Brazil (1985, UK)

In Terry Gilliam's eccentric, offbeat, satirical ultra-dark comedy - it was a hybrid work, combining science-fiction, despairing ultra-black comedy and fantasy. It was part of a three-film "Trilogy of Imagination," including Time Bandits (1981) and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989). Brazil was also the first installment of another Gilliam trilogy of dystopian satires, followed by 12 Monkeys (1995) and The Zero Theorem (2013).

The highly-rated cult film told about an austere, oppressive and repressive, polluted, decaying future dystopian world of conformity, bureaucracy and Big Brother totalitarianism in a terrorist-threatened Londonesque metropolis. One typical drone worker was harried by inefficiency, malfunctioning machines, corruption, automation, and bureaucratic mistakes. The film brutally satirized technology, bureaucracy, and authoritarian societies controlled by state corporatism. The film's poster tagline described:

It's all about flights of fantasy. And the nightmare of reality. Terrorist bombings. And late night shopping. True love. And creative plumbing. It's only a state of mind.

There were many visually-imaginative references to Kafka's The Trial (and Orson Welles' The Trial (1962)), Orwell's 1949 novel 1984 (and Michael Radford's 1984 (1984)), and Anthony Burgess' 1962 A Clockwork Orange (and Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (1971)). It had other similarities to Fritz Lang's mechanized society in Metropolis (1927), Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove: (1964), and the 'book-burning' of Fahrenheit 451 (1966).

Gilliam's Orwellian fantasy film, with two Oscar nominations (Best Original Screenplay and Best Art Direction) was made on a budget of $15 million, and grossed only $9.9 million. A controversy over its dark ending had forced director Gilliam to cut about twelve minutes from the 144 minute European theatrical version before its general US release in 1986. Severe editing cuts proposed by the studio, that emphasized the film's romantic themes and provided a happy ending, threatened to change the message and tone of the entire film. However, Gilliam was finally able to open his own 132 minute cut of Brazil in late 1985 (the American release version).

• the film's inventive opening scene ("Somewhere in the 20th Century") envisioned a stylized world of an alternative, authoritarian future in a nameless European country; it was characterized by Central Services ductworks that were advertised on television by a slick business salesman (John Flanagan) and a chorus: ("Central Services. We do the work, you do the pleasure. Hi, there. I want to talk to you about ducts. Do your ducts seem old-fashioned, out-of-date? Central Services' new duct designs are now available in hundreds of different colors to suit your individual tastes. Hurry now, while stocks last, to your nearest Central Services showroom. Designer colors to suit your demanding taste") - the advertisement about ducts (that connected the centralized bureaucracy with the lives of the oppressed people) was interrupted by a violent explosion inside a department store (the TV was displayed inside the store's window)
• the society was often plagued by terrorist attacks and bombings, thought to be waged by enemies of the state (although they could have been orchestrated by the state itself as a scapegoat for authoritarian control of the people)
• in one of the Ministry of Information (MOI) government offices, a flying beetle-shaped insect was swatted at, causing it to fall into an office teletype printer where it was squashed in the machine (it was a literal "bug" in the system) - and a typographical print-out name-error was created on an arrest record; it unjustly identified an innocent citizen (shoe repairman Mr. Buttle) as the detention and arrest target, instead of the real, suspected terrorist Archibald "Harry" Tuttle (Robert De Niro) - an illegal, renegade ("free-lance") maintenance man; it was a perfect example of technological-automation gone wacky and oppressive bureaucratic muddling in the society's bureaucracy
• on Christmas Eve, the innocent Archibald and Veronica Buttle family (Brian Miller and Sheila Reid) [Note: Archie and Veronica were the main characters in the Archie Comics] was in their Shangri La Towers apartment with their two children; in the tenant's apartment above them, a tough butch-female truck driver named Jill Layton (Kim Griest) was taking a bath in dirty water; she noticed that a group of armed policemen used a saw to cut a circular hole in the Buttle family's ceiling (through Jill's floor), to "drop in" and invade the apartment below, to falsely accuse and brutally assault the husband; due to mistaken identity, the unsuspecting Mr. Archibald Buttle was placed in a canvas strait-jacket with a hood, straps, and buckles, and taken away as a subject for detention and interview by the security troops of the MOI
• the madness and indignity was further exemplified by an exchange with the dazed and panic-stricken Mrs. Buttle who was required to sign multiple forms: ("That is your receipt for your husband, thank you, and this is my receipt for your receipt"); Archibald Buttle was wrongly arrested due to the mix-up and taken away - soon after, he died from heart issues
• the main character was then introduced - mild-mannered, low-ranking, meek, bureaucratic civil servant Everyman Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce), who as a technocratic statistician was stuck in a tedious, mind-numbing civil servant job; he worked in the dull regulatory Ministry of Information (MOI) in the Department of Records, jammed with paperwork and filled with endless pneumatic tubes and ill-functioning equipment
• Sam's supervising boss Mr. Kurtzmann (Ian Holm) [meaning "short man"] was upset that Mrs. Buttle's compensation check was not properly recorded, and attempted to locate Lowry to inquire about the problem; Sam was experiencing the first of many dream fantasies, and was still asleep in bed in his apartment (and late for work) when his phone rang; Sam was having recurring dreams of soaring as a superhero with metal mechanical wings in the clouds [Note: a reference to Brewster McCloud (1970)] toward a mysterious, long blonde-haired fantasy dream-girl doppelganger (also Kim Greist) - revealed later to be similar in looks to a real-life trucker named Jill Layton

