Will and Jake Grimm (Matt Damon and Heath Ledger) are con artists who fool villagers into paying them to kill monsters in French-occupied Germany in the19th Century. They set up the monsters themselves with stage-magic tricks and two assistants (Mackenzie Crook and Richard Ridings). But an Italian torturer named Mercurio Cavaldi (Peter Stormare) captures them and hauls them before the French General Vavarin Delatombe (Jonathan Pryce), who forces them to solve the mysterious disappearances of young girls in Marbaden. The villagers believe there are supernatural forces at work but Delatombe thinks it is con artists. But there really is a 500-year-old Thuringian Queen (Monica Belluci) who is using the girls to restore her beauty.
It seems that King Childmaric the First built a city there along ago and his queen dabbled in black magic. She hid in a tower to avoid the bubonic plague, but the plague came on the wind and she rotted over the years. She used a spell for eternal life but not eternal youth, and she needs the blood of twelve young women to regain her beauty. So far, she has sacrificed ten. She uses a werewolf huntsman (Tomas Hanak) with a magic axe and various enchanted creatures in the forest, including murderous trees. The Brothers Grimm, with the help of a huntress named Angelika (Lena Heady), the sister of two of the missing girls. With Capaldi, they discover the Queen’s tower in the woods. Another girl goes missing and all of Capaldi’s men die in the forest. The twelfth girl is taken, even though Capaldi and Angelika try to prevent it.
Jake discovers twelve crypts with eleven girls inside. He rescues the last girl and takes the werewolf’s axe. The Grimms return to the village. The axe is the only thing that strikes fear into the hearts of the trees. Delatombe captures the Grimms and the French soldiers start to burn down the forest. The brothers are saved by Angelika, but the werewolf is actually her father, commanded by the Queen’s spell, and he drowns Angelika, making her the 12th victim. The Queen creates an icy wind which puts out the forest fire. Delatombe orders the death of the Grimms and when Capaldi refuses to do the deed, Delatombe shoots him. Will impales Delatombe. Jake manages to get into the tower.
Jake shatters the enchanted mirror and the Mirror Queen dies. The werewolf becomes Angelika’s father again and smashes the mirror completely by jumping out of the tower with it. Cavaldi, however, is alive, having put on the Grimm’s armor. Jake survives the fall on the Queen’s mattresses. Jake awakens Angelika with the Kiss of True Love and the other eleven girls are resurrected, along with Will. The villagers celebrate and thank the brothers, who decide to change careers and try publishing.
The film was directed by Terry Gilliam, based on a script by Ehren Kruger, rewritten by Gilliam and Tony Grisoni. The release was delayed ten months by demands and arguments by the Brothers Weinstein. Johnny Depp was Gilliam’s first choice to play Will Grimm, but Bob Weinstein vetoed that, unfortunately, since by the time the film came out, so had Pirates of the Caribbean and Depp was a big star. Damon and Ledger asked to switch roles. Matt Damon had wanted to work with Terry Gilliam ever since he saw Time Bandits. The feud between Gilliam and Weinstein went on forever. Gilliam and Martin Scorsese have said the same thing: The Weinsteins took all the joy out of filmmaking. Critics said the movie was full of beautiful imagery but the story was labored.
Because of Writers Guild rules, Terry Gilliam and Tony Grisoni could not be called screenwriters despite actually writing much of the screenplay, so they listed themselves in the credits as Dress Pattern Makers. Matt Damon’s hairstyle was based on British TV chef Jamie Oliver. The queen who restores her youth with the blood of young girls was based on the real Countess Erszebet Bathory in the 17th Century, generally considered to be the first recorded serial killer. The entire movie is full of recognizable details from dozens of Grimm Brothers tales and the kind of extraordinary surreal imagery you expect from Terry Gilliam.