Brazil (The Criterion Collection Three-Disc Special Edition)
by Terry Gilliam
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DVD details
Actor: Ian Holm, Jonathan Pryce, Katherine Helmond, Kim Greist, Robert De NiroDirector: Terry Gilliam
Brand: Brazil
Writer: Charles McKeown
Writer: Terry Gilliam
Writer: Tom Stoppard
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
Format: Box set, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.78:1
Running Time: 132 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-09-05
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Criterion
DVD Reviews of Brazil (The Criterion Collection Three-Disc Special Edition)
DVD Review: Great
Summary: 5 Stars
Critics (such as the film's most famed detractor- Roger Ebert, whose only point worth noting is his likening the film to Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times) have often compared it to George Orwell's 1984, but, naturally, this is a rather facile comparison, and made mostly because of the plethora of insipidly quotable state sponsored apothegms, like `Don't suspect a friend- report him,' `Be alert- some terrorists look normal,' and `Suspicion breeds confidence.' The state that Sam lives in, in the film, is rather inept (witness the ease with which the rather bumbling Tuttle thwarts the authorities at almost every stage). Sam fails not because the state overpowers him, like Winston Smith to the Oceania authorities in 1984, but because his bumbling and idiocy is even more pathetic than the state's. In effect, Sam fails because he's even more inept and personally weak than the system that subjugates him- he wins the devolutionary race to the bottom (is a Lowest Common Denominator society the cause or result of its citizens?). This is especially true in contrast to De Niro's Tuttle; which augurs well for the citizens of their inept state; whereas the residents of the dismal Orwellian Oceania are doomed.
The DVD package comes in three disks. Disk One has the Final Cut, in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio, as well as an audio commentary by director Gilliam. It is lucid, passionate, engaging, and truly a delight. Rare is the filmmaker, outside of Werner Herzog, who seems engaged by discussing both his film, its circumstances, and its art. Gilliam also dispels the myth that the film was named after the title song, Aquarela Do Brasil; instead claiming the title was gotten first (after a dream Gilliam had of the film's opening in a rain forest about to be techno-plundered) and the song added afterwards. It's interesting that in the few dozen reviews I looked at of this film, not a single critic gives the correct provenance for the film's title- even after claiming to have reviewed the DVD. The transfer is very good, and Gilliam gives so much engaging information that it almost makes the special features on Disk Two seem persiflage by comparison. That disk has two excellent documentaries- a contemporaneous 30 minute long What is Brazil? film that serves as a de facto Making Of featurette, and a 60 minute film, called The Battle Of Brazil, that details the film's struggles against its studio, Universal, and its idiotic empty suits, as well as a piece of grandstanding by the Los Angeles Film Critics Society (of which host and film critic Jack Mathews was part of), which chose Brazil as best film of the year to force the studio to release the full version. Other features include the theatrical trailer, storyboards and assorted crew recollections and discussions of the film. Disk Three has the bowdlerized 94 minute version, and a commentary by David Morgan- a film expert on the works and career of Gilliam. While he is dutiful in pointing out when and where the two films diverge, Morgan is rather useless in discussing other aspects of the film, like some of the moments that are unaffected by the changes, and a few actual improvements- such as the substitution of a few close-ups for long shots, or certain angles the camera shoots at, which give a deeper `in' to the `moment.' His high point is catching the biggest error Gilliam's bowdlerizers made- leaving in the `dream sequence' shot of Tuttle getting devoured by windblown newspapers. In the longer version we see this as one of the first hints that Sam's `escape' from captivity is not real. But, in this version, where the escape is `real,' Tuttle's demise is more than incongruous, it's an actual thumb in the eye. He follows that up by ending his commentary asking which of the two films is the more subversive- the bowdlerized cut which suggests that power can be subverted, or the final cut which shows the only `escape' from authoritarianism is death or insanity?