Sam's Recurring Dream of Saving A Blonde Dream-Girl
		Dream Girl Jill Layton (Kim Greist)
Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) as a Winged Super Hero

• Sam rushed to the MOI building, and passed through the lobby where a gigantic, winged male statue was outstretched over a nude female figure; the stone sculpture was labeled: THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE; he briefly noticed one of the lobby's visitors with a concerned look resembled his dream-girl - she was there to report a "wrongful arrest" to the uniformed porter at the Information Desk, but was frustratingly given the bureaucratic run-around; Sam also had a few words with an old married friend, Jack Lint (Michael Palin), who enviably had recently been promoted to a higher-level job
• in Kurtzmann's office, Sam learned about the Buttle/Tuttle mistake due to mismatching personnel code numbers, and that the reknowned terrorist (and heating engineer) named Tuttle should have been detained instead; Kurtzmann notified Sam, due to his mother's connections, that he had been promoted to Information Retrieval, but Sam had always been resistant to the change
• Sam's vain and narcissistic mother Ida Lowry (Katherine Helmond) was under the care of cosmetic surgeon Dr. Louis Jaffe (Jim Broadbent), and had become obsessively addicted to plastic surgery to rejuvenate her face, and was undergoing a grotesque procedure; Sam visited his mother to protest his promotion: "I'm happy where I am," but she was pushing for him to advance himself
• Sam joined his newly-transformed mother in an upscale restaurant to have lunch with her idle rich friend - a face-disfigured, bandaged client Mrs. Alma Terrain (Barbara Hicks); Mrs. Terrain bragged about her switch of cosmetic surgeons, leaving Dr. Jaffe ("the knife man" according to Mrs. Terrain) and transferring to Dr. Chapman, a rival doctor with "revolutionary" techniques; both women were in a futile attempt to escape the "ravages of time" and stay young
• suddenly, an enormous blast from the area of the restaurant's kitchen was evidence of another terrorist attack; those who were unharmed resumed their conversations in the midst of the mangled bodies, and the string quartet (with blackened faces) started playing again
• Sam experienced the second of his daydreams of his floating, idealized dream girl (in a swirling cloth veil); his view of her was cut off by a series of rectangular monoliths or pillars that broke through and erupted from the country's landscape; he abruptly awoke from his nightmare, and realized his malfunctioning room thermostat caused smoke to pour out of a vent in his living room; he phoned government-sponsored Central Services for repairs to his AC system, but received a dismissive recorded announcement
• unexpectedly, notorious Heating Engineer repairman Harry Tuttle, dressed in black like a Ninja-warrior/terrorist, was there to fix Sam's complex network of AC ducts; he announced that he was performing a free-lance (and illegal) repair on Sam's heating/AC unit; he explained how he had previously worked for the government's Dept. of Central Services, but had become exasperated by their repetitive forms and time-wasting, crippling paperwork, and had quit to become a free-lancer: ("I couldn't stand the paperwork. Listen, this whole system of yours could be on fire, and I couldn't even turn on a kitchen tap without filling out a 27B/6. Bloody paperwork... I came into this game for the action, the excitement. Go anywhere, travel light. Get in, get out, wherever there's trouble. A man alone. Now, they've got the whole country sectioned off. Can't make a move without a form")
• as Tuttle recommended fixing Sam's repair issue by bypassing the problem duct area, two authorized, government-employed, nasty and inept Central Services workers Spoor (Bob Hoskins) and Dowser (Derrick O'Connor) also arrived to fix the AC; Sam helped Tuttle to avoid detection and get away by stalling the two red-hatted buffoons, and insisting first on seeing their proper paperwork permission; he then learned that Archibald Tuttle was wanted by the "big boys" at Information Retrieval; as the renegade Tuttle left, he exhorted Sam: "Listen, kid, we're all in it together"
• back at Sam's day job, Kurtzmann continued to be distraught over having a "refund" check issued for the Buttles; when it couldn't be automatically deposited to the Buttles due to their lack of a bank account, Sam volunteered to visit Mrs. Buttle in her apartment to have her personally sign the check and cash it at the corner sweetshop; on the motorway, Sam drove a tiny, three-wheeled Messerschmidt automobile to the Shangri La Towers housing complex, and parked in an underground garage
