Satire: the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.
1. So...what do you think the movie is offering as a solution to the problem? Now that you have seen the whole film, you can talk even more specifically about what the movie wishes to change in the context of how it proposes to change whatever ill or problem it is addressing.
2. Our conversation in class today was mostly about the world today (going back maybe 30 some years) and how Brazil connects to our world. So what do you find most timely or contemporary about the movie? Really try to not repeat what others say: please, all of you present as many different views as you can about the timeliness of this wild movie.
Finally: a scene from the 1984 film 1984, which provides us a possibility of what is done to Sam Lowry by his best friend Jack.
1. The greatest problem in this film are the lies. The lies the “government” tells. The lies the departments tell. The lies leaders tell themselves. All of it leads to major mistakes and unnecessary paperwork. The solution provided is simple really, stop trying to control everything and everyone. Let things run smoothly. We, as humans, are constantly trying to fix things that aren’t broken. That’s clearly a very large theme within this film. I believe that the writer was trying to expose and enforce this idea.
ReplyDelete2. Was this film timely? 100%. The amount of unnecessary red tape is utterly ridiculous. There is so so much paperwork, but in reality, what does it accomplish? Our government creates checks and balances which I’m grateful for of course, but if opposing parties are involved, it can make it very hard to actually get anything done. Our government makes mistakes because they’re human. But rather than publicly apologize and admit fault, they try to hide the problem, cover it up, or throw money at it.
1.) The problem that Brazil addresses is that having too much gov control is bad. Especially if the system invades your privacy. It is also crazy to not address human errors because our mistakes can be dangerous but also helping us not make them again. Because Brazil doesn't address human error, they make the same mistakes, and do the same actions over and over again. Furthermore, they prosper off of human fear and safety by creating these attacks or better yet, acknowledging that attacks can occur. The solution is probably in their messed up actions. It told us to not do the things that they did in the movie. I didn't see many alternatives but it gave us time to think.
ReplyDelete2.) I find that mass hysteria or people's highly gullible personalities is the most timely. People assumptions and stick with the first thing that comes to mind when they see an event/object. The people in charge didn't bother to check twice on the name and Lowry's mother didn't skip a beat to make herself younger. Also, dependence on technology and efficiency will make us go crazy. We become too reliant and soon won't be able to do things ourselves. The ending was amazing. It was satirical putting up a happy ending when realistically he was going to be tortured. Ex Machina's aren't real ad the movie shows that point. It also points out that those closest to you can betray you or won't stand with you in your cause. Many times, the hero dies an untimely death trying to do something right.
1. The problem presented by the show is the attempts by governments to cover up their mistakes, and how they go into a panic if there is a mistake. The solution is, even when governments are not in a good situation, is to not cause a distraction that will get the populous to forget any mistakes that might have been made. Starting something else will just mean that there are two problems that the government faces.
ReplyDelete2. This movie is definitely timely. Government were still creating distactions that would get the people’s attention when the movie was made, and they still are doing it now. The battle between Great Britain and Argentina over the Falkland Islands had only happened three years before the release of the movie, in which the dictator of Argentina had invaded to distract the people over his undemocratic rise to power. Governments in the future were still doing it (invasion of Iraq), and they will continue to created distractions.
1. I honestly did not see much of a feasible solution in the end of the film. Ultimately Sam loses, and he is mentally broken. In this way, however, the solution is that there isn't one and that the only escape is to live through ones mind. I think the movie is pushing for change by not having a solution because while this world is exaggerated, it is saying that if humans go as far as the people in the movie, there will be no way to stop the obsession with technology and the repercussions of pointless government paperwork and structure. The movie proposes change by showing the extreme of society and how terrible it would be if we got to that point.
