The Definitives

Brazil (1985)

Director: Terry Gilliam
Cast: Jonathan Pryce, Robert De Niro, Michael Palin, and Kim Greist
Rated: R
Runtime: 142 min.

by Brian Eggert

Entered into
The Definitives:
3/18/2007

Original Release Date:
12/18/1985

Terry Gilliam's 1986 film Brazil represents the archetypal example of fatalistic storytelling. Hope, which in Brazil is a prospect singularly manifested in dreams, lingers like a mirage in the distance, barely sustaining society’s willingness to maintain itself. Trained by the subjugation of a paperwork-obsessed government, the world Gilliam depicts is beset by bureaucratic dominance over nearly every aspect of human life. Its fatalism materialized into a curious historical irony for the director: A bureaucratic producer nearly prevented this film, in its complete, cynical form, from being released; but after a long and dirty battle, his masterpiece triumphed. Indeed, Gilliam’s dream for Brazil prevailed (if fighting within its own world, it might not have), ballooning into a womb burgeoning with content and giving cinephiles a Citizen Kane for the modern age. 

Cinema challenging The System finds audiences dedicated to the idea of rebellion. Pseudo-rebellion pictures like Fight Club succeed both as cult and commercial successes because people desire revolution, though generally resist rebelling themselves. Standing up to your boss or to the government may seem impossible, but watching a film fictionalizing such events can be therapeutic. Movies about successful rebellion, such as V for Vendetta, ultimately maintain defeatist themes when applied to real life issues. Defeatist because, though people adore films like these for their victory over The System, in reality, The System usually prevails. Cathartic films of this sort liberate, acknowledge that The System exists, and yet fight ruling powers through fantastical, often unrealistic means. They forget The System consists of more than one institution; in actuality, our world is made up of systems on top of systems, on top of other systems, and so on, beyond understanding.

Brazil refuses to play into the hands of catharsis, comparably to George Orwell’s authoritarian government dystopia classic 1949 novel Nineteen-Eighty Four. Though for different reasons, both stories end dismally and acknowledge the institution’s eventual victory over the individual. The book served as a warning against a government potentially relying on totalitarianism, which would occur, according to Orwell’s book, only a few decades in the future. Brazil stresses that even the imagination is at risk in a dictatorial society.

Orwell’s world may be a futurology, or cautionary tale, but the same cannot be said for Brazil. Opening titles describe the film’s setting as existing “Somewhere in the 20th Century.” The city remains unknown, though one could presuppose it takes place in England (it was filmed in England, and Gilliam’s work with the British Monty Python troupe points to this). But rather than assuming location, figure satirical allegory representative of all cities and governments in a contemporary setting: A city with skyscrapers endlessly high; offices with paperwork mandating every action; imperfect, wiry automations guiding everything. And as a result, imagination and fantasy are a minimum requirement of this despondent setting.

Brazil’s inspiration originated from a seventeenth century document detailing the costs of what a person was required to pay for their own witch hunt interrogation. The Inquisition brought observers and character witnesses by the dozens to make or break a witch trial; in addition, it took several man hours to torture a potential witness, which cost money, so the accused would be forced to pay for his or her own interrogation or punishment. Gilliam saw a type of sick bureaucratic logic at work in this document, analogous to our own daily lives filled with endless piles of soul-depleting paperwork, high interest rates, and inhumane industry diplomacy.

Gilliam insists his picture is not science fiction. The setting is nonetheless foreign, with industrial technology spreading everywhere like an overgrowing vine, so that the comparison is not an unjust one. Unlike Orwell’s novel, future totalitarian government is not the enemy, but rather modern society; it is the banal day-to-day that we currently float along in. Some link science fiction with the future, whereas an alternate reality, someplace unfamiliar, or in this case an allegory, can exist in a place with fictional technologies during present day. Visually similar to the subterranean future shown in Gilliam’s own 12 Monkeys, we see apparatuses made up of computers with monitors so small they require magnifiers, endless streams of ducts, and absolutist political entities—all familiar, yet exaggerated for the sake of Gilliam’s message. The result is a contemporary-set fictional landscape.