• during his visit with the grieving and hysterical Mrs. Buttle, all she could say was: "What have you done with his body?..."; Sam met the Buttle's blonde upstairs neighbor Jill Layton who peered down at him from the hole in the ceiling; Sam called out to Jill ("It's you!") - the embodiment of his dream girl, but she disappeared from sight and drove off in a massive Coleman Pursuit Tractor; Sam realized that Jill resembled the subject of his many daydream fantasies, when he often imagined himself as a lone heroic, silver-winged warrior knight-savior combating the technological threats of the Machine Age; he was unaware that she had also become involved and frustrated as she tried to report the grievous 'mistaken identity' error to the inept, bureaucratic authorities
• upon his return to work, Sam searched for information on Jill Layton, but was blocked; it dawned on him that information about Jill would be available if he accepted his mother's promotion efforts to allow security clearance and access into the Ministry of Information; in a third daydream sequence, Sam fantasized in an alley that he was heroically saving and rescuing Jill, by battling good and evil, in the form of dark hooded mutants with rotting baby-doll faces who were pulling ropes and dragging Jill in a floating cage
• after returning to his apartment, Sam discovered that the two Central Services AC workers had returned (with the proper "27B/6" form) and ripped out and tangled his duct works; they had also discovered Tuttle's unorthodox bypass solution, regarding it as an act of sabotage; to spite Sam, they left Sam's apartment in disrepair
• a fourth dream sequence commenced (a continuation of the previous one), with the appearance of a giant 12-foot tall Samurai Warrior (Winston Dennis); it was the first of three separate sequences, all with the Samurai warrior - a symbol of the autocratic government; the warrior's suit was comprised of electronic tech components (i.e., resistors and volume knobs); Sam sliced through the ropes holding the cage that imprisoned his dream-girl; the dream ended after the giant metal Samurai struck the tip of one of Sam's wings with a battle-axe and Sam lost his wings
• Sam was interrupted in his apartment by the arrival of a singing telegram girl (Diana Martin), dressed in a red bell-boy outfit, who invited him to a high-society party held to celebrate his mother Ida's recent cosmetic surgery; at the party, his red-haired mother looked more youthful after the facial surgery with Dr. Jaffe, although competing plastic surgeon - dwarfish Dr. Chapman (Jack Purvis) with a monocle, disagreed with Jaffe's technique; one of Chapman's recent patients, bandage-faced Mrs. Terrain shuffled over and explained: "There was a little com-pli-ca-tion. Dr. Chapman says it often happens with a delicate skin like mine. Nothing to worry about. He's promised me these bandages will be off in a jiffy"
• in an effort to clear Jill's name, Sam maneuvered at the party to speak to wheelchair-bound Deputy Minister of Information Mr. Eugene Helpmann (Peter Vaughan), to "help" him to acquire a promotion to the "Information Retrieval" Department; his intent was to access Jill's classified records; a very short fifth dream sequence followed of a continuing battle with the Samurai
• Sam visited the 30th floor of the Information Retrieval department where he reported to his new boss Mr. Warrenn (Ian Richardson) - who was surrounded by a bustling group of cloned yes-men, known as Expediters, Sam was led to his new cramped and tiny office; in one of the film's most memorable scenes, Sam battled in a tug-of-war with his moving desk that he shared with his cubicle-mate Harvey Lime (Charles McKeown, the film's co-scriptwriter) on the other side of a partition; afterwards, he asked Lime to help him find information on his dream girl - Jill Layton; as he waited, Sam experienced another daydream of attempting to rescue Jill from the cage by grabbing ahold of one of the cage's restraining ropes; two giant brick-and-mortar arms emerged from the cobblestone road and grabbed his ankles
• Sam's dream ended with the delivery of a rudimentary print-out of Jill's profile; he took an elevator to the 50th floor of the building to Room 5001 (on the floor was a splotch of blood), to speak to Reference Officer 412/L -- friendly MOI official Jack Lint, who was wearing a blood-stained white coat and whose work consisted of interrogation; Sam learned that Jill, after witnessing the embarrassing Buttle incident (and trying to help Mrs. Buttle sort out the error regarding the wrongful arrest), was seen as a suspected terrorist and political dissident (and a possible associate of Tuttle); Sam was given Jill's file by a reluctant Lint, but implicitly warned about investigating too deeply; Sam was unaware that the enviable Jack was unscrupulously involved in torturing and interrogating government prisoners
• as Sam was returning to the floor of his office, the elevator malfunctioned, and from the mezzanine level of the building, he saw Jill at the front desk registering a complaint; with his new credentials, he was able to get to Jill and lead her safely from the massive building; outside while picking up littered papers, Jill slipped away and entered her truck; Sam followed and jumped on the running board and climbed into the passenger seat, but found himself delivered back to the Ministry's front entrance, where he was ordered out of her truck
