Alien: Romulus--back to basics

It's not often these days that I buy a movie ticket to the premiere of a new movie, but I did so recently so that I could attend the first showing (last night) of the new Alien film--Alien: Romulus. I chose to watch it in ScreenX format, which simply means that the screen extends to the walls on both sides of the theater, about halfway up on each side. I wasn't impressed with this format, and interestingly enough, it 'disappeared' about a third of the way into the film. It's simply irritating and added nothing to the movie, which was very good, by the way. I give it four out of five stars. It's a non-stop roller coaster ride into an alien universe that is neither friendly nor habitable for human beings. It's simply a fight for survival by humans and aliens alike. And most of the time, the aliens win. 

The film takes us back to what made the original Alien films (Alien from 1979 and Aliens from 1986) so good. Those films were sci-fi horror at its best. The original Alien film was marketed with the tagline 'In space, no one can hear you scream'. The new film pays homage to these films while finding new ground; the xenomorph monsters in this film are essentially the same as in the original films (with one exception)--murderous and bent on survival at all costs, with corrosive acid for blood and the ability to prey on humans for food and for reproduction. They have a multi-stage life cycle, exhibit hive-like characteristics in terms of how they develop and live, and are fairly intelligent. In short, you don't want to mess with them. But the humans in all these films have no other choice, usually at their peril. 

The overall story is simple enough; a group of young people leave the slave-like working conditions on the perpetually dark planet they live on (Weyland-Yutani's Jackson’s Star mining colony) for a better life on the planet Yvaga III where the sun shines. In order to accomplish this, they need cryosleep chambers that will make the nine-year trip possible. They end up stealing these from a decommissioned space station that was actually a research station, now deserted, that was studying the aliens. Of course we know that this space station is not deserted, but rather inhabited by the xenomorphs, who have killed all the humans on board. I won't divulge the last part of the film or the ending, but suffice it to say that the director, Fede Alvarez, has done a great job of providing non-stop action and scares. The ending didn't really open for a sequel as far as I could determine, which is probably just as well. This film stands on its own as one of the best new entries into the repertoire of Alien films. 

The Kashmir Files

There are some films that will haunt you for the rest of your life. The Kashmir Files is one of them. I saw it last night with a friend who happens to be from India. She did not know the story of the 1990 exodus of the Kashmir Pandits, which is what the film is about, but she had heard that the film was very good. She invited me to join her and her family and friends to go and see the movie. We have previously talked about going to see an Indian Bollywood film together with some of our other friends, a group of women who happen to be former colleagues, and we will do that at some point. But last night's film was not a happy Bollywood film. 

The Kashmir Files is a Hindi-language drama film (with English subtitles) based on real-life stories of the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits during the Kashmir Insurgency. It was written and directed by Vivek Agnihotri and was released in March of this year. It has done very well at the Indian box office and it will be interesting to see how well it does globally. The film has been criticized for promoting anti-Muslim sentiment due to the brutality of the extremist Muslim insurgents against the Kashmiri Pandits. If you want to read about the film you can do so here: The Kashmir Files - Wikipedia. What I have understood is that the insurgents butchered not only the Kashmiri Pandits but also moderate Muslims and other religious groups. Their aim was to free Kashmir from India and to make it a Muslim state; their motto was 'convert, leave, or die'. In the film, the young male university student named Krishna Pandit (played by Darshan Kumaar) learns what happened to his parents and brother at the hands of the insurgents; he has not been told the truth by his grandfather who raised him. His speech at the end of the film to his fellow university students was electrifying. He tells the story of what he has learned about what happened in Kashmir after going there to spread his grandfather's ashes together with his grandfather's old friends, which leads to estrangement from his professor Radhika Menon (played by Pallavi Joshi) who has pushed him to front the new separatist movement. All the actors and actresses in this film delivered excellent performances.  