As for the film itself, there is no great nor memorable camera work to speak of- the odd angles Gilliam uses are all rather standard fare from his Python days, for this film is almost wholly dependent upon the great screenplay by Gilliam, playwright Tom Stoppard, and Charles McKeown, as well as some truly outstanding (and subtle) comic acting by the stars and supporting cast, which included Ian Holm, Bob Hoskins, Ian Richardson, Peter Vaughan, and Jim Broadbent. And, when I say `acting,' I truly mean it. This is acting not built on melodramatic high points, but on often fleeting moments of sardonism where the turn of an eye, or the tic in a face can convey something, both from the main and supporting cast. Pryce, as example, was relatively unknown before this film, while De Niro was in his post-Taxi Driver-Raging Bull heyday as `the greatest actor in the world,' yet it is Pryce's acting that dominates the film, whereas De Niro's is a supporting role in all measures of the term.
Brazil is a theatrical film that is unique. Despite constant and wrongheaded comparisons to other dystopias, it is a film that clearly inspired later filmmakers- most notably Canada's Guy Maddin. But, it also clearly had an inspiration few have noticed- the classic 1967 British television series, The Prisoner. Both works essentially end with the destruction of the individual (even if The Prisoner's lead character `escapes'- he still is destroyed for he is revealed as the villain) in response to modern society. The only essential difference is that more inept and cowardly Sam Lowry never quite realizes he's a prisoner in The Village (or perhaps does, but refuses his reality, thereby deepening his pathos). All in all, The Criterion Collection's DVD set of the film is equal to the film it presents, and that is something all cinemaphiles can celebrate. Get to it!
Description of Brazil (The Criterion Collection Three-Disc Special Edition)
BRAZIL (BOX) - DVD MovieIf Franz Kafka had been an animator and film director--oh, and a member of Monty Python's Flying Circus--this is the sort of outrageously dystopian satire one could easily imagine him making. However, Brazil was made by Terry Gilliam, who is all of the above except, of course, Franz Kafka. Be that as it may, Gilliam sure captures the paranoid-subversive spirit of Kafka's The Trial (along with his own Python animation) in this bureaucratic nightmare-comedy about a meek governmental clerk named Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) whose life is destroyed by a simple bug. Not a software bug, a real bug (no doubt related to Kafka's famous Metamorphosis insect) that gets smooshed in a printer and causes a typographical error unjustly identifying an innocent citizen, one Mr. Buttle, as suspected terrorist Harry Tuttle (Robert De Niro). When Sam becomes enmeshed in unraveling this bureaucratic glitch, he himself winds up labeled as a miscreant.
The movie presents such an unrelentingly imaginative and savage vision of 20th-century bureaucracy that it almost became a victim of small-minded studio management itself--until Gilliam surreptitiously screened his cut for the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, who named it the best movie of 1985 and virtually embarrassed Universal into releasing it. This DVD version of Brazil is the special director's cut that first appeared in Criterion's comprehensive (and expensive) six-disc laser package in 1996. Although the DVD (at a fraction of the price) doesn't include that set's many extras, it's still a bargain. --Jim Emerson
If Franz Kafka had been an animator and film director--oh, and a member of Monty Python's Flying Circus--this is the sort of outrageously dystopian satire one could easily imagine him making. However, Brazil was made by Terry Gilliam, who is all of the above except, of course, Franz Kafka. Be that as it may, Gilliam sure captures the paranoid-subversive spirit of Kafka's The Trial (along with his own Python animation) in this bureaucratic nightmare-comedy about a meek governmental clerk named Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) whose life is destroyed by a simple bug. Not a software bug, a real bug (no doubt related to Kafka's famous Metamorphosis insect) that gets smooshed in a printer and causes a typographical error unjustly identifying an innocent citizen, one Mr. Buttle, as suspected terrorist Harry Tuttle (Robert De Niro). When Sam becomes enmeshed in unraveling this bureaucratic glitch, he himself winds up labeled as a miscreant.
The movie presents such an unrelentingly imaginative and savage vision of 20th-century bureaucracy that it almost became a victim of small-minded studio management itself--until Gilliam surreptitiously screened his cut for the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, who named it the best movie of 1985 and virtually embarrassed Universal into releasing it. This DVD version of Brazil is the special director's cut that first appeared in Criterion's comprehensive (and expensive) six-disc laser package in 1996. --Jim Emerson
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