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'Don Quixote' WILL debut at Cannes after court rules in Terry Gilliam's favour

(Credit: Tornasol Films)
(Credit: Tornasol Films)

UPDATE: A Paris court has now decided that Terry Gilliam’s The Man Who Killed Don Quixote can screen at Cannes Film Festival after all. The film’s long-awaited debut was in doubt after Paulo Branco of Alfama Films sought an injunction to stop the film’s closing night gala.

Deadline is reporting that Cannes chief Thierry Frémaux announced the news from the stage of the Debussy in the Palais. “We have won,” he said.

The legal battle could still cause problems with the film’s cinema release, but it hasn’t stopped its big night at Cannes when it premieres on 19 May.

ORIGINAL STORY: Terry Gilliam was hospitalised at the weekend, as he waits for a court verdict over whether his movie The Man Who Killed Don Quixote can be shown at the Cannes Film Festival.

According to Deadline, the 77-year-old Monty Python star was the subject of what’s been called ‘a mild alert’ over the weekend, and was in hospital in London overnight under observation.

A report in the French newspaper Nice-Matin, suggested that Gilliam had suffered ‘a kind of stroke’, but it appears not to be the case.

A statement given to Deadline reads: “Whilst we don’t comment on personal health matters, we can confirm that Terry Gilliam is currently at home preparing for his trip to Cannes next week in support of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote.”

Gilliam is awaiting a judgement from a French court over whether his film can be screened, following a legal dispute over its funding.

It’s programmed in to close this year’s Cannes Film Festival, which began yesterday, but producer Paulo Branco is trying to block the screening, claiming that he owns the rights.

Gilliam says that Branco initially agreed to provide €16 million in funding for the movie, but when no money appeared, he moved on to secure other financing, though Branco says the film now cannot be exhibited without his say so.

A decision from a tribunal in Paris is to be handed down later this afternoon.

And now other reports put the future of the so-called ‘cursed’ film, which stars Jonathan Pryce and Adam Driver, in further jeopardy.

Indiewire reports, via sources close to the production, that Amazon Studios, which was in line to distribute the movie, will now not handle the US release of the film.

How that affects other regions, is not yet known, but Gilliam secured funding for the movie from Amazon in 2015, after it had spent years in development hell.

Amazon has declined to comment.

The original 1998 shoot, which found Johnny Depp in the lead role, was legendarily unlucky, with flash flooding on the desert set in Spain, and constant noise from a nearby NATO airbase.

There was a even a documentary made about the disasters the movie faced, Lost In La Mancha, released in 2002.

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