I leave the political discussions for the experts. I cannot comment on the history or the events of 1990 in Kashmir; I know very little about Indian history. But it struck me once again how much evil is committed in the name of religious sentiment. Religion has been the reason for many of the wars up through history and for the ensuing brutality. After seeing this film, I asked, why? Why can't we live in peace, coexist peacefully with each other? I firmly believe that most people want to do just that. Why can't we worship as we please without preaching and subduing others who believe differently? If you believe in several gods and I believe in one, so be it. We are different. I have no right to tell you that my beliefs are better than yours, nor do you have any right to tell me that yours are better than mine. I am not the sole possessor of truth in this life and neither are you. It is more important to me that we should live peacefully together. But I see that many political leaders do not want to do that. That is very clear to me when I look at what is happening in Ukraine. Man's inhumanity to man; I wonder if it will ever stop. 

One of the older characters in the film says that inhuman leaders rely on the hopelessness of the people they subjugate in order to retain their power. He says that one must always have hope, because if there is hope there is the possibility of change. I can imagine that for those who lived through this era in Indian history, that having hope was difficult, much like it must have been for the Jewish people during WWII. But it is hope that keeps you going. My friend said that one of her friends did not want to attend the film with them because she is from Kashmir and experienced what happened first-hand. I can understand that too. The film was tough to watch, and probably on my own, had I read about it first, I would not have chosen to see it. But I don't regret having seen it. Sometimes it is necessary for the bubble that we live in to be popped from time to time. Because we really have no idea what it is like to have to leave your country behind because an invader wants to kill you. We have no idea. 

The Family Way--a touching film from 1966

The film The Family Way, starring Hayley Mills and Hywel Bennett as a young married couple who have problems consummating their marriage, is billed as a comedy/drama/romance. I watched it yesterday and found it less a comedy than a serious drama with some comedic moments included. My first thought when I saw that it had shown up on Netflix was that I will finally get to see this movie. When it was released in 1966 my parents told me that I was too young to see it, and after having seen it, I understand they were right because I wouldn't have understood it. But I was old enough to have read about the film in The New York Times, and because it starred Hayley Mills, I wanted to see it. 

Hayley Mills was an actress we grew up with and whom we all wanted to be. She starred in so many films that we loved as children--Pollyanna (1960), The Parent Trap (1961), The Moon-Spinners (1964), and That Darn Cat (1965), to name a few. Pollyanna was shown in our grammar school, in the auditorium as I remember. Schools did that way back when--got a hold of a film for general audiences and gathered us all together to watch it on 'movie day'. We didn't see it in 1960, rather around the late 1960s. The Moon-Spinners was shown on television's The Wonderful World of Disney and we were fascinated by the story as I remember, which was a crime adventure, a romance, and a travel film. We saw it on television in the late 1960s. I liked this film especially since it also had a romantic interest for Hayley Mills who was already a teenager (18) by that time. My mother took us children to see That Darn Cat when it was released in 1965; I remember the lines to get into The Music Hall on Main Street in Tarrytown. We enjoyed that film as well, as we did most films because going to the movies was always a fun time. 

Hayley Mills was 20 years old when she made The Family Way. The film was quite a departure for her in terms of theme; it was a 'grown-up' film because she played a young woman, Jenny Piper, who marries a young man, Arthur Fitton (played by Hywel Bennett), about her age. Due to circumstances beyond their control, they cannot go on their honeymoon and they end up living in her husband's parents' house. There is very little privacy, and Arthur has a difficult relationship with his father Ezra Fitton, played by Hayley Mill's real-life father John Mills. Jenny and Arthur do not consummate their marriage on their first night together, and as time goes on, it seems less and less likely that they will. The reasons for this are not completely clear--lack of privacy is one of them, a practical joke played on them involving a collapsing double bed is another (Jenny laughs but Arthur doesn't), but his overall  inexperience with women is another. He is the bookish sort, a quiet, non-rowdy, serious young man. It is hinted at one point that he might be homosexual, which turns out not to be true. What he really needs is a push, but that doesn't come until close to the end of the film, after both sets of parents have gotten involved and after his humiliation (as Arthur sees it) is complete. When he finally gets angry and expresses his feelings, he overcomes the hindrance in the way of his being a true husband to Jenny. While this storyline could have been played for laughs, it wasn't, and that's why I liked the film. It made viewers feel sorry for the couple, it made them want to wish them well, to try and work out their marriage. It also presents their parents as real human beings with problems and regrets of their own. I won't give away the film's ending, but suffice it to say I'm glad I finally got to watch it after all these years. 

