37 Time Bandits

[Martha]

Time Bandits

[img]http://criterion_production.s3.amazonaws.com/release_images/179/37_box_348x490_w100.jpg[/img]

In Terry Gilliam’s fantastic voyage through time and space, a young boy named Kevin (Craig Warnock) escapes his gadget-obsessed parents to join a band of time-traveling dwarves. Armed with a map stolen from the Supreme Being (Ralph Richardson), they plunder treasure from Napoleon (Ian Holm) and Agamemnon (Sean Connery)—but the Evil Genius (David Warner) is watching their every move! Featuring a darkly playful script by Gilliam and costar Michael Palin, Time Bandits is all at once giddy fairy tale, revisionist history lesson, and satire on technology gone

Disc Features

- Audio commentary by director Terry Gilliam, cowriter/actor Michael Palin, and actors John Cleese, David Warner, and Craig Warnock
- Time Bandits scrapbook
- Original theatrical trailer
- Subtitles for the deaf and hearing-impaired
- Optimal image quality: RSDL dual-layer edition

Criterionforum.org user rating averages

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[Matt]

Roger Ebert's original review:

First reactions while viewing TIME BANDITS: It's amazingly well-produced. The historic locations are jammed with character and detail. This is the only live-action movie I've seen that literally looks like pages out of Heavy Metal magazine, with kings and swordsmen and wide-eyed little boys and fearsome beasts. But the movie's repetitive, monotonous in the midst of all this activity. Basically, it's just a kid and six dwarfs racing breathlessly through one set piece after another, shouting at one another. I walked out of the screening in an unsettled state of mind. When the lights go up, I'm usually fairly certain whether or not I've seen a good movie. But my reaction to TIME BANDITS was ambiguous. I had great admiration for what was physically placed on the screen; this movie is worth seeing just to watch. But I was disappointed by the breathless way the dramatic scenes were handled and by a breakneck pace that undermined the most important element of comedy, which is timing.

TIME BANDITS is the expensive fantasy by Terry Gilliam, one of the resident geniuses of Monty Python's Flying Circus. It is not a Monty Python film. It begins with a little boy who goes up to bed one night and is astonished, as we all would be, when a horseman gallops through his bedroom wall and he is in the middle of a pitched battle. Before long, the little kid has joined up with a band of six intrepid dwarfs, and they've embarked on an odyssey through history. The dwarfs, it appears, have gained possession of a map that gives the location of several holes in time--holes they can pop through in order to drop in on the adventures of Robin Hood, Napoleon, and King Agamemnon, and to sail on the Titanic's maiden voyage.

As a plot gimmick, this sets up TIME BANDITS for a series of comic set pieces as in Mel Brooks's HISTORY OF THE WORLD--PART 1. But TIME BANDITS isn't revue-style comedy. It's more of a whimsical, fantastic excursion through all those times and places, and all of its events are seen through the wondering eyes of a child. That's where the superb art direction comes in--inspired work by production designer Milly Burns and costume designer Jim Acheson. I've rarely, if ever, seen a live-action movie that looks more like an artist's conception. And yet, admiring all of these good things (and I might also mention several of the performances), I nevertheless left the screening with muted enthusiasm. The movie was somehow all on the same breathless, nonstop emotional level, like an overlong Keystone Kops chase. It didn't pause to savor its delights, except right near the end, when Sir Ralph Richardson lingered lovingly over a walk-on as the Supreme Being. I had to sort things out. And I was helped enormously in that process by the review of TIME BANDITS by Stanley Kauffmann in The New Republic. He describes the film, unblinkingly, as a "children's movie." Of course.

There have been so many elaborate big-budget fantasies in recent years, from RAIDERS to SUPERMAN to CLASH OF THE TITANS, that we've come to assume that elaborate costume fantasies are aimed at the average eighteen-year-old filmgoer who is trying to recapture his adolescence. These movies have a level of (limited) sophistication and wickedness that is missing in TIME BANDITS. But perhaps TIME BANDITS does work best as just simply a movie for kids. I ran it through my mind that way, wondering how a kid would respond to the costumes, the panoply, the explosions, the horses and heroic figures, and, of course, the breathless, nonstop pacing. And I decided that a kid would like it just fine. I'm not sure that's what Gilliam had in mind, but it allows me to recommend the movie--with reservations, but also with admiration.

