| | | The Criterion Collection.
Features: DVD, Widescreen
Pitting the imagination of common man Sam Lowry against the oppressive storm troopers of the Ministry of Information, this bitter parable for the Information Age has come to be regarded as an anti-totalitarian cautionary tale equal to the works of George orwell, Aldous Huxley, and Kurt Vonnegut. Gathering footage from both the European and American versions of his celebrated masterpiece, Terry Gilliam has assembled the ultimate 142-minute director's cut of Brazil - now in a gorgeously remastered new transfer.System Requirements:Running Time: 142 MinutesFormat: DVD MOVIE
"...a remarkable accomplishment...satirical and cautionary impulses work beautifully together." Janet Maslin, The New York Times
"Contains some of the most clever lines ever." Ted Prigge, Rec.Arts.Movies. Reviews
"A stunning achievement!" The Village Voice
"...a remarkable accomplishment...satirical and cautionary impulses work beautifully together." "Janet Maslin, The New York Times"
"Contains some of the most clever lines ever." "Ted Prigge, Rec.Arts.Movies. Reviews"
Editor's Note
BRAZIL is Terry Gilliam's masterpiece. Cowritten by Gilliam, playwright Tom Stoppard, and Charles McKeown, the cult-favorite film is set in a futuristic society laden with red tape and bureaucracy. When a bug (literally) gets in the system, an innocent man is killed, leading mild-mannered Sam Lowry (an excellent Jonathan Pryce) to reexamine what he wants out of life. He decides to fight the totalitarian system in his search for freedom--and the woman he loves. The terrific, offbeat cast features Robert De Niro as a renegade heating engineer; Katherine Helmond as Sam's ever-younger mother; Michael Palin as a government-sanctioned torturer with a distaste for upsetting the status quo; Bob Hoskins as a vengeful Central Services employee; Jim Broadbent as a wacko plastic surgeon; the wonderful Ian Holm as Sam's nerve-ridden, pitiful boss, afraid of his own signature; and Kim Greist as the rebel Sam falls for. The look of BRAZIL is relentless, overwhelming, and outrageously spectacular. Giant monoliths rise from the street; government offices are a network of computers, pneumatic tubes, and narrow hallways built with Nazi-like precision; and apartment complexes are a maze of washed-out grays and numbers, all frighteningly uniform. The terrorist explosions actually bring color into this dull, monochramatic world. BRAZIL is a nightmare vision of the future, yet also hysterically funny and incisive, one of the most inventive, influential, and important films of the 1980s.
Plot Summary
In this darkly comic view of the coming future, bureaucratic cog Sam Lowry dreams of escaping the totalitarian machine that society has become. He fantasizes about joining a beautiful woman flying through the clouds, far away from this world. One day he glimpses a female truck driver who resembles his fantasy and he attempts to win her love--but he ends up being dragged into the underworld of antigovernment terrorists and radicals. Terry Gilliam's vision, both expensive and expansive, resulted in a battle with studio executives over the lack of commercial potential of the darkly humorous, but often grim, material that was reedited for theatrical release without the director's approval.
| Features | 94-Minute Love Conquers All Version | | All-New, Restored High-Definition Digital Transfer | | Audio Commentary By Terry Gilliam | | Audio Essay By Journalist David Morgan | | Audio: English Dolby Digital Stereo | | Essay By Jack Mathews | | Featurettes: What Is Brazil? & The Battle Of Brazil: A Video History | | Interactive Menus | | Original Theatrical Trailer | | Raw & Behind-The-Scenes Footage | | Scene Selection | | Storyboards, Drawings & Publicity/Production Stills | | Subtitles: English | | Video Interviews With The Production Team |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: Image |
| Release Date: 9/5/2006 |
| Running Time: 142 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 1985 | | Catalog ID: 163 | | UPC: 00715515018029 | | Number of Discs: 3 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English | | Available Subtitles: English | | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1 |
| Cast & Crew
| Awards |
Winner (1986) | | | British Academy Awards, Norman Garwood, Best Production Design | | | British Academy Awards, George Gibbs, Richard Conway, Best Special Visual Effects | |
Nominee (1986) | | | Oscar, Norman Garwood, et. al., Best Art Direction-Set Decoration | | | Oscar, Terry Gilliam, et. al., Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen |
| Memorable Quotes| "Have a nice day. This has not been a recording."----Central Services phone operator to Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) | | "You can't make a move without a form."----Harry Tuttle (Robert De Niro) to Sam |
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| | Professional Reviews | Rolling Stone
"...Gilliam creates this dehumanizing universe with demented wit, sane anger and the most eye-popping visuals since METROPOLIS..." 12/14/1998 [/23Entertainment Weekly
"...Landmark retro-future tragicomedy..." -- Rating: A 11/15/1996 p.85 New York Times
"...BRAZIL, a jaunty, wittily observed vision of an extremely bleak future, is a superb example of the power of comedy to underscore serious ideas, even solemn ones....Ambitious visual style..." 12/18/1985 p.C22 Los Angeles Times
"...It's a knockout..." 06/10/1992 p.F7 Total Film
"...It's rich in irony, steeped in surrealism and touched with genius....Easily one of the greatest movies of the '80s..." 07/01/2003 p.129 Sight and Sound
"...Hugely inventive..." 08/01/2003 p.66 DVD Verdict 10 of 10
"Brazil is nothing less than a magnum opus, one that speaks from the screen, and from its place in the history of cinema. Never before have so many professional lives been touched, talked about, and taunted than with Terry Gilliam's personal artistic tantrum. When removed from its controversy and boiled down to its basics, Brazil is a film unlike any other, an original vision of the world, albeit one filled with paranoia, pathos, and dread. The acting is stellar, each role here filled by talented individuals completely in tune with the director's vision. It's a shame that Jonathan Pryce didn't catapult into superstardom on the power from his performance." - Bill Gibron
Reel.com 9 of 10
"The film is awash in special effects, fascinating imagery, and brilliant moments. For me, however, Brazil is so crowded and chaotic that it's difficult to engage with. Instead of being interested in Sam Lowry's predicament or horrified at the Kafkaesque world he inhabits, I find myself admiring the amazing tangle of ducts and tubes that dangle from Lowry's ceiling when the electricity in his apartment goes on the fritz, or checking out the various slogans that pop up on walls or on televisions throughout the film. The film's fans claim that these elements are what make Brazil great. For me, however, the film remains an undisciplined hodgepodge with moments of greatness." - Rod Armstrong
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