ReplyDelete2. One of the most timely aspects of this movie for me is the unnecessary paperwork, this is because today, everything is so regulated and politicized that the government is unable to help a lot of people because of rules and incorrect of insufficient paperwork. Nothing in "Brazil" was functional, which can be seen today in government and technology. Another timely aspect of the movie is the terrorist attacks, because people are so used to them and view them as an inconvenience. Similarly in modern day, shootings and mass murders are part of peoples daily routines when watching the news to the point where people become numb to those events.
The problem is the over controlling and prideful government in this movie. They kill off people regularly as punishment banking on the fact that there is no fault in their system, leaving no room for the human error that is bound to happen. When it comes to a solution, simply saying don't do those things doesn't seem like a viable option. The government will be controlling over their people no matter what. The real question is how do we keep people in check without taking away their freedoms? I didn’t find myself seeing a solution amongst the chaos and it seems to me the best way to have any change is by having those in government expose the truth behind how they control their citizens as Sam Lowry tries a bit. Then again, most of his actions were just to get the girl so maybe there isn’t much nope after all, and also the going mentally insane part of the whole thing.
ReplyDeleteThis movie is of course still timely. There are governments all around the world that practice the same ideals as Brazil’s government when it comes to ultimate control. One of the biggest examples of control can be shown by following the money and how a bit too big size of the money made by countries go to the government in certain countries, making them in control of everything in the market, We see examples of the government taking control of the market, be in cahoots with gangs to gain everlasting control, and meddle in with elections for that same control. This control comes with fear from the people, a similar one to that of a big brother watching down and the paranoia that comes with that.
The problem I discerned while watching was an abusive and overbearing government. I don’t believe that Brazil shows an exact solution to pulling apart the government as it won in the end. However, the protestation against the ministerial system all came from individual people who had been alienated in some way by this ridiculously flawed authority, so I think I the movie was highlighting the power of counterculture, or the reaction to a previous system. As more people like Sam and Barbara realize the inadequacy of their governing force, it will eventually fall apart and allow them to start anew.
ReplyDeleteIn terms of what the director intended this movie to portray, I would assume that the radical counterculture that was still strong in the film industry during the 80s wouldn’t stress this now more politically conservative belief that reducing the government is better, but as far as the message goes, I think that what is most applicable to America today is the danger of useless bureaucracy clogging an otherwise healthy system of authority. Shown with the useless forms and unhealthy competition between ministries, the government in Brazil constantly fails and makes mistakes, and it warns us not to get caught up in unimportant rivalries and partisanship, and instead work together to achieve a common goal.
I'm not entirely sure that the movie offers a solution to the fear of an overbearing government. In a way, this movie could be seen as a warning, which is a certain kind of solution. I think the directors are trying to convey the dangers of a society where the government can control every aspect of life. In this movie, no one really knew what was going on. There was a lack of truth, in regards to everyday life. It's possible that the directors are placing value in this truth, and acknowledging that we are heading in a direction where that will be lost.
ReplyDeleteSimilarly to what I said above, I think the concern that our government and society turns out like the one in Brazil, is most timely. Recently, there has been an idea that the government is responsible to fix every issue for everyone. People want more government programs, which ends up leading to one centralized power. Brazil is obviously an extreme example of this kind of corruption; however, it is plausible for a government to end up like this. I think it's important to be aware of the detriments of one centralized power, and make sure that our country does not end up like that.
I think the problem presented by the movie was having a controlling and secretive government can result in extreme distrust in the community. The solution to this problem was to have people rebel against the government by trying to help the community. Since the government is so overbearing, this solution was affective because they were revisiting the government without directly attacking it. This shows that the movie is trying to change the lack of trust in the members of the community. It is also proposing that people should rebel against a government that restricts their “natural rights.”
ReplyDeleteI think that this movie is very timely. It connects to our world today by exaggerating the measures the government takes to have control. I also think it shows how people are gullible and will believe things that are highly unrealistic. The movie shows this with the terrorist attacks. The people are so convinced that the terrorist attacks are a threat to them that they do not stop to think of whether they are actually real.