[denti alligator]

With a far superior edition out there and in print, is Criterion likely to try and re-do this or will it exist solely for those completists who want a copy to put between spines 36 and 38. I mean, who else would buy this?

[glaswegian tome]

Well, obviously the Criterion edition is the only place that you can hear Gilliam's commentary on the film. The newer release of it (by Anchor Bay, I think) doesn't have any commentaries.

[manicsounds]

The UK disc has the commentary, with one word by John Cleese censored

[Antoine Doinel]

Get your own reproduction of the map from the film.

[manicsounds]

Time Bandits on BluRay in Region B

Unfortunately, Optimum significantly downgrades the extras from the previous Criterion and Anchor Bay releases....

[mteller]

Blu-Ray coming from Image 8/24

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[Ashirg]

According to Image web site, the only extra is a trailer and a Terry Gilliam interview

[Feego]

Forgive me for being ignorant, but why can't Image include the Criterion extras on the Time Bandits Blu-ray (and Mona Lisa for that matter)? Does Criterion own some content exclusively that is not also owned by Image?

[ianungstad]

I still think it's highly likely Criterion will do new special editions for all the Handmade stuff, with Image just handling the barebone editions that retail for less than $15.

[Gregory]

Forgive me for being ignorant, but why can't Image include the Criterion extras on the Time Bandits Blu-ray (and Mona Lisa for that matter)? Does Criterion own some content exclusively that is not also owned by Image?

Image is just Criterion's distributor, and rights ownership is a separate matter.

[Feego]

Forgive me for being ignorant, but why can't Image include the Criterion extras on the Time Bandits Blu-ray (and Mona Lisa for that matter)? Does Criterion own some content exclusively that is not also owned by Image?

Image is just Criterion's distributor, and rights ownership is a separate matter.

Thanks for clearing that up.

[CrazedCollector]

Criterion now lists Time Bandits as OOP.

So, sign of a re-release coming up, or a sign to buy it now (for those of us who have been waiting for a better edition)?

[Napier]

Criterion now lists Time Bandits as OOP.

So, sign of a re-release coming up, or a sign to buy it now (for those of us who have been waiting for a better edition)?

I believe it's part of Handmade Films. Probably being re-issued with How to Get Ahead in Advertising and Withnail and I.

[tavernier]

Image is releasing this on Blu on August 24, with Mona Lisa, Withnail & I and The Long Good Friday.

[CrazedCollector]

So... if I want these movies with a spine #, I should buy them ASAP? Or will Criterion likely issue SE Blus?

[swo17]

See discussion here.

[CrazedCollector]

See discussion here.

Thanks!

[criterionsnob]

OOP according to Criterion.com.

[ianungstad]

I asked Image Entertainment about the titles from Handmade Films a few months ago. They said they would be interested in putting these films out in new Criterion special editions but that Criterion has yet to approach them with the idea.

I don't think it will be all that difficult to renew the license.

[Tribe]

I asked Image Entertainment about the titles from Handmade Films a few months ago. They said they would be interested in putting these films out in new Criterion special editions but that Criterion has yet to approach them with the idea.

I don't think it will be all that difficult to renew the license.

I don't see Criterion doing a lot of licensing from Image these days. I wonder if that business relationship has gone severely South.

[Feego]

I have the 2-disc Anchor Bay edition. Is the Criterion commentary worth tracking down?

[manicsounds]

yeah... it is a good commentary, which was also on the UK Anchor Bay (minus the John Cleese F-word about the royal family greeting....) but that is also out of print. That's why I still have this ol' non-anamorphic DVD on my shelf.

[manicsounds]

"Time Bandits mega-deluxe" Criterion edition coming soon as well as Mulholland Drive and La Dolce Vita according to the article.