Sam Lowry, trapped by this bureaucratic, paperwork-obsessed world, daydreams. Left otherwise unfulfilled by office routine, he escapes into his imagination where he is a hero—a winged warrior fighting desperately in an attempt to save the woman, literally, of his dreams. One day, Sam sees the face of his fantasy woman somehow tangibly real. The Ministry’s organization, with all its forms, receipts, filing, and governmental bric-a-brac, prevents Sam from discovering the identity of his desire made flesh. To find her, he resorts to desperate measures: Sam takes a promotion he does not want, which increases his Ministry security clearance; he begins to be seen by his superiors when normally he would revel in his anonymity; he forgets about the institution, as the actualization of his dream represents the possibility of release from an inescapable societal complex.

Winning an Oscar for their art and set decoration, Norman Garwood and Maggie Gray owe a major portion of their visualizations to Gilliam, whose imagination exceeds almost any filmmaker working today. Brazil illustrates a world obstructed by technology and architecture; we rarely, if ever, see the sky or any form of nature (plants, bodies of water, animals). Orderly, yet grimy and dark with the leftovers of smokestacks and long-since-new mechanisms, the physical world intrudes on both the viewer and the film’s characters. By the end of the picture, the viewer feels like a claustrophobic in a shrinking room.

Described by Gilliam as “Frank Capra meets Franz Kafka,” the film’s look contains elements of 1940’s architecture and clothing, combined with a futuristic application of ducts, expressionism, and Victorianism. Ducts violate interior sets: large tubes run awkwardly through walls, literally penetrating internal landscapes, therein symbolizing how even in your home, the inescapable bureaucratic world infiltrates and observes. To film this environment without losing touch with his characters required a true visionary. Gilliam creates with manic artistry, sensitive both to visual and the emotional realms, and so has earned a name for himself as a true auteur.

Indeed, Gilliam originally wanted to name his film 1984 ½, combining Orwell’s vision with the filmic auteurism of 8½. A masterpiece by masculine idealist Federico Fellini, 8½ portrays a film director (Italian actor Marcello Mastroianni) embracing dreams in place of a reality that does not suit him. Autobiographical for Fellini, the film describe personal pressures that mushroom while trying complete his next film (a science fiction epic); those stressors distort his interpretation of the events around him. Thus, the viewer of 8½ is never completely sure which scenes represent reality and which represent fantasy.

While the title 1984 ½ would have alluded to great works of literature and film, Gilliam’s title has its own metaphor signifying fatalistic design. Gilliam thought up the title Brazil while watching the sun set in the steel-producing city of Port Talbot in Whales. He imagined someone sitting on the blackened, coal dust-ridden beach, listening to a diverting old vacationer’s song like the famous “Maria Elena,” which in some retellings of the story is replaced with the escapist song “Brazil” (in most retellings, Gilliam decides “Maria Elena” should be replaced by “Brazil,” as it’s a catchier tune). At some point during the film’s production, the Geoff Muldaur version of “Brazil” was chosen for the film’s theme and eventually became the title. The irony of Port Talbot’s setting and the juxtaposition of the sunset’s beauty against the filthy landscape of the steel town inspired the title. Whether resigned to dreaming of escape to Port Talbot, or simply hoping for an otherwise impossible escape from Port Talbot, the song points out the desire to get away (and how ironic a wholly corrupted dream, a getaway to Port Talbot would be). When the song is hummed or played in the soundtrack, the irony of its placement underlines absent possibility of an exotic beach, sunshine, or a getaway…

Sam and the real-life version of his fantasy, Jill Layton (Kim Greist), are introduced, brilliantly, via clerical error. One of the film’s first scenes shows a nameless Ministry technician in his office. A printer clanks out some never-ending stream of documents. A fly buzzes about the room. The stuffy employee waves at it with a newspaper, but the fly lands on the ceiling. Climbing up to the ceiling on an assortment of office furniture, the employee swats the fly dead. The squashed insect falls, and we see the last names flashing by on the printer all say “Tuttle”. When the fly lands in the printer, suddenly one of the files reads “Buttle”.

As a result of a swatted fly, a chain of events occurs, which leads to the wrongful arrest and execution of a citizen named Buttle. Inevitably, due to this mishap, Sam sees Jill, a woman whose face he has seen a thousand times in the playground of his mind.

