It was a pure joy to witness fellow MONTY PYTHON member and all round wacky movie visionary Terry Gilliam at Londons National Film Theatre last weekend. He was there for a pre-screening intro and Q&A on his financially draining but critically rewarding 1985 cult fantasy masterpiece BRAZIL. Although now 68 and donning an indistinguishable and instantly ageing grey goaty - making him closer resemble a cross between Jack Elam and a later year Orson Welles than the youthful bohemian giant we have come to respect- as soon as those drawn out Minnesotan tones were heard it was categorically clear this wasn't some old impostor. Taking the words out of my mouth someone quibbled him on his preference of actor, to which he acknowledged that he preferred classically trained Brits (hence the likes of Johnathan Pryce et al) over method madness, (he didn't mention names but I sensed he was recalling De Niro here). He likes the way stage trained Brits can have a laugh and switch from cracking a joke to getting into character in a heartbeat. Gilliam was clearly in his element when quizzed about his hearty feuds with producers. At one point his mobile unexpectedly rang to which he joked that it could be fate bringing him the financial rewards to greenlight his next project! One wonders whether after so many years of battling with financiers he actually really enjoys the strenuous challenge to get his movies made. After all it wouldn't be half as much fun if they just throw the money at him and let him do as he pleases. Unfortunately no one had the chance (at least not me) to quiz Gilliam on his two collaborations with the late Heath Ledger, which included the heavily studio mangled THE BROTHERS GRIMM and the actor's final but unfinished project THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS, where his role has been posthumously split between four other actors. Shame as you could sense that being such an actor's director he would undoubtedly have had shed some positive insight on what it was like to work with the tragic figure. Also it would have been nice to have gotten an update on his continuously ill-fated THE MAN WHO KILLED DON QUIXOTE, whose trials and tribulations made splendid heartwarming documentary material for LOST IN LA MANCHA. And now onto the BRAZIL screening itself... Although the plot noticeably run out of steam about half way through its duration, BRAZIL still stood up well as a delightfully surreal and wacky critique on a dystopian bureaucratic future - which is bizarrely overrun by intestinal air ducts and intrusive technology. Gilliam claims the aesthetics were inspired from when he came to England and noticed that the beautiful concepts of the Regency buildings had been sacrificed for toilet pipes running through the exterior design. That 'violation of an aesthetic for the sake of the mod cons' got his goat up and this ridiculous visual catastrophe dominates the technocratic vista in the movie. Of course BRAZIL is another take on George Orwell's 1984 and the 'Big Brother' concept, following the more serious and sterile Michael Radford film, and also works on a haunting level of claustrophobic totalitarian intrusion laced with that stylistic trademark Python humour, in addition to working as a persuasive social satire on the burden of consumerism. For anyone who doesn't know the plot concerns daydreaming file clerk Sam Lowry (played by a never better Jonathan Pryce) who has to do battle with the bureaucratic 'Ministry of Information' in which he works, in order to locate the girl of his dreams. The film is wonderfully supported by an array of British character talent including the likes of Ian Holm, Peter Vaughan, Michael Palin, Ian Richardson and Bob Hoskins in addition to the likes of Robert De Niro popping up for a wonderfully offbeat performance as a subversive plumber. What works to a lesser degree seems to be the romance between Lowry and Jill Layton (Kim Griest), which appears a little forced and trite (perhaps the point?) and some of the humour does sometimes fall flat in places. But all this doesn't deter from the beauty of the performances, the creative expanse of the world Gilliam has created (posters nicely reinforce the futuristic nightmare), the brilliantly realised if overly long fantasy sequences, (that witness a heroic free-soaring Lowry take on a monstrous axe-wielding metallic giant) and that audacious but beautifully poetic downbeat ending, which Gilliam fought hard for but which the studios dismissed instantly as incomprehensible. The newly hired studio head at Universal refused to distribute the film if the ending wasnt romantically tinkered, (something that Gilliam protested at all costs after an unfaithful happy ending ruined the conclusion ofone of his favourite films: BLADE RUNNER), but the director stuck to his guns and the film was eventually released to critical applause. Gilliam claimed in his introductory talk that the film was a result of his own burning outrage of the world around him, how it suffocated him to the point of exhaustion and how difficult it is to break free from rigid bureaucracy, which is evident in how he in turn suffered to regain control of his own movie under severe formalities. Unfortunately Gilliam couldn't sit in during the screening but he apologised for this as he had to rush to attend his daughter's birthday bash, it was nice however, to be within this spendid man's company for a time. BRAZIL is indeed always a film that is ripe for reappraisal and one that is arguably better understood and even more cinematically apt in today's erratic and unstable climate. Some would say it is the director's finest work, whats certain is that it is indeed his most personal.
