Brazil Analysis

      After watching Brazil I was on sensory overload. The cluttered framing and chaotic movement throughout the entire movie gave the movie a very crowded and active feeling. I feel that the chaos was created to show the viewer the downfalls of technology. Throughout the entire movie technology is constantly breaking, causing troubles, and generally inconveniencing others. By framing the scenes with such a crazy feel, the director is trying to show that technology does not make things easier, it makes things worse on occasion. This is further supported by the few scenes in the movie that are peaceful and happy. In the early dream sequences, there is barely any technology involved, the scene is beautiful and peaceful. In the final dream sequence the two main actors once again find themselves in a setting with little technology. The scene is peaceful and happy. The lack of chaos and brighter lighting emits this feeling.
     As a whole I felt the movie was a satire bashing industrialism and the rush to better technology. Minor underlying themes such as the main actors subconscious played by Robert Dinero, totalitarian like state of the government and many others helped to further argue against technology. Most importantly though, Sam Lowry portrays a very important juxtaposed role in the movie. He is one of the few who is not satisfied with technology, constantly fighting against it he battles to find peace inside the insane world he lives in. There are a plethora of examples that exemplify his desire to escape. To begin with his dreams clearly depict a desire to escape the shackles of technology. He desires to fly free from the dark and decrepit city that has locked away his beauty. In reality it is much the same, he finds his escape form everything in the simple joy of love. In the restaurant scene he becomes enraged with the ordering system and the reliance of all the others at the table on technology. Lastly when his air conditioning goes out, he finds comfort in his old refrigerator. One of the few pieces of technology in the movie that was not altered.
       Sam Lowry battles against society to show them the better way the entire movie. For this reason I also noticed that the director painted him to resemble the Christ figure. In the dream sequence he is mounted on the wings and positioned on them much like he would be on a cross. At the ending of the movie, when his mind leaves him as he is being tortured he realizes his highest desires (a world with love and without technology), when the dream ends the characters hands are both bleeding from holes in his hand, his head has been crowned with a helmet and his crusades have been put to an end by a totalitarian force.