The Brothers Grimm

The fantastic mind that is Terry Gilliam is back after 7 years (his last effort was the trippy and excellent Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas) to direct The Brothers Grimm, the adventures of the legendary duo of folklore collectors who travel from little village to little village in a French occupied Germany performing fake exorcisms pretending to save the villagers from non-existent witches and other enchanted creatures.
After a very problematic preproduction (specially over the casting of the main actress, Gilliam and Damon wanted Samantha Morton but the Weinsteins went with Lena Headey), filming (Gilliam's right hand cinematographer Nicola Pecorini was fired by Miramax for being too slow) and final cut of the movie (the most expensive scene in the movie was cut), the final result is mixed, with a very big mess of a first hour, and a last hour that works once the story comes together and the FX get better.

Matt Damon and Heath Ledger play Will and Jake Grimm, full of wigs, big costumes and weird accents. Will is the womanizer and the one that makes Jake go on to these the villagers and scam them for all they have. Jake on the other hand is a believer, he loves his fairy tales and all the fantasy about them. A fantasy geek you could say.
Damon and Ledger are fine in their performances, with the former taking the lead during the first half of the movie in which they are shown traveling saving the villages. There's lots of special effects here but they are not great. Also, the story cuts every now and then to show a fairy tale (Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, Hansel & Gretel, there's also Jack and the Magic Beans at the beginning of the movie) always about little girls who end up being captured. The problem is that those tales have nothing to do with the main story of the movie at point and so it's all very confusing.

The movie comes to life once our heroes get to the village of Marbaden to discover the mystery of 10 little girls that have disappeared in the enchanted forest. They are sent by General Delatombe (Jonathan Pryce) and are accompanied by his right hand, the terrible Cavaldi (Peter Stormare), both delivering horrible accents and pretty bad performances all around. Here's where they meet Angelika (Lena Headey) and while investigating the forest they discover the tower of the Mirror Queen (Monica Bellucci) who may have something to do with the little girls.
Besides adding these new characters, and the story coming more together, this second part works because Ledger's Jake takes command (he was very weak during that first half) as he accepts in these fiery tales they're being part of, while Will still does not believe nor care much for what's going on, but eventually does.

The special effects are excellent in this second part too, specially during the sequences with the Mirror Queen. And the costumes are also great in the movie, though the one for the Mirror Queen does not showcase Bellucci's spectacular body.
With the support of a great score from Dario Marianelli, the movie is hurt by that first half when it doesn't work at all because of the mess of a script by Ehren Kruger (The Ring movies, The Skeleton Key). Overall though, The Brothers Grimm is not bad, but I'm sure is not even close to what Terry Gilliam had in mind.