 

Tenet, a movie I can't recommend

Tenet is the latest movie from Christopher Nolan, who wrote and directed it. It stars the talented John David Washington (Denzel's son), a charming Robert Pattinson, Kenneth Branagh in a brutal role, and Elizabeth Debicki in a strange role. Did I like the movie? No. I'm sure there were many people who did. But it's hard to believe this is the same Christopher Nolan who made the fantastic Interstellar. 

Tenet is billed as an action and sci-fi film, but in my opinion, it doesn't work well as either. Or rather, it should have been one or the other. As an action film, it's entertaining to watch--fast-paced and good action sequences. Like a modern Bond film. I'm willing to suspend my need for a totally logical plot if action movies are entertaining. But they have to make some sense. Tenet should have remained an action thriller without the added sci-fi element, because the idea of inverted time made no sense to me, was not well-explained, and simply served to muddle the plot. As Collider.com explains, "the basics of time inversion is that someone in the future invented some doodad that allows time to flow backwards. Therefore, certain elements are flowing backwards through time. Their trajectory has become inverted." Oh kay. My question is why? Why is this interesting? Toward the end of the film, when the blue and red groups of soldiers (regular time and inverted time soldiers) are advancing and retreating multiple times, it was enough to cause whiplash. It made me dizzy. I kept wondering when it was all going to end. I kept thinking--please stop. I kept wondering how many times we needed to see fire and smoke pulled back into windows and doors, like what happens in backdrafts. Except that this was to illustrate inverted time? How many times did we need to see that? One or two times was ok, more than that, no. I have no desire to sit through this film again trying to figure it all out. Once was enough. And that was NOT how I felt about Interstellar, which I've seen at least three times at this writing. It is not enough to throw the idea of inverted time out there for us as moviegoers to figure out. That's the moviemaker's job. Better luck next film, Mr. Nolan. 

IO--a love story between a young woman and the planet she calls home

I watched the sci-fi film IO on Netflix last night. It is the story of Earth's demise, through the eyes of a young woman, Sam, who has only known an Earth that is headed for destruction. She was born into a world that was dying--animals, birds, humans. Global warming led to changes in the earth's atmosphere that could not sustain life any longer. The only places where there still remained enough pockets of oxygen were in mountainous areas, and that is where her scientist father moved her and her mother. He wanted to find a way to save the Earth; most other surviving humans have made the long trek to Io, one of Jupiter's moons, which apparently can support life. Sam is one of the few remaining humans on Earth, and she spends her days carrying on her father's work, looking for evidence of life/new life down in the Zone (the city), which is completely barren and devoid of all life. She drives an ATV and always has a supply of oxygen with her. On the top of the mountain where she lives, she tends to living plants that she has managed to grow in a greenhouse, a surprising development. She also has a huge telescope so that she can look at the night sky and at Io, where her engineer boyfriend Elon lives. They carry on a long-distance relationship characterized mostly by loneliness. And then one day Micah comes into her life, arriving in a hot-air balloon. He has come to visit her father after his wife died; both of them listened to her father's advice to stay on Earth rather than leave for Io, while he researched ways of making humans and animals able to adapt to the new atmosphere. That decision proved fatal for his wife. Sam tells him that her father has taken a trip to another part of the mountains on a research mission and that he is due home in a few days. Micah accepts this at first, but after several days, he begins to understand that things are not what they seem. He finds out that Sam's father is dead, as is her mother, and that she is living there alone. He decides to take her with him in the balloon to the site of the last shuttle launch that is leaving for Io. He doesn't want to leave her on Earth alone. Sam seems determined to join him, especially after they both become romantically involved, and after she finds out that Elon is leaving on a ten-year mission to Proxima Centauri. She understands that she and Elon will never be together, and that pushes her toward Micah. But things are not what they seem.

I won't give away the ending to the film, but I found it to be moving. It touched me that a young woman who had never known an Earth that was healthy, was so determined to restore it to its previous beauty, to help it to survive. It touched me that she did not want to give up on this planet, that she believed (foolishly perhaps) that it could be saved. The ending is ambiguous; one is unsure if it is a dream or reality. I chose to believe that it was reality.