• taking a risk, Sam attempted to warn Jill that she was a suspected terrorist, but she thought he was a government agent; as guards approached, she drove off, as Sam confessed that he was in love with her - in his dreams; as she tried to extricate him from the truck, he kept insisting for her to trust him and that he loved her
• when they arrived at her place of work - an industrial power plant, Jill was handed a brown package, and Sam instantly suspected it was a terrorist bomb; they crashed through a roadblock and were chased by armored pursuit vehicles, and eventually escaped when she released the truck's load - a prefabricated house - from the back-half of the truck into the other vehicles' path
• the two entered a busy shopping mall and entered a lingerie store, where they both struggled for the parcel; they came upon a face- and hand-bandaged, mummy-like Mrs. Terrain (pushed in a wheel-chair) who described her latest surgical catastrophe: "My complication had a little complication. But Dr. Jaffe says I'll soon be up and bounding about like a young gazelle"; and then a devastating explosion rocked the department store; they were dirtied but unhurt, and when Sam accused Jill of being a terrorist bomber, she denounced him by showing him that the package contained a harmless toy
• a security guard was transformed, in Sam's daydreaming mind, into the Samurai for Sam's third and final dream sequence with the warrior; Sam was able to spear the Samurai in the chest and topple him over - dead; he approached and removed the Samurai's mask - his own face was under the face covering [Note: The scene paid homage to a similar one in Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)]; he had become his own greatest enemy, due to his obedient complicity as a government functionary in the bureaucratic machinery; both were detained by black-garbed and helmeted guards
• back in his office, Sam was reprimanded and scolded by Mr. Warrenn for not keeping up with his work; to attempt to clear Jill's innocent name, Sam again visited Lint's office, but was unable to dissuade Lint from believing that Jill was a terrorist responsible for the destructive mall bombing, and that she was in league with Tuttle; frustrated, Sam attempted to destroy part of the paper-clogged bureaucracy by blocking the pneumatic cylinder tubes and causing a minor explosion in the building
• upon his return to his apartment, he found Central Services engineers Spoor and Dowser dressed in transparent plastic suits (with life-support tubes connected to terminals) to protect them from ice-cold conditions that they had created in his place; Tuttle vengefully came to Sam's rescue by swapping the positioning of two duct tubes by directing a flow of raw sewage through hoses into their suits until they drowned and exploded; Tuttle again exclaimed: "We're all in it together, kid"
• Sam again met up with Jill outside his apartment and deposited her at his mother Ida's unoccupied home for safe-keeping; he gave her a long-awaited kiss before returning to his office, after-hours, to manipulate and delete Jill's records; he marked her as deceased, so that she wouldn't be arrested as a suspected underground accomplice
• during an overnight with Jill in his mother's bedroom (where she was transformed into the likeness of his dream girl), Sam had sex with her; as a winged mechanical bird, Sam soared upward into the blue sky with his angelic dream girl holding on; but then during a Buttle-styled attack through the ceiling and through other entry points in the home, the two were seized at gunpoint, and Sam was taken prisoner and bagged with a full-body straitjacket; presumably off-screen, Jill was machine-gunned to death for resisting arrest; his own vain efforts to clear Jill's name by using his position to change her records had caused him to be targeted, victimized as a terrorist and wrongly aligned with the rebellion by the totalitarian regime - and he lost his lover-dream girl forever
• in the downbeat, disturbing and shocking conclusion, after being apprehended, Sam was detained and kept in confinement within a gigantic smokestack dome; the troublesome Sam was blamed for a string of terrorist bombings, and for treason against the state; he was strapped into a torturer's chair in the middle of a circular platform that was situated under the vast, dark dome, and the canvas bag was removed from his head
• Sam was to be questioned and tortured by two torture agents in white doctors' jackets as the spritely tune Brazil played; the white-coated technician who was wearing a pock-marked, smiling baby mask approached to administer electric shocks and torture, from a tray with implements; Sam recognized him as his friend-turned-sinister Jack Lint, who was accompanied by the wheelchair-bound Deputy Minister of Information, Mr. Helpmann