Harry Tuttle (Robert DeNiro), a subversive plumber refusing to work within Central Services, remains the intended victim, but thanks to the fly, he survives. Independent for the intrigue of freelance plumbing, adventure keeps Tuttle moving. Both Central Services and The Ministry view him as a terrorist because he lives his dream. Sam meets the rogue plumber after calling Central Services when his heating goes haywire. Immediately, Sam looks up to Tuttle as a hero.

Though Sam does everything he can to avoid being suspect, he chooses odd associations: Harry Tuttle and Jill are both suspected terrorist. But Jonathan Pryce plays Sam Lowry as loveably innocent; neither he nor Tuttle nor Jill are terrorists. How could they be? They are the only dreamers in the film.

The Ministry of Information’s propaganda claims Tuttle and those like him (citizens refusing complacency and adherence) engage in terrorism. Explosions in public places occur and people learn to ignore them as normalcy; furthermore, we never see the agitator behind these “attacks”. Are there really terrorists, or does the government cause these explosions to create a sense of chaos and fear? Given a choice between anarchy and order, most will take order.

The Ministry’s propaganda machine cranks soundlessly; we see sardonic posters broadcasting fear-inducing indoctrinations against independent thought, such as "Suspicion Breeds Confidence", "Loose Talk Is Noose Talk", "The Truth Shall Make You Free", and "Don't suspect a friend, report him". The endless paperwork records peoples’ activities; scanning devices are everywhere; people are designated by their security level. Big Brothers’ eyes never waver from their fixed position on each and every member of society.

Comically, Big Brother’s dependence on technology (as with the printers thwarted by a swatted fly) sometimes backfires. At the Department of Records, Sam’s boss Mr. Kurtzmann stands watch over an ocean of workstations. After Kurtzmann disappears into his office, he hears the echoing sound of hundreds of employees clicking over from their workscreens to a raucous cowboy movie. Kurtzmann rushes back to the door and opens it, hoping to catch everyone in the act, but not before the employees can switch back to their workscreens. With suspicion he shuts the door again and the Western’s sound snaps back on. Kurtzmann, as a boss, is a joke. He is unsure of himself, though his confidence in the authority of his position is concrete. When something complicated arises, he leaves the details to Sam.

In depicting a world obsessed with paperwork, scrutiny, and micro-management, Gilliam could not help but obsess over the details. Brazil’s lush production blossoms with content, and contains layers upon layers of texts, both visual and thematic. The aforementioned propaganda is not shoved down the viewer’s throat; posters resembling WWII and Cold War misinformation are seen only in the background and often out of focus. Much of the film inhabits the background, or resides in the subtle humor and satire from scene to scene. In the interpretational sense, this is a film requiring reading from the viewer. Indeed, to see every little activity of every character in every scene requires multiple viewings. Gilliam’s career is filled with pictures harboring details beyond the scope of a normal film; it is that frenzied attention to detail that gives Gilliam a sometimes notorious name.

Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe, two documentary filmmakers, have followed Gilliam’s career closely. Making two feature-length behind-the-scenes docs on Terry Gilliam productions, the first was entitled The Hamster Factor and Other Tales of 12 Monkeys. Detailing the making of Gillaim’s most successful film to date, Pepe and Fulton depicts the detail-obsessed genius of the director. “The Hamster Factor” from their title refers to a point in 12 Monkeys’ production when Gilliam became more concerned with the behavior of a hamster out of focus in the foreground than with the film’s star, Bruce Willis. Hours were spent in attempt to convincing a hamster to run in a wheel as Gilliam wanted. Meanwhile, an entire production crew stood idling, waiting for Gilliam to be pleased with a meager detail (which Gilliam admits that no one but him will probably notice). Driven by the smallest specificity, Gilliam chases his vision with an endless ferocity.

To find Jill, Sam's actions, while within the context of the film seem unthreatening (for example, taking a promotion to indirectly subvert the system), are dangerous in a merely resultant, roundabout way. Sam does not deliberately undermine authority until he is forced to; his intentions are only to quietly seek out his dreams—to get the hamster to run in the wheel. Yet because of their nature, dreams are criminal. Sam refuses to admit he has hope, as that would mean he somehow has refused to accept his position, refused to conform. Though it subsists only as a symptom of his desire, dreaming is inherently rebellious in Brazil’s world.