1. On the last blog, I wrote about how I thought the movie was trying to expose automatronization. After finishing the movie, there are a couple more scenes that could relate to this idea. The clip where the bodies are moved in as their crimes are read aloud is particularly haunting to me- the viewer does not actually even get to see the punished. Instead, we merely see their shadows on the clinically bare, shadowed walls of the holding rooms. The cinematography itself deprives the accused of an interaction with the audience. Just as the department employees wish to dehumanize their victims, the frame at which the viewer sees these accused victims is only a shadow- merely the recognition that the person takes up space, but no more than that. Someone mentioned this in class- it was almost as if the accused were merely pieces of machinery on a factory procession line. They were moved in, stopped, the department employees said their crimes, then the next body-bagged accused comes in. There is no emotion or recognition, just the shadow of the accused and the banal, expressionless words of the department employee reading a piece of paper. No one portrays fear, pain, guilt, or sorrow.... except for Sam. We see him suffer in his cell and beg Jack to spare him. Though he suffers profoundly at this moment, the next scene is one in which he is rescued and executes his personal view of revenge (is blowing up the Department really the best way to exact retribution, Sam?). In a perfect end to this cinematic circle, Sam is rescued by Jill in the same house that he previously dropped from her rig to stop the police. And at the end of this scene, we see Sam finally at peace with Jill in a land flourishing and plentiful with nature. Even their natural surroundings have become the opposite of the waste land portrayed when they had driven down the freeway into the city. But alas, Sam is only dreaming, and the movie ends with his tortured body sitting limp in a chair. Though his reality is disheartening and contrary to what the audience expected, Sam’s little smile in the last clip suggests that he is finally happy. Sam has finally escaped the automated society he lived in, a society in which people lived on top of each other, constantly bombarded with slogans and threats. No one necessarily seemed to live in fear of the police, but they also didn’t try to resist the society pushed onto them. As we discussed in class, if the ducts represent the human body’s intestines, this meaning for the movie holds up. Many of our bodily processes are involuntary- we do not have to focus on our heartbeats, our breaths, the digestion of our food. All of these processes continue without our conscious thought. And though this is helpful at times, when the body is corrupted with disease, these normally beneficial processes turn dangerous. Cancers are allowed to spread by appearing as normal cells, parasites move in and convince the tissues around it to supply it with food, not its host. But we often aren’t aware of these dangerous process for some time, because until we really focus on what is wrong, the ailments that seemed to appear minor are much more dangerous than what we feared. The same is true for the society in the film; yes, the government is horribly corrupt and invades every household in the city. But no one outwardly shows this- people continue on at dinner, never stopping to consider the fact that a bomb exploded mere feet from their table. Until Sam enters and stops the continuous, mindless procession of the papers, the horror of the society may not have been revealed. But Sam is caught in the end, and his dream is only a dream. The vision that he wants for himself is not real, and is only the result of torture enacted upon him by a previous friend. But his dream allows him to find a new world, a lush, beautiful world where he and Jill can be happy.
ReplyDelete(cont.) So the real world is never changed, and Sam’s reveal of the truth behind Mr. Buttle’s death has no impact on those around him. So what is the solution to the problem of this automated society? If Sam’s only solution was a dream induced by torture, then is this a solution? I believe that it is (Not the torture! His dream is the solution). The cliché of following one’s dream is used so often, but Sam’s perseverance to reach Jill in real life is continued, even escalated, in his dream. And it sets him apart from the society. He no longer has to share a table with another employee, his name is more than just a number assigned to him, and the earth itself is recovered from the horrors bestowed onto it. So if the movie is exposing the concerns of an automated society, then the answer to its satire lies in Sam’s removal from the protocol and system. Maybe the solution is to dream your perfect reality until one day, you are able to achieve it. Though Sam wasn’t really able to live his dream in conscious, real life, in his own lost-sanity way, he was able to. Sam’s “happily ever after” (again, so very cliché) did come true.