• suddenly Sam was triumphantly rescued by a band of armed commandos led by terrorist Tuttle - the renegade (freelance) air-conditioning engineer; Jack was shot dead, and Sam with other freedom fighters escaped down the steps of the Ministry Building before it was blown up [Note: the sequence paid homage to the Odessa Steps sequence in Sergei Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin (1925)]
• during Sam's flight from police with Tuttle, he imagined Tuttle's body completely covered with littered strips of paperwork from the demolished building that adhered to his body and mummified him before he disappeared; Sam also found himself in a church at the funeral of his mother's close friend Mrs. Terrain who had died after botched "acid treatments" of her face by rival plastic-surgeon Dr. Chapman; in contrast, due to her repeated treatments, Sam's mother was transfigured into dream-girl Jill in her 20s, and ignored Sam due to the attention she was receiving from scores of young handsome male admirers; the funeral ceremony was disrupted by government agents, and Sam fell into the black darkness of Mrs. Terrain's emptied and open casket
• Sam emerged in the city's streets (with monolithic skyscrapers on either side) with the police and other monstrous creatures in pursuit; to escape, he climbed up an immense debris pile of used AC flex-ducts, opened a brick door, and found himself in the pre-fab house being pulled by Jill's tractor-trailer (a Scammell Commander); reunited with her, Jill and Sam drove away from the city to a pastoral setting where they created a homestead - a happy ending
• however, his ideal perfect and illusory idyllic paradise free of societal restrictions was revealed to be a self-deluding fantasy of wishful thinking - his escape to a green vista with a pastoral backdrop was covered over by a close-up of the faces of the two torture agents - Deputy MOI Helpmann and Jack Lint, that entered the frame from either side; Sam found himself back in a chair within the domed torture chamber; his left hand had a bloody puncture wound (or stigmata?)
• the film's final lines came at the moment of Sam's complete insanity; as the two agents peered into the face of the catatonic Sam (and the camera), they commiserated about Sam's untreatable condition: (Mr. Helpmann: "He's got away from us, Jack." Jack Lint: "Afraid you're right, Mr. Helpmann. He's gone"); the spritely tune Brazil played
• the film's final image was of the half-smiling Sam humming the film's theme song to himself (Ary Barroso's "Aquarela do Brasil" or "Brazil") - insanely lost in his own inner world

"He's gone."

• gradually, the backdrop of the dome of the torture chamber faded and dissolved into the vision of a cloud-filled sky, with the brilliant orb of the sun shining brightly; Sam still sat in the chair in the center of the domed area at the end of the walkway; the credits began to play, accompanied by upbeat samba music