After many years–almost 30–the British director Terry Gilliam makes his wish come true and finally brings to the big screen the adventures of Don Quixote, the odd errant knight, protagonist of Miguel de Cervantes’s book. But a terrible curse has not yet abandoned the former Monty Python cast member: since the very first attempt in 1989, this production has been affected by bad luck, the first “original” movie never saw the light, and all was documented in the movie Lost in La Mancha.

Gilliam never renounced to fight against his giants, and after many troubles and sleepless nights, he finally managed to produce The man who killed Don Quixote, starring Adam Driver and Jonathan Pryce, even arriving at the Cannes Film Festival–as closing film, not in the competition–scheduled for May 19th.

And just when it seems that Gilliam had finally got his moment of glory, here everything is falling apart. The first complication knocks on the door in the form of a legal issue, linked to the rights distribution of the film, and causes the loss of Amazon as the American distributor of the movie; until a few days ago, even the debut at the Cannes Film Festival seemed to be uncertain. Meanwhile, on May 8th, the British director suffered stroke: a recovery for the director, and a movie in custody. Is it really just coincidence?

Three days ago Paris court came to the rescue resting its case and ruling in favour of the film being screened at Cannes, followed shortly after by the news of the good health of Gilliam: on the festival’ twitter account appeared a picture of the same director captioned “not dead yet” and also “coming to Cannes”.

Still five more days to go to the premiere of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote at Cannes Film Festival, what could ever happen? We’re not the only ones to worry about its misfortune and bad luck: Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe, directors of Lost in La Mancha, have in fact announced the sequel to the documentary, entitled He Dreams of Giants.

Published on Polpettas Magazine. Italian version available.