The film has gotten mostly negative reviews in the media, on Imdb and elsewhere. I will admit that it might have benefited from tighter editing as it dragged in some places. And the science part of it was full of holes and mistakes. But I was drawn in by the story, and that is what makes a film work for me. If it touches my heart, then it works for me. It was not a sappy film, nor was it an upbeat one. It was simply a film that describes our perhaps not-so-distant future. Make of that what you will. If global warming brings about an end to our way of life on this planet, there will be people who will want to stay on Earth to try to save it, and those who will leave it behind. It is not always so easy to know what one would do and that is what the film tries to portray. I think it managed to do that despite its flaws. If you are looking for Alien, I am Legend, or Interstellar, this is not any of those films (it couldn't be anyway because it is very low-budget). Monsters are not waiting in the dark places to attack, and there is no impressive interplanetary space travel or talk of tesseracts. However, like Interstellar, it touched me because at heart, it is really a love story. In Io's case, it is a love story between a young woman and the planet she calls home.

A Star is Born--2018

Bradley Cooper's A Star is Born is a beautiful movie. I saw it this past Thursday evening, and it has stayed with me since then. Besides being a beautiful movie, it is a moving one--a love story that reaches in, grabs your heart, and doesn't let go. I haven't felt this way about a film since Brokeback Mountain from 2005. A Star is Born has gotten excellent reviews all the way around, and that is not surprising. I was thinking about why the film works so well; after all, this is the fourth remake of the original film from 1937. I haven't seen the original film or the other remakes, but I feel sure that this film, apart from the original, is the best. I think it comes down to the two leads, Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga. Both play vulnerable characters who open up to each other and who fall in love. Both are singers, one on the way up (Ally, played by Lady Gaga) and one on the way down (Jackson Maine, played by Bradley Cooper). Jackson Maine is struggling with alcoholism and drug addiction; his career as a country singer has peaked and he knows it. When he begins to sing together with Ally after 'discovering' her in a drag bar where she performs at times, he understands that she is what he needs, both professionally and personally. But other people recognize her talent and do not want him and his addictions to stand in her way, with a tragic outcome. It's a story that's been told many times in many different ways, but this one works. It's been brought up-to-date, with Ally being able to move between a number of different song genres, from country music to pop.

In my opinion the film works because the chemistry between Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga is real, raw, palpable. You feel it every time they look at each other, hug each other, or touch each other. You feel that they care for each other, and you feel for them when their relationship falls on hard times. Their chemistry has been commented upon by many movie reviewers and the stars themselves. The movie is filmed in an intimate manner, with close-ups of their faces and expressions, which creates the effect that we are right there with them. There is a vulnerability and an ease between them that works; there is nothing slick or superficial about their relationship. I found myself thinking that this is the way many romantic relationships start, with that vulnerability and ease. They are beautiful things if you are lucky enough in your life to experience them; they are what we are always seeking a return to, and if we are lucky enough, we find them again and fall in love with our partner all over again.

But it occurred to me as well that both Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga experienced that vulnerability in their real lives when making this film, not just in their characters' lives onscreen. Cooper is an actor, not a singer (or director--this is his first time as director), and Lady Gaga is a singer, not an actor; yet both of them moved out of their 'safe' zones to try something new, with amazing results. Cooper can sing, and Lady Gaga can act. Additionally, Lady Gaga knows what it takes to reach the top, and I feel sure that she drew on those experiences and used them in creating Ally. The performances of the other actors in this film are also worth lauding--Sam Elliot as Jackson's brother Bobby, and Andrew Dice Clay as Lorenzo Campana, Ally's father.

Cooper and Lady Gaga supported each other and brought out the best in each other, and created a film that will last, that will still move you half a century from now. That is an amazing feat and one to be proud of--to know as the director, and as actors, that you have created a film that is already assured a place in posterity.