Gilliam never allows his audience to think Sam outsmarts the structure against which he is pitted. Our hero is pushed or pulled one way or the other at the world’s whim, but eventually realizes his disillusion. Near the end of the film, with the bureaucratic world fixatedly catching up with Sam's indirect rebellion, Sam and Jill fall in love. To keep The Ministry away, he creates a false record of Jill’s death—his first and last malicious, direct act against The System. Sam seeming undermines The Ministry of Information by proving dreams can come true. Gilliam gives us only a brief moment of happiness with Sam before foot soldiers crash in through the windows, killing off Sam's hopes. The woman of his dreams is executed resisting arrest. The Ministry prevails and processes Sam, preparing him for a torturous interrogation.

Sam drifts away... He imagines escaping with Harry Tuttle, a figure of heroism in the face of oppression, and then together demolishing The Ministry’s headquarters. But Tuttle becomes consumed by a swarm of loose papers, signifying the helpless and absolute officialdom of Brazil’s world. Eventually, Sam and Jill escape to a paradise away from bureaucracy, skyscrapers, advertisements, propaganda, and ducts 

Except no such haven exists; all dreams and fantasies are false in Gilliam’s film. Any hope Sam might have had for happiness was as unrealistic as escaping to a nice vacation spot on Port Talbot’s coal dust-blanketed beach. In reality, Sam's shock over Jill’s death has forced his mental collapse. The film's ending punctuates how The System of the world dominates us all, regardless of how independent we may feel. Gilliam recognizes the only way to escape this trend is to dream. How else can we be satisfied with life?

Unlike Sam, Terry Gilliam’s struggle to create a dream, in this case Brazil, succeeded; though not without a battle. The heavily publicized war over its release earned Gilliam the reputation of a troublemaker among Hollywood studio executives, some of whom claim that Gilliam thrives on anarchy.

Their point is not beyond understanding; Gilliam shares peculiar similarities to his main character. Both he and Sam are their own worst enemies. In one dream sequence during the film’s first half, the winged superhero version of Sam fights against the personification of The Ministry: a massive, faceless samurai warrior decorated in metallic armor. The samurai disappears and reappears at random. Sam gets the upper hand and wounds the warrior. It bleeds bright orange and blue flame, and then topples over onto its back. Sam creeps up slowly on the samurai’s body. All at once its facial armor plate bursts and Sam sees his own face on the warrior. In the real world of Brazil, this dream foreshadows how Sam’s growing, reckless paper-trail catches up with him in the end. He tries so desperately to find Jill that he forgets he is always being watched. He becomes reckless in his desire for freedom; it leads to Jill’s death and his own descent into madness.

Gilliam’s parallel reputation as a filmmaker has been marked with problem productions. His critics suggest the issue resides in his unwillingness to compromise his art, his often dramatic battles with studios, and a mystical-yet-unintentional attraction to chaos. Brazil’s famous production history best signifies his curse-like magnetism to ill-fated productions, and his likeness to Sam’s paper-trail.

For years, the idea for Brazil circled in Gilliam’s head. After writing the script, the director’s previous achievements with Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Time Bandits, and Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life intro The Crimson Permanent Assurance, promised the director would be seen by studios as an artistic and commercial success. Gilliam shopped his script around Hollywood and found that every studio rejected Brazil. At one point, Twentieth Century Fox agreed to produce his script only after Gilliam directed their “A” screenplay at the moment, Enemy Mine. Top directors in Hollywood, such as Steven Spielberg, turned down Enemy Mine (it was later filmed by Das Boot helmer Wolfgang Petersen); when Gilliam turned it down too, Fox suddenly became interested in the film preventing a non-A-List director from turning down an A-List screenplay—it must be something special. On that rationale, Fox agreed to take over international distribution rights for Brazil; Universal took over U.S. distribution.

Though the elaborate sets and special effects, still impressive today, gather the most attention, Brazil’s barrage of unique characters guide the film. In casting the picture, Gilliam wanted primarily British actors. Jack Lint, Sam Lowry’s friend and The Ministry of Information’s interrogator (a character sought after by De Niro), is given a creepy, chummy disposition by Monty Python regular Michael Palin. Versatile actor Ian Holm of Alien and Time Bandits fame portrayed Mr. Kurtzmann. American actress Katherine Helmond, having worked with Gilliam on Time Bandits, reteamed with the director to play Sam’s plastic surgery-addicted mother—a character who progressively gets younger and younger looking as the film goes on (by the end, when Sam has lost his mind, he sees his mother and Jill as virtually the same woman). Several other Brit actors such as Bob Hoskins, Jim Broadbent, Jack Purvis, and Charles McKeown give equally notable performances.  