ReplyDelete2. Again, the automated society in the film, in my opinion, is just as apparent now as it was then. This automation reminded me of the time after WWII. Following WWII and the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Americans began to realize that science may not always have the best interests of humanity in mind. In the years since, historians have begun to study this, especially as it concerns to the conundrum that the American public had participated in the building of the bomb without actually realizing what they were involved in. The soldiers on board the Enola Gay even claimed that they were acting on orders, and that their involvement was not their own choice. The American people began to realize that the little roles of Americans in the wartime effort- jobs that were often never truthfully portrayed to employees- culminated in the production of bombs that killed innocent civilians. All this was accomplished by the automatronization of American society. The factory metaphor was used here as well- American employees adding their bit to the bomb, never seeing the end product until it was off the conveyor line and in the headlines. And as we discussed in class, the information age arrived not too many years afterwards, a time where the sheer possibility of electronics shadowed the damage that could be caused by the power of the machines. People can post one opinion of theirs without ever seeing where that comment ends up. And I believe that this mentality is just as evident now as it was in the past. As Brazil portrayed, most of the government employees never stopped to consider the consequences of their actions. The man at the start of the film, so intent on the fly, didn’t realize that the bug’s fallen body caused the Tuttle-Buttle typo. If he’d stopped to review his papers- papers printed off independent from his command- he might have realized the severity of his error. But he didn’t. And maybe his actions weren’t the sole cause of Mr. Buttle's death. Maybe his supervisors could have reviewed the papers as well. Obviously, no one was actually familiar with the case enough to realize that Mr. Buttle was in fact not the Mr. Tuttle they wanted to find. And I believe that this mindset is reflected in today’s society, just as it was in the 1940s and the 1970s. I see the continued effect in technology, but I also see this automation in the military. As we discussed in class, the war following 9/11 had no factual basis. The public was told lies and years of torturous warfare have occured since then. Personally, I don’t and couldn’t ever condone the mass destruction of our military, along with other militaries. The terrible deaths of civilians that come out of air raids on cities are nothing less than pure horror, and I can’t see past these casualties, even if the US proclaims that the air raid was in an effort to stop the enemy forces. To me, the bottom line is that innocent people were targeted, even if their deaths were unintentional. This is my opinion, and I understand that it’s not everyone’s. But I do fear that warfare could get worse as people begin to lose their focus on its destruction. Many people have suggested that drones could one day deploy bombs on cities, eliminating the need for bomber planes flown by humans. And as Donna Ellwood says (much appreciation to her for her Stealing Fire class), this allows an immensely dangerous weapon to be used without the judgement of humanity involved. This is frightening to me: automated technology, unable to understand pain or injustice, could one day produce the weapons possible of death. How can the end of someone’s life ever be determined by a piece of technology that is unable to have remorse or guilt? So Brazil’s presentation of a society where no one stops to consider the consequences of their actions sounds all too similar to the society we have now, and the society we may one day be a part of.
ReplyDelete1 The problem presented in this movie is the control that the government holds over us. The government controls a lot of what we do even if we do not know it. This movie is also pointing to how little the government actually helps better society. The more dependent we get with electronics the more control the government can have on us.
ReplyDelete2 This movie is just getting more real, and true as time moves forward. we are in a digital age which connects us to all around us, like the ducts shown in the movie. as long as the government has the amount of control it has now this movie will always be prominent.
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ReplyDelete1. To be honest I don’t believe that this movie offers an actual solution to the problem of the government having to much control over us. The movie definitely makes the problem obvious, as we see with almost everyone in the film feel the pressures of the government, wether its the overbearing amount of paperwork or the fear of being arrested and tortured, but we are never given an actual solution to solving this problem.
ReplyDelete2. I think that this movie gets more real and more relevant as time goes on. I think that the movie really connects to modern day when we see how afraid people are of the government and the punishments for betraying the government. Also i think surveillance by the government in the film is very much like today. We are so use to other countries governments and our own watching us and surveilling what we do that we are use to it, even though it takes a part of our freedom away.