It’s staring to seem as if there’s some sort of curse that is designed to ensure Terry Gilliam never actually makes The Man Who Killed Don Quixote. After all, there’s certainly a lot of irony in the fact he’s now spent well over a decade trying to make a film based on the story of a man who goes on a series of delusional quests, not realising that what he’s doing is unreal and impossible.
In case you don’t know the story, after several years of trying to get it off the ground, the movie finally went into production in 2000, with Johnny Depp and Jean Rochefort starring. However very quickly a combination of factors, ranging from Rochefort getting seriously ill to a storm wrecking the sets, meant to the whole thing had to be called off (you can find out more about the disaster it became in the documentary Lost In La Mancha).
However after many more years trying to get the money together, it finally seemed Gilliam was nearing the start of production again, this time with Robert Duvall and Ewan McGregor in the lead roles, with Ewan as a 21st Century ad exec who travels back in time to the 17th Century and meets Don Quixote, gettting involved in his adventures.. However the whole thing has collapsed once more, with Gilliam telling Variety that, The financing collapsed about a month and a half ago. I shouldnt be here. The plan was to be shooting Quixote right now.”
But in true Don Quixote fashion, he hasn’t given up, saying his cast is still in place and he’s now looking at new sources of financing. Will it ever happen? We’ll just have to wait and see.