Frequently Asked Questions

2. Why were there problems with Brazil's release in America?

In January of 1985, Terry Gilliam delivered his completed Brazil to Universal studios, on time and on budget. Brazil's complex and interweaving plot demands a lot of screen time in order to tie up all the loose ends - and Gilliam was happy about the way the film worked in its 142 minute cut. Fox Pictures International had just signed the international agreement to the film and had accepted the 142 minute length without any sort of protest, so Gilliam expected Universal to accept it for distribution in America.
      Not so. Sidney Sheinberg, the president of Universal studios had taken an interest in Brazil - Sheinberg "liked many parts of Brazil, and thought there were many moments of bravura filmmaking," but what Sheinberg saw lacking was commercial potential. The cure for this, in Sheinberg's eyes was a re-edit, one that took the various parts of Brazil that were commercially viable, namely Sam's pursuit of his dream girl, the stunning set design and Gilliam's off-beat style of humor, while removing those things that were not, namely the film's dark ending, the overtones of the dehumanizing effects of the government, and Michael Kamen's witty but dark orchestral score.
      This began a personal battle between Terry Gilliam and Sidney Sheinberg for control of the film. Sheinberg had forced Gilliam to sign a time provision which said that the running time of Brazil would have to be 132 minutes for Universal to accept it, and that even then Universal could follow up with any editing it deemed necessary. A rough cut of Brazil which ran at 132 minutes was created by Gilliam's editor Julian Doyle in order to fulfill the contractual obligation on time, and was sent to Universal pictures. Gilliam worked on a 132 minute edit, while Sheinberg himself began work on the studio's edit of the film.
      Scheinberg's editors Bill Gordean and Steve Lovejoy created an edit which cut out many of the dream sequences and essential threads in the plot of Brazil, while splicing in all elements of humor and all usable footage involving Sam Lowry and Jill Layton, the "dream girl". If that wasn't bad enough, Gordean and Lovejoy also lopped off the entire ending sequence which involved Sam Lowry's interrogation (and eventual loss of sanity) by his coworker Jack Lint. Instead, they chose to end the film where Sam finally consummates his relationship with Jill, and escapes