Why I loved La La Land

If you haven’t seen La La Land, the movie musical that won and lost the Oscar for best picture in the space of a few minutes (it was mistakenly announced as Best Picture at the Oscar awards), see it. It was nominated in fourteen Oscar categories, and won ten of them (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3783958/awards). The Oscar fiasco is quickly forgotten when you slip into the world that La La Land creates. I am not a real movie musical fan—it’s not my favorite genre—but if more of these kinds of musicals are made in the coming years, I may become one. The songs in this film are lovely, catchy, bittersweet and memorable. There is an air of respect in the movie that is rare these days. It was a refreshing change to experience that level of respect for nearly everything in a film--respect for the genre, for the actors, for the plot, for jazz music, for acting, for individual dreams, for good manners, for courtship and good old-fashioned romance (more important than one often likes to admit), for serious conversations, and overall for the art of movie-making. That art is on display in full force in this movie—stylish lovely sets, historical references to the Hollywood of a bygone era and to a Los Angeles of a bygone era as well. It’s a dreamy, dreamlike film in some respects that has its feet firmly planted on the ground in most respects. Boy meets girl, they don’t get together right away, and then they do. Both are talented individuals who have big dreams, and whose pursuits of those dreams unite them in a common cause. They love each other and they want the other to succeed. And when the other doubts himself or herself, they are there to remind them of the bigger picture, the goal, the big dream. They are there to remind them to never give up. Neither of them do. I loved pretty much everything about this movie. It evoked just the right amount of nostalgia for a (presumably) more innocent time, the longing for a time in one’s life when everything was still new and untested, when love was new, when conversations between people mattered as a way of getting to know them. It illustrated the importance of striving tirelessly to achieve your dreams regardless of the outcome (not always a happy ending), of not compromising or settling for the job that gives you the most money, of believing in yourself even when everything seems to be falling apart around you or when the voice of reason is telling you to give in and settle for less. Along the way, we are treated to acting that tugs at your heartstrings (Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone were wonderful together and singly) and a story that reminds you of that time in your life when dreams and love were new and your future, largely unknown and somewhat daunting, was ahead of you. There were some really good dance numbers and some memorable songs. I found myself humming one of the songs (the one that Ryan Gosling whistles when he is walking out on the pier) on the way out of the movie theater. The director, Damien Chazelle, makes it clear that the typical Hollywood happy ending as depicted in the fantasy sequence at the end of the film is not always the ending in real life for those who achieve their dreams. Boy and girl don’t always ride off into the sunset together. We need that reminder, even though we are rooting for the couple to be together against all odds. Sometimes we experience a love when we are young that transcends us and our real lives, and we are not ready for it. Or it may simply serve another purpose—to bring out the best in ourselves and to help us achieve our dreams—and that kind of love is to be cherished for a lifetime. 

Riding with the raptors

There’s a lot to love about the new dinosaur film Jurassic World. Mostly, it doesn’t pretend to be anything more than what it is—a fun and fast-paced action film about a dinosaur theme park that bites off more than it can chew when it creates a new and better dinosaur, Indominus rex, to attract larger audiences. The new dinosaur has four different kinds of DNA in its genome, all of which have produced a cunning killer that appears to be unstoppable. Part of the fun is finding out what kind of DNA the scientists have used to create this monster. And as always in these kinds of films, scientists come off as the bad guys who can be bought, either by the paranoid military or by greedy companies or both. When you go to see these kinds of films, you know that within about thirty minutes after the start, it’s all going to go to hell, the dinosaurs are going to start eating people, and panic will ensue. And it does. Jurassic World is a dinosaur disaster film with a hero who gets to do the coolest thing I’ve seen on film so far—ride his motorcycle in the midst of the velociraptors that he’s been trying to train (with very limited success since they are cunning killers themselves). Their help is enlisted when it becomes clear that the velociraptors are perhaps the only creatures that can bring down Indominus Rex. But there is a neat twist here once the raptors meet Indominus, and I won’t give it away. The film is worth seeing, the special effects are very good, the plot is fairly predictable, the acting a bit stiff, but overall it’s a fun 3D ride. We all know that what is said is not nearly as important as what is done in these kinds of films. Action is what counts; in that regard, Chris Pratt will be a good addition to the genre for the future films. When I saw the first Jurassic Park film, and Sam Neill and the children stood watching the dinosaurs from a distance, I remember commenting to my husband that it would be so cool if humans could actually travel in the midst of the different kinds of dinosaurs, at their level if you will. In Jurassic World, they can and they do, with the help of the Gyrosphere, a computer-controlled sphere-shaped ride that has room for two people to sit in it, and that moves along the ground so that the park visitors can get a real feel for the dinosaurs. I’m looking forward to the subsequent films, although I cannot for the life of me figure out what ground the filmmakers are going to cover next. But I’m sure it will be one heck of a ride.  

