March 2000

Brazil (Criterion)
Reviewed by Doug Blackburn
DVD Format

Overall Enjoyment:
Picture Quality:
Sound Quality:
Packaged Extras:

Starring Jonathan Price, Katherine Helmond, Ian Holm, Bob Hoskins, Michael Palin, Kim Greist

Directed by Terry Gilliam

Theatrical Release: 1985
DVD Release: 1999
Dolby Digital Surround
Widescreen

Brazil is a milestone movie in my life. It is the only movie I ever purchased on VHS tape. When it came out on laserdisc, I purchased that too. When the Criterion laserdisc came out, I passed for some unknown reason. I wanted the Criterion laserdisc, I just never got around to ordering it. Now there’s the better-than-ever Criterion Brazil DVD Box. Of course, I had to have it. Now lest you think of me as some obsessive completist, you should understand that I’ve never spent this kind of money on any other movie. I paid about $70 for the VHS tape because I couldn’t wait for the lower priced version to come out a year later. The three disc Criterion box seems a bargain if you are a careful shopper. It can be had for as little as half of what I spent on that VHS tape, though the retail price is closer to $60 depending on where you look.

I don’t know what it is about Brazil that is so attractive to my sensibilities. Could it be the amusingly lame "technology" the people who inhabit Brazil-space have come to know and love? Is it the thorough murder of the idiocy of bureaucracy performed by the only American member of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, director Terry Gilliam? Is it the goofy costumes? The odd and compelling sets? Or maybe it’s the fact that 80% of the people who see this movie just don’t get it. I do tend to love getting a message that is lost to the masses.

One element that certainly attracts me to Brazil is Gilliam’s incredible creativity and the lengths his partners in crime go to in support of Gilliam’s vision. Where else but in the world of Brazil could power for lights be delivered not by conveniently hidden wires, but by gross often greasy-looking ducts hanging from the ceiling? Where else could a computer monitor be a tiny 3" CRT with a huge magnifying lens in front of it (no covers to make it pretty or safe of course!)? Where else can a man dream of flying and of being dragged down by the long arms of the pavement itself or by huge bloated bodies with the faces of babies? Where else could plastic surgery be as barbaric with results as potentially off-putting as death? The world of Brazil is gloriously twisted. It’s as if it is the same earth we know, but with perhaps the top 20% of the cream of humanity skimmed off. All the creativity, scientific curiosity, independent thinking and ability to solve complex problems has been whisked away by a fate of evolution or a deadly high-IQ virus. The work of the "cream" is replaced with pathetic substitutes for the real thing such as, photos of beautiful food on the menu belie the scoops of blue or green glop on the plate delivered to your table. A woman’s hat that’s a giant shoe, Mickey Mouse vehicles, desolate landscapes, and bureaucracy so maddening that you almost feel affection for the ones we really have to deal with.

Throughout the movie, our hero dreams of escape, of his ideal woman, of his ability to fly gracefully, of finding her and of running away from the idiocy forever. He does find her, but running away from the idiocy proves to be quite a problem. Dark humor, irony, and insanely spot-on satire are combined with futility, inevitability, and powerlessness to make a roller coaster ride of a movie. For me, this is one of the great movies of all time. It’s an effort of the force of sheer unrecognized genius, unrecognized by Gilliam and his cohorts at the time and unrecognized except for rare exceptions among critics and the public. Brazil is a different sort of movie to be sure. It isn’t the acting performances that make it great, it isn’t the plot or the dialogue or the sweep/scope that makes Brazil great. It’s the vision, the ideas, and the execution that make this movie great. Because of that, Brazil is often looked upon askance by those for whom only ordinary movies are the only real movies. It isn’t a movie for everyone, but if you like to see authority and authority figures poked in the eye with a stick, it may never have been done better than this.

In the Criterion Box you get 2 full versions of the movie. Gilliam’s cut which was previously only available on the Criterion laserdisc and the god-awful cut run on television against his wishes. The TV cut is amazing in how it illustrates the power of editing and how completely undone a movie can become in the hands of jerks bent on trying to make it into something other than what it was originally intended to be. The TV cut is pathetic to the core. Watching it is painful but instructive. The Universal VHS tape (1986), Universal laserdisc (date unknown, but circa 1988) and Universal DVD (1998) all use the 131-minute US cut of the movie seen in theaters here. This cut is kinda-sorta okay with Gilliam but he obviously prefers the 142-minute cut released in Europe and on the Criterion laserdisc (date unknown, circa early 1990s) and DVD (1999). The horrid TV cut runs only 94 minutes. The full-length Gilliam-approved cut is clearly the best version of Brazil that I’ve seen.

The plot is impossible to summarize in a paragraph that will make any sense at all. I’m worried that if I attempt a plot summary, people will be put off by Brazil even before seeing it. I can tell you that ideas are more important than the plot in this movie. Many scenes do nothing to advance the plot but they deliver an idea. They deliver a "this is how it is" picture of the world of Brazil-the-movie. Romance is, at first, unrequited but ultimately giddy. There’s a neurotic mother-son relationship. Toss in a sub-plot about an underground public utility terrorist (Robert DeNiro) who repairs what the bureaucracy can’t. Intermingle a tale of bureaucratic error with fatal results. Vanity, timidity, and stupidity are all centerpieces of single or multi-part vignettes. Brazil has enough meat on the bones to keep you thinking about it for years.

The 3.5 ratings awarded for picture and sound quality do not mean that Criterion has screwed up in any way. Brazil was released in 1985. A lot of technological improvements have occurred since then. Brazil was not a "big budget" spectacular. It had an okay budget that was stretched in many creative ways to achieve something pretty interesting. Due to the budget and technological limitations in the original film, 3.5 is as high as you could honestly score Brazil for picture and sound compared to the best movies available today. Readers should understand that this Criterion Box represents the very best possible looking and sounding version of Brazil that you can find anywhere, save the original prints.

Criterion Brazil Box - Feature & Contents Summary:

Disc 1

• Gilliam-approved 1.85:1 widescreen 142 minute cut
• Remastered video
• Remastered Dolby Surround
• Gilliam commentary
• English spoken language, English subtitles

Disc 2

• 30 Minute "What Is Brazil?" on-set documentary
• 60 Minute Criterion documentary "Battle of Brazil" which explains all the problems Gilliam had getting Brazil released and problems trying to keep it from being wrecked after release
• Screenwriter’s script commentary
• Production designer commentary on the "look" of Brazil
• Costume designer commentary
• Story boards (some which made it into the movie, some which didn’t)
• Music composer’s commentary
• Special Effects studies
• Trailer
• Still photos

Disc 3

• 94 Minute Gilliam-hated TV cut (4:3)
• Non-Gilliam commentary, quite good at pointing out each difference in the editing and how it affects the viewer

GO TO
[ Current Video Online Issue ] [ Video Review Archives ]