I've seen in years.
The actors are all top-notch talent. You might remember Jodelle Ferland from her later work as Alessa in the Silent Hill screen adaptation. Her portrayal of the innocent and imaginative Jeliza-Rose is second to very few performances I've seen recently. Jeff Bridges brings his wide and considerable talents to the screen as the father, and let me just say his performance for most of the movie is...interesting. I don't want to give everything away up front, but know that this film is weird. Another diamond in the unknown rough is Brendan Fletcher, playing the retarded and epileptic Dickens. I'm not sure how much of a compliment it is to praise an actor for portraying a handicapped person (the Academy does, however), but this guy fucking nails it. The mannerisms, the expressions, the dialogue...everything is perfect with his character.
A hallmark of Gilliam's films is his unflinching commitment to his vision. Tideland continues this tradition with fantastic, surreal cinematography and use of the physical landscape both within the farmhouse and surrounding it. He draws out the decayed beauty of the rustic American South motif, magnified by Jeliza-Rose's perception of it. Even the juxtaposition of the adorable Jodelle against the rotting, almost dystopian backdrop gives the film a vicious bipolar dichotomy that is as much felt as it is seen.
In short, this film is brave and imaginative. After chewing on the same predictable shit for the past couple of years (another summer, another ten romantic comedies), I'm glad I stepped outside my comfort zone and watched something that didn't give a shit about how many seats were sold. Now, my comfort zone is fairly wide, though, so if you consider yourself squeamish with a movie that introduces themes that flirt openly and dangerously with pedophilia and other taboos, this is not the film for you. It won't be the film for most people. For those of you wanting to try something new, and it may involve actual effort, rent something else, try to stick with Tideland to the end, and if you can't at least you've got another movie to fall back on without having to make another trip. Worth watching for the Alice in Wonderland elements, an innocent but unsettling trip through a child's mind, or to impress/disgust that pretentious filmo girl you've been trying to get with/away from.
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