The power of Interstellar

I have seen the movie Interstellar twice at this writing, and plan to see it several more times and to own a copy of it. It is one of the best movies I have ever seen in my opinion, and has already become one of my all-time favorites. From a critical standpoint, the inevitable comparison to 2001: A Space Odyssey is understandable, since 2001 was a groundbreaking (and now classic) space film, but Interstellar can stand on its own as a masterpiece of groundbreaking filmmaking. I ‘judge’ films often on the effects they have on me. Do I think about them and the messages they impart after I’ve been to see them? Are they in any way life-changing? Do they challenge my assumptions and beliefs? The answer is yes to all these questions where Interstellar is concerned.

As most of you who read this blog know, I am a science fiction fan and have been for a long time. I saw 2001 for the first time when I was twelve years old. Even though I understood little of what it really was about, I understood intuitively that it was destined for greatness, because of its subject matter but also because it was an incredibly well-made film. Even when I watch it now, I feel the same way. It inspires awe. Interstellar does the same. It deals with space travel, black holes, singularities, event horizons, wormholes, tesseracts, gravity, the theory of relativity, and time in relation to gravity. For example, the astronauts in the film age much slower compared to those they leave behind on earth; this is explained well in the film even though it is difficult to understand conceptually. Much of the physics/astrophysics/quantum physics underlying the film are real, not fantasy. Christopher Nolan, the director, worked together with Kip S. Thorne, Caltech professor emeritus of theoretical physics, who is executive producer of Interstellar and who subsequently wrote a book called The Science of Interstellar, which I am reading now. It is a fascinating book that discusses the proven science versus scientific speculation in the film. It’s a good companion piece for the film once you’ve seen it. Interestingly, my husband, who majored in physics/biophysics and who subsequently moved into the field of cell biology, recently showed me a college textbook called Gravitation co-authored by Kip Thorne together with Charles W. Misner and John Archibald Wheeler. He had read it and meant that if I really want to attempt to even begin to understand the problem of gravity, I should attempt to read it. But I know I won’t, because the mathematics will just blow me away. I hit the wall in my first year of college when we got to complicated derivations in calculus. Up until that point though, I understood and even enjoyed studying most of the math taught to us.

In contrast to 2001, Interstellar is a warm film, despite its ‘cold’ subject matter. It is not afraid to tackle the difficulties and complexities of human relationships. 2001 was an extraordinarily stylish and elegant film, but it lacked depictions of real and warm human relationships. Cooper’s warm relationship with his scientifically-inclined young daughter Murph in Interstellar is well-portrayed and real. The strong bond between them was palpable; it was heartbreaking to watch him leave her behind on earth, knowing he probably would not see her again in their lifetimes. Matthew McConaughey did a terrific job as Cooper, the loving father who leaves ten-year old Murph (played beautifully by Mackenzie Foy) behind to go into deep space in search of a new world for the remaining earth inhabitants to move to. Even the relationships between the astronauts and the computers TARS and CASE were ‘warm’; these computers did not turn on the humans as HAL did in 2001, rather the opposite—they tried to save them in several instances. I won’t give away the story of Interstellar for those of you who haven’t seen it, but I will say that it is an incredibly warm and moving movie, one that is not afraid to deal with human emotions, complex science, metaphysical issues, and space exploration in one movie. Of course there are some flaws in such an ambitious venture, how could there not be? Some parts drag on a bit too long, others are too short, but I left the theater knowing I had seen a film that was life-changing. Why? Because it brought up issues and feelings for me that I have been thinking about and experiencing ever since my parents passed away. What is our place in the universe? Why are we here? What is beyond death? Can love transcend space and time (and death)? Is love a real force to be reckoned with? Can it be characterized scientifically? Is there life elsewhere—is it possible that the earth is not alone in its ability to sustain life? It wouldn’t bother me to find out that there are worlds similar to ours in other galaxies that can sustain life. It is comforting to know that. It makes space seem less alone and empty. Ultimately, it is the power of love and our hope in the future that keeps mankind going, regardless of where we find ourselves. Finally, Hans Zimmer’s score is perfect for the movie—moving, intense, mind-expanding and uplifting. I am still thinking about the movie many days after I saw it for the second time; that is the effect it has had on me. For those of you who have seen the movie and want some ‘answers’ to some of what was brought up in the film, I recommend IMDB’s FAQ page for the movie: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0816692/faq?ref_=tt_faq_sm –a very well-written page.

