The Adventures of Baron Munchausen they approached the person again when they were done, he was met with the reply, "I'm not gonna pay you, because I don't want to seem to be doing anything that could benefit Terry Gilliam." "Munchausen" is the third entry in Gilliam's ""Trilogy of Imagination"", preceded by "Time Bandits" (1981) and "Brazil" (1985). All are about the "craziness of our awkwardly ordered society and the desire to escape it through whatever means possible." Gilliam explains that, "The one theme that runs through all three of these pictures is a consistently serious battle between fantasy and what people perceive as reality."
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen are never more than a detail in Gilliam's compositions". Richard Corliss wrote: Everything about "Munchausen" deserves exclamation points, and not just to clear the air of the odor of corporate flop sweat. So here it is! A lavish fairy tale for bright children of all ages! Proof that eccentric films can survive in today's off-the-rack Hollywood! The most inventive fantasy since, well, "Brazil!" You may not believe it, ladies and gentlemen, but it's all true. Vincent Canby called the film "consistently imaginative" and a "spectacle [that] is indeed spectacular and worth the admission price and patches of boredom"; he said