In finding actors for lead roles of Sam and Jill, Gilliam’s search was vast. For Jill Layton, the director saw auditions from Kathleen Turner, Jamie Lee Curtis, Madonna, and many others. Strangely, Gilliam admits actress Ellen Barkin (Sea of Love and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas) was the most impressive candidate, and she had the role until a split-second change of mind turned the director toward a virtually unknown Kim Greist. To the director’s dismay, Greist’s audition was better than her on-set performance; she proved incapable of giving Jill the ferocity Gilliam had written for the character. As a result, Greist’s role was trimmed down. This ultimately helped the film, making Sam the focus and Jill the distant fantasy.

Gilliam wrote Sam Lowry to be a youthful hero, so a young Tom Cruise vied for the role. But Cruise, in the U.S., refused to send Gilliam, in London, an audition tape (the director demands that auditions be done on tape, as the camera can pick up subtleties the naked eye can not). Cruise, according to Gilliam, feared his taped audition might get out after he became a star and all but cried on the phone when Gilliam turned the actor down pending a tape.

After seeing Jonathan Pryce’s audition, Gilliam rethought the Sam character as a middle-aged man; at the time, Pryce was in his late thirties. The studio thought Gilliam insane for casting such an old and little-known actor in the lead role, but nonetheless accepted the decision. With a childlike innocence in his eyes, Pryce’s Sam Lowry is an out-of-depth figure Gilliam compares to Stan Laurel, but Pryce's physical humor also recalls Harold Lloyd and Charlie Chaplin. His performance is the apex of the picture: unintentionally heroic, painfully endearing, and absolutely innocent. 

Producer Arnon Milchan backed Gilliam’s screenplay throughout the process and saw to it that Gilliam had a $15 million dollar budget, final cut, and a running time of 135-minutes to work with for the U.S. release. When the completed film clocked in at 142-minutes, Fox began distribution throughout Europe and the film opened to loved-it or hated-it reviews; Universal, having made an arrangement with Gilliam to film a movie seven minutes shorter, insisted Gilliam make cuts. The director refused; cuts would have sacrificed his vision. Gilliam, somewhat ignorantly, could not understand how seven minutes mattered so much among “friends.”

And so the director’s laborious filmic vision was put at risk by Universal President Sid Sheinberg. The result would be a notorious Hollywood clash, made wholly public in Jack Mathews’ column in the Los Angeles Times, and then documented fully in Mathews’ book The Battle of Brazil.

The Ministry of Information in Brazil could stand-in for Sid Sheinberg, as suddenly an outside party to the creative process was attempting to influence Gilliam’s film. Sheinberg believed Gilliam’s cut to be bloated and depressing, yet he saw potential for a commercial picture more “accessible” to audiences. Sheinberg’s intention was to trim the 142-minute cut and release a 94-minute “Love Conquers All” version, wherein everyone lives happily ever after. Not Gilliam’s intended thesis for the picture, the happy ending was a slap in the face. In several meetings, Gilliam shot back, insisting that if Sheinberg wanted to make cuts, Sheinberg should place his own name on the film and remove Gilliam’s. After several dramatic phone calls with Sheinberg on the fate of Brazil, Gilliam declared war: On one side, artistic integrity, and on the other, a producer looking to “spare” audiences a bleak message and hopefully sell a few more movie tickets.

Gilliam’s intention was to rally support, knowing that if his story became public, undoubtedly sympathy would reside with the David of the story (and hopefully demonize the Goliath). Gilliam attempted to show critics his version of the film, but was denied approval by Universal to show screenings of the 142-minute version. Gilliam, on a rebellious whim, took out a full page add in Variety that simply read:
Dear Sid Sheinberg,
When are you going to release my film,
BRAZIL?

Terry Gilliam.