Bureaucracy and the film Brazil

I first saw the film Brazil in 1985 when it was released. It seems to have made a lasting impression on me, since I have remembered its basic message many years later. The message is that an out-of-control bureaucracy goes hand-in-hand with an Orwellian world, a dystopia, where the bureaucratic powers that be control the lives of society’s citizens. Parts of the film (a satire) are funny, but if you’ve lived a while and had anything at all to do with dysfunctional bureaucracies, you’ll understand that what you’re seeing on the screen is far from funny. A functionary named Sam Lowry, who is good at his low-level job but bored with his life, has recurrent dreams about rescuing a pretty blond girl and flying away with her to live a life of ‘happily ever after’. His mother, who is well-connected with all of the important bureaucrats, is trying to get him promoted, which he doesn’t want. She’s also trying to get him together with the daughter of a friend, something neither he nor the young woman wants. One of his assignments is to rectify a form error that resulted from a fly falling into a typewriter and causing the typewriter to type B instead of T when writing the name Tuttle, which has dire consequences for Archibald Buttle (a shoe cobbler with a family), not Archibald Tuttle (a terrorist and enemy of the state). This proves to be more difficult than he can imagine, and in this dystopian future, Archibald Buttle ends up dead. The bureaucracy that caused his death wants nothing more than to cover up this error and to forget it. Lowry ends up meeting Jill Layton, a neighbor of the Buttle family who reports this error (she is the woman from his dreams), and finds out that she is considered a terrorist because she insists on justice for Buttle’s family. When he decides to help her, he is also labeled a terrorist along with the woman he loves. Along the way, he ends up meeting terrorist Archibald Tuttle, a heating engineer who doesn’t play by the rules and who fixes Lowry’s heating system without the proper forms and authorized parts. This causes Lowry a number of problems with the bureaucracy that simply won’t accept that he has had unauthorized repair work done on his heating system, and his apartment is taken away from him. Those scenes are funny and sadly enough, true if you work in bureaucratic public sector workplaces and don’t play by their rules.

I’ve been thinking about this film lately, mostly because a large percentage of work time for many employees these days goes to appeasing the bureaucratic lions, tossing them bones and keeping them happy. It’s not an easy job, especially when the bureaucratic system is nothing but a dense jungle of incomprehensible rules and regulations that can choke the life out of most well-meaning employees. Case in point: you need an account number to order an instrument. You must talk to the accounting department that has its own rules and regulations concerning ordering and setting up an account number, but they haven’t talked to the order department that has its own rules and regulations concerning the same. Emails are sent back and forth, no one is on the same page, and weeks go by, even months. The accounting and ordering departments have the mistaken idea that all employees outside their departments actually understand accounting and ordering procedures and terminology. God help those employees if they make a mistake at any point along the way—if so, it’s ‘bless me father, for I have sinned’ against the great god of bureaucracy. If the system is insulted, it doesn’t take kindly to that. Atonement takes the form of listening to the functionaries’ lectures and demands of obedience to their rules, and generally being subservient to their wishes. I understand the need for bureaucracy in terms of keeping an organization ‘organized’ and running efficiently. I draw the line at having to toe their line, of having to jump when it tells you to jump. I draw the line when the system begins to feel like a totalitarian regime and when you actually become afraid to deal with it.