How do I talk about _Brazil_? That's a question I've been asking myself for a while. It’s an intricate and bizarre film that’s open to interpretation.

The disturbing nature of its dystopia is made clear early on. Despite its aesthetic prowess, its labyrinth of bureaucracy is dehumanizing and inefficient. Many in its system wander around like mindless drones or are utterly absorbed in its consumerism, with all its experimental inventions and cosmetic surgeries. Also, repression of emotions can be seen in characters like Jack; Sam walks in on Jack after he tortures someone, is covered in blood, and seems to be having a breakdown, then turns around with an insincere smile. It's all so disconnected from human interaction and dependent on formalities and machinery that it only takes a single bug (literally) to cause an innocent man's death.

This poses the question: How has this society transformed into this, and is it the result of malicious intent? The beautiful thing about the film is it isn't; in a culture that dehumanizes people, the film humanizes them.

At its core, the goal of its totalitarian information bank is to do the work for people so that they can focus on pleasures. But only the upper class can indulge in such pleasures, and others have no influence. The upper class doesn't care to change the system, and the middle class can't risk losing their jobs, so the lower class, living in poverty amongst a promised utopia, is left to fix the system. However, they have no path to do it through bureaucracy, so they must resort to violence to protest.

But those in power dismiss these protests; they view their whole system as a game where they won, and those opposed to the system are sore losers. But it’s clear this “game” is rigged. Sam has always had an upper-class life; he’s entirely out of his depth when engaging with the lower class, and the influence his parents acquired allows him to be readily offered a promotion.

Ultimately, their society represents a pursuit of efficiency without sustainability. Instead of revising their system, everyone shifts the blame; they won't even pronounce Buttle dead; it's all a game; most are unqualified for their positions, live in fear, and everyone's out for themselves. An endless array of problems can't be recognized or resolved; they must be covered, and those with any influence think the system is perfect and are only obsessed with maintaining the status quo they benefit from and additional technological advancements. It’s likely that these “terrorists” are just another issue they’re ignoring. Their 13-year-old bombing campaign is treated as “beginner’s luck” despite being an ongoing element throughout the film.

But let's discuss Sam. Sam is utterly content at the film's beginning; he feels no pressure in his job, is more adept than his boss, and lacks ambition. The only thing that suggests otherwise is his dreams, a simplistic good versus evil fantasy where he's a hero saving a damsel in distress. However, these dreams become more frequent and become integrated with reality as Sam loses his previous contentedness, encountering a woman who reminds him of his dream girl and becoming more exposed to the horrors he's been protected from and complicit in.

As the film nears its ending, there are sequences where it's ambiguous if it's reality or a dream. But as far as I’m concerned, everything following Sam getting knocked out and arrested is in his head. His accidental destruction of documents, Tuttle filling the suits of the engineers with sewage, and the far more amorous version of Jill he meets and saves from the system. But then Sam is interrogated, and Jill’s death seems to have been unequivocal, but Tuttle, alongside a group of rebels, swoops down like an action hero to save Sam. This is the film’s solution to breaking the system, coming together in camaraderie against it. An increasingly surreal sequence follows where Tuttle eventually disappears, and Sam falls into various horrors. But the pace quickens, and he’s abruptly in the back of Jill’s truck, brought to the countryside where the two can live happily ever after.

However, this escape was all in Sam’s mind; he was still being interrogated, now permanently stuck in this fantasy. Because, in truth, Sam was never anyone extraordinary. He’s only one man, and while he doesn't like the system, he's not a rebel. Sam envisions himself as a hero but has a skewed moral compass, and his motivations are consistently self-serving. The only reason he accepted the promotion and went down the path he did in the first place was in pursuit of Jill.

Furthermore, were there any terrorists to begin with? Jill asks if he’s ever seen any terrorists and sees the actions of the Ministry Of Information as horrendous. We see explosions throughout the film, but never the terrorists who caused them. Sam suspects Jill for one of them but is proven wrong, and all we witness Jill and Tuttle do on their own is help Sam with his heating and rightfully file a wrongful arrest. It’s Sam who sees them as terrorists, and with Jill, he’s the one who goes through the barricade and ends up killing law enforcement while being chased. Moreover, the Ministry of Information has failed to identify any and is interrogating anyone potentially involved.

So, are they chasing a phantom? These explosions are only the infrastructure falling apart around them, and no one considers this a possibility or a malicious ploy, a means to create an enemy to justify further totalitarianism and rule through fear. It's likely a combination of both, but more the former.

Maybe there are terrorists, or perhaps it's a phantom; either way, _Brazil_ remains endlessly endearing and whimsically sardonic yet simultaneously deeply bleak, provocative, and human.