Director: Terry Gilliam
Writers: Tony Grisoni and Terry Gilliam, based on Mitch Cullin’s novel
Producers: Jeremy Thomas (U.K.) and Gabriella Martinelli (Canada)
Cast: Jodelle Ferland, Jeff Bridges, Janet McTeer, Brendan Fletcher, Jennifer Tilly

‘Alice in Wonderland meets Psycho’ is how director Terry Gilliam describes Tideland. Given Gilliam’s Monty Python roots and past feature credits, including the offbeat Twelve Monkeys (1995) and Brazil (1985), one can bet Tideland is a strange story indeed.

 Tideland tells the tale of Jeliza-Rose (Jodelle Ferland), a young girl living in rural isolation with her ex-rockabilly father Noah (Jeff Bridges). Trapped in an empty landscape and lonely life, Jeliza-Rose lives in a fantasy world that includes fireflies with names, talking squirrels, and the decapitated heads of four dolls whom she names Mustique, Baby Blonde, Glitter Gal and Sateen Lips. Throw in a wetsuit-wearing, mentally damaged young man named Dickens (Brendan Fletcher) and other strange characters, and you have a psychological fantasy worthy of Gilliam’s filmography.

Gilliam stumbled across a copy of Mitch Cullin’s novel Tideland on his desk in 2001. The author had sent it to him in hopes of getting a quote for the back cover page. From the start, Gilliam liked the story, which he found ‘funny, touching and disturbing all at the same time.’ Adds Gilliam: ‘I found four or five incredible characters that are the heart of the movie, whose situations become more and more strange. Most of all, I loved that it was a child’s world, and that was a world I wanted to explore on film.’

If Tideland’s vast flat landscapes look familiar to those in the Prairies, it is because the $20-million film was shot in Saskatchewan’s Qu’Appelle Valley. (Interiors were shot at the Canada Saskatchewan Production Studios in Regina.) ‘We found exactly what we were looking for in the Qu’Appelle Valley,’ says Tideland producer Jeremy Thomas. ‘The houses and locations we found looked like they came straight out of the novel… Then, coincidentally – genuinely coincidentally – we found a studio [and] tax credits. This all came together perfectly without any compromise to the initial vision of the film.’

2001: Gilliam reads Cullin’s fantasy novel Tideland and loves it. He calls up Tony Grisoni, a writing collaborator on his 1998 feature Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, to work on the screenplay.

Gilliam gets U.K. producer Jeremy Thomas (Sexy Beast, The Last Emperor) of the Recorded Picture Company on board, and they option the book rights from Cullin. Thomas, in turn, sends the script to Gabriella Martinelli, head of Toronto prodco Capri Films, and Thomas’ coproducer partner on David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch (1991).

‘It was such a surreal script,’ says Martinelli. ‘I was excited at the prospect of watching Terry bring the scenes to life.’ She convinces Thomas that Saskatchewan would be an ideal location for the film, offering as it does vast wheat fields dotted with Gothic-looking houses – integral to the film’s style – and a 35% tax credit. Martinelli’s Capri Releasing will distribute.

2003: After auditioning about 400 young girls for the role of Jeliza-Rose, Gilliam receives a tape of 10-year-old Jodelle Ferland (Too Cool for Christmas, Kingdom Hospital) from Vancouver. He likes what he sees, meets Ferland in Toronto, and casts her.

‘The funny thing is, having cast her, I then realized she’s already done 25 films for television,’ Gilliam says.

Brit Janet McTeer (The Intended) is subsequently cast in the role of Dell, up-and-coming Canuck Brendan Fletcher as Dickens, Jennifer Tilly as Queen Gunhilda, and the ever-reliable Jeff Bridges as Noah. Gilliam had wanted to work with Bridges again after their success with The Fisher King (1991).

June 29, 2003: Gilliam begins production in Prague on the long-delayed US$75-million fantasy feature The Brothers Grimm. While this will take up much of Gilliam’s year, planning on Tideland moves forward.

Nov. 27, 2003: The Brothers Grimm wraps. It is finally slated for wide release through Miramax on Aug. 26, 2005.

June 28, 2004: Telefilm Canada announces that Tideland is one of four English-language features to receive cash from its Canada Feature Film Fund. The film seems to be in line with the funder’s search for more commercially viable fare.

Other investors in the $20-million 56% Canada/44% U.K. copro include the U.K.’s Foresight Film Partnership and Prescience Film Financing, Astral Media, the Canadian Television Fund and The Harold Greenberg Fund. HanWay Films will handle international sales.

September 2004: Gilliam takes the occasion of the Toronto International Film Festival to introduce Ferland to the press and talk up his new project. Of Ferland, the director says, ‘She’s in every single scene. She is the movie.’ He also expresses some anxiety in the wake of his aborted The Man Who Killed Don Quixote production in 2000. ‘I’ve always been frightened by having enough money to do what I want. Jeremy and Gabriella, they say this will be an enjoyable experience. That’s got me worried.’

Sept. 27, 2004: Tideland starts its 11-week shoot, with the crew setting up camp at Lake Katepwa in the Qu’Appelle Valley. Housing is provided in holiday cabins and residents’ homes. Veteran Italian director of photography Nicola Pecorini, who collaborated with Gilliam on Fear and Loathing and Don Quixote, mans the camera.

During production, Martinelli tells Playback that, on the whole, everything is going remarkably smoothly. ‘We’re on time, on budget; we’re getting fantastic footage and [Gilliam] is a complete and total delight to work with. We had an Indian summer during the whole time we were shooting exteriors.’

Oct. 20, 2004: One of the production’s most difficult sequences involves crashing five trains together at night. The scene is so spectacular and realistic that some residents believe it is real and rush over to help.

November 2004: The shoot moves into Regina’s Canada Saskatchewan Production Studios.

winter ’04/05: Shooting wraps; post begins in London.

June 2005: Tideland is completed.

Sept. 9, 2005: Tideland makes its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in the Masters category. It is slated for a Canadian release in spring 2006.