| Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 1, 2006

Perfect material, you might think, for Terry Gilliam's brain of perpetual invention. But despite occasional flashes of dark genius, he hasn't laid a golden egg.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 11, 2005

The Brothers Grimm has enough haunting, fairy-tale imagery for 10 movies, but no emotional kick to drive those images home.

Full Review | Aug 29, 2005

It's kind of cold and it's kind of a mess, but I thought it was a glorious mess and it looks so great and it is so interesting and there is so much going on that I have to recommend it on a very mild level.

Full Review | Aug 29, 2005

It's easy to sense the allure this fantastic project held for Gilliam, but it's hard to imagine the outcome is anything like his early expectations.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 28, 2005

Only a cinematic genius like Terry Gilliam could make an unqualified masterful mess like the long-delayed fantastical adventure The Brothers Grimm and still come out looking brilliant.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 27, 2005

The movie is an utter mess, but it's the kind of maddening disappointment that could only be made by a director of Gilliam's stature.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 27, 2005

Jammed with stuff and all but empty of drama.

| Aug 26, 2005

The best thing to be said about this expensive but drab wannabe mirthmaker is that it has some of its director's quirky touches.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 26, 2005

The result is something that might best be called Monty Python and the Holy Mess.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Aug 26, 2005

A flawed but brilliantly imaginative mix of darkness and humor reminiscent of Hammer period chillers like Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter by way of Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 26, 2005

Its energy is impressive, but its effects are scattered.

| Original Score: 1/4 | Aug 26, 2005

This aimless epic about a pair of charlatan brothers sinks under the weight of a problematic script, questionable star casting, hamfisted editing -- and penny-pinching by Gilliam's latest patrons, the Brothers Weinstein.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 26, 2005

Sometimes delightful, sometimes tedious, always creative.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 26, 2005

Those who adore Terry Gilliam for his taunting French soldiers in Monty Python and the Holy Grail or his weird subversiveness in Brazil may find The Brothers Grimm to be a fairy tale gone sour.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 26, 2005

[Gilliam's] two great successes -- Time Bandits and especially Brazil -- were dazzling enough that he's been struggling ever since to prove that his best work isn't behind him. On the evidence here, the struggle continues.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 26, 2005

Terry Gilliam casts such a mad, magical spell over the proceedings that the film is endlessly energized and gleefully imaginative.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Aug 26, 2005

A movie as enjoyable as it is clever.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 26, 2005

It's worth watching even when it doesn't.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 26, 2005

A messy fairy tale riff that overcompensates for a less-than-enchanting story with frenetic busyness.

| Original Score: C- | Aug 26, 2005