A move both bold and against traditional hush-hush Hollywood politics, the fate of Brazil instantly became public interest. Robert De Niro, who does not traditionally give television interviews, agreed to get on the talk show circuit with Gilliam—with De Niro using his own celebrity as a means for Gilliam to speak out against the proposed rape of his vision. The message was clear: Gilliam wanted blood. The director refused to back down and confronted Sheinberg with what was later called “Guerilla Tactics”; Sheinberg went as far as to say, ironically, that Gilliam saw himself as one of the terrorists in Brazil (forgetting that we never actually see a terrorist in the film).

Suddenly, a small revolution began to take place. Los Angeles college campuses arranged lectures and subversive screenings of Gilliam’s cut; the film developed an underground rallying movement by which those passionate about artistic freedom had something to stand up for. And why not? Gilliam was justified in fighting for his film.

The breaker came when the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, after seeing the picture in a covert screening, announced that Terry Gilliam’s cut of Brazil was the winner of their Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay awards. Universal took the hint and Gilliam’s cut was released. Though the film’s reviews remained mixed around the U.S., audiences were allowed to view Gilliam’s 142-minute cut. Helping the film along, the L.A. Film Critics proved that those who write about film can also influence the industry, exposing the world to one of the most original pieces of cinema ever released.

Public response garnered what many expected: audiences looking for sheer entertainment were confused (some described Brazil as “cinematic rape” of the senses, according to Gilliam), while thinking-film audiences revered the picture for its layers, social commentary, and cinematic beauty. Nominated for two Oscars including Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Art & Set Decoration, off-screen, the movie became a success story, mirroring the conflict in the film’s narrative (excluding the conclusion).

Save for Brazil and Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane, production battles in Hollywood, sadly, rarely end positively. The artist and director, the David, constantly encounters a Goliath-sized executive sitting behind a desk, attempting to dictate artistic vision by way of profit, salability, or risk to the executive’s reputation. Gilliam had Sheinberg; Welles had William Randolph Hearst.

Welles’s Citizen Kane, oft-noted as “the best film ever made”, loosely models the life of newspaper giant William Randolph Hearst (and other tycoons of the period, including Howard Hughes and Samuel Insull). Noted for his use of yellow journalism tactics to sell papers, Hearst was one of the most powerful and eccentric (as the super-rich often are) people in America during the 1930’s. But defining Hearst’s reputation as eccentric is an understatement. Welles formulated the film’s newspaper mogul Charles Foster Kane with bits and pieces of Hearst’s life: Kane’s mansion Xanadu played off Hearst’s own castle in San Simeon, CA; Kane’s cradle-robbed wife echoed Marion Davies, Hearst’s mistress thirty years his younger; and the name for Kane’s sled, Rosebud, came from Hearst’s pet name for Davies’s clitoris. Needless to say, when Hearst heard of these rumors, he did everything in his power to stop the production on Welles’ movie. Hearst offered RKO pictures near a million dollars to destroy all prints of the picture, and put pressure on the bosses of RKO and the other studios, threatening to expose their Jewish heritage to the media. Despite Hearst’s power, Citizen Kane was released, though without the needed advertising any other studio picture might have received in Hearst’s papers. Citizen Kane failed at the box office and lost the Best Picture Oscar that year to How Green Was My Valley, but it was revisited over the years by critics and film historians, and now is viewed by many as the best piece of filmmaking in movie history.

Welles, like Gilliam, dealt with outside influences attempting to infiltrate his art throughout his entire career. Citizen Kane was the director’s only success story. The Lady from Shanghai, Mr. Arkadin, and most notably The Magnificent Ambersons and Touch of Evil—all masterpieces—were either reedited without Welles’ permission, had crucial footage burned by crazed executives, or were released in a form not approved of by Welles. In the end, the director walked away with only one complete success released in his chosen structure; the rest of his career, he was, in one way or another, defeated by The System.

Akin to Citizen Kane, Brazil was the first in a line of troubled productions for its director. For Gilliam, next came the fantastical The Adventures of Baron Munchausen in 1988. Munchausen’s production went exceedingly (and notoriously) over budget, had problems with a pirating producer, could not find ample shooting locations, and was almost shut down on several occasions due to the excessive reaches of the director’s vision. Eventually, the film was released and the result was an artistic, but not commercial success.

