Director: Terry Gilliam

Cast: John Neville, Sarah Polley, Eric Idle, Oliver Reed, Uma Thurman, Sting, Robin Williams, Jonathan Pryce

Country: U.K. and West Germany
Year: 1988
Running Time: 125 min
Format: 35mm

Baron Karl Friedrich Heironymous von Munchausen was a 17th Century Russian Army soldier of fortune, whose fantastic tall tales were published in 1785 book by Rudolph Raspe, a drinking buddy of the Baron. His stories have gone on to enchant the children of Europe for centuries and are considered classics of German literature. Filmmaker Terry Gilliam (Brazil, Time Bandits, 12 Monkeys, Fisher King) led a troubled, grand-scale production to bring the Baron's tales to the screen. Made with one of the highest budgets ever at the time ($43 million), it performed poorly at the box office on its release, but has endured to become a timeless masterpiece family film.

A theater company's production of the tales of Baron Munchausen finds itself under attack from both the Turks, and the real Baron Munchausen. To prove his stories are not tall tales, the Baron sets out in a balloon, intent on ending the war with the Turks. Accompanied by a young stowaway (Sarah Polley) and his band of talented henchmen, the Baron's travels add more amazing adventures to his repertoire. They journey from inside the belly of a whale, to dancing with Venus (Uma Thurman in one of her earliest film roles), to a meeting on the moon with the King Of The Moon (Robin Williams credited as Ray D. Tutto), all the while avoiding encounters with the Grim Reaper. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is visually inventive, imaginative storytelling.

--Skizz Cyzyk

The Maryland Film Festival is something of a homecoming for Colleen Haskell, as she was born and raised in Bethesda, Maryland. While at Walter Johnson High School, she enjoyed drama, working backstage in lighting, sound and set design. She went on to earn a bachelor's degree in Theater from the University of Georgia, and while there completed a six-month internship with the London Film Festival. After graduating, Haskell spent two months in Ghana, West Africa, before returning to Miami, Florida to enroll in a two-year portfolio program at Miami Ad School. It was while there that Colleen was cast on the first season of Survivor, where she was the eleventh person voted off the island. Since returning to civilization she has had guest-starring role on television shows That '70s Show and Maybe It's Me and co-starred with Rob Schneider in The Animal.