His next few productions, including The Fisher King and 12 Monkeys, progressed without problems. And though during the filming of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Gilliam was confronted with a few minor budget and screenwriting disputes, nothing could compare to the monumental disaster of his next production:

Gilliam’s most painful Wellesian blow came during the production of his unfinished film The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, whose collapsed production is detailed in the documentary Lost in La Mancha (directed by Fulton and Pepe). Quixote was set to star Johnny Depp, who worked with Gilliam on Fear and Loathing. The busy actor had scheduling issues; the weather was painfully uncooperative; their exterior locations were situated near an intolerably loud NATO base; the film’s Don Quixote had a herniated disc; and the European-funded budget was drastically cut—all of this in the course of a few weeks, which made filming the picture an economic impossibility. Production was cancelled and the picture was never made. Luck and The System were not on Gilliam’s side; like several unfinished Welles films (including Welles’ own Don Quixote production), Gilliam had no choice but to halt because of greater issues.

Lost in La Mancha helps illustrate how the stigma attached to Gilliam is, in some cases, unjust, as he cannot be blamed for Quixote’s setbacks. It also brings attention to the failed project, creating high demand for a finished product. Today, Gilliam’s fight for The Man Who Killed Don Quixote goes on: he has the support of Johnny Depp, now a much greater star than he was a few years ago, but has yet to once again secure the financial backing to attempt another production.

After the Don Quixote failure, Gilliam moved on and eventually signed to direct The Brothers Grimm with a massive $80 million budget to play with. Still, producers Bob and Harvey Weinstein refused to give Gilliam the actress he wanted (Gilliam reportedly wanted the versatile Samantha Morton, but the Weinstein Brothers insisted on Monica Belluci for her sex appeal), the effects he needed, and the final cut he demanded. Eventually, Gilliam left the picture before post-production finished to freely film Tideland, a critical failure and otherwise bizarre film. He returned to The Brothers Grimm to lazily complete post-production, no longer caring about the completed product (which is clear upon viewing).

Brazil represents the singular example of Gilliam fighting The System and coming out on top. In each of the aforesaid cases, the director sacrificed something, be it a piece of the film or of himself, to release a product not entirely his vision. With Brazil, Gilliam’s fight represents a Citizen Kane-type victory; the film succeeded, untouched by the studio, regardless of the attempted tampering, restructuring, and censoring of its message and length. The dream prevailed.

The triumph of dreams over reality is a reoccurring theme in Gilliam films. Brazil is the second picture in what Gilliam has off-and-on referred to as his “Dream Trilogy”—a free grouping of Time Bandits, Brazil, and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. Each film’s main character struggles to reconcile the importance of dreams over day-to-day banality. In Time Bandits, a child escapes from his parents’ house, rotten with technology, into the adventuresome possibilities of history; in Brazil, a middle-aged man escapes reality by way of dreams, substantiates them in reality, and then finds the two cannot coexist; in The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, an elderly romantic finds his tall tales are too imaginative and unrealistic for the Age of Reason. In each film the dreamer is overwhelmed by close-mindedness, astute rationality, and apathetic dogmatism—in other words, reality.

Like many of Gilliam's films, Brazil is a dramatic tragedy: the protagonist loses his battle. Gilliam illustrates the sad truth that to dream of bringing down or breaking free of The System is hopeless; he even goes so far as to affirm that dreaming begets punishment. A reality of life is that though we fight unjust structures of authority, they usually win. While this can be considered a defeatist position, it is more often than not the truth.

Brazil, the Citizen Kane of the latter twentieth century, is the ultimate in fatalistic film. It challenges set parameters and the organization built up to keep the individual down; in that, it exposes The System's faults through wry humor, expressive visuals, and defiant social commentary. Gilliam’s feelings in 1985 are perfectly exemplified: the production’s real-life villainesque studio executive was tantamount to the film’s Ministry of Information; Sam Lowry reflects Gilliam’s own quixotic, self-destructive nature. Moreover, the picture begins Gilliam’s continued personal and professional hardship at filming his dreams.

Both Sam Lowry and Terry Gilliam attempt to rebel against any stoic acceptance of dispassion and bureaucracy; their battle is one of imagination, possibility, and hope. The film itself is ironically more realistic: Brazil understands the need for escape when one is suppressed by the world's monotony. But it also acknowledges the fatalism of humanist ideals. They are, after all, ideals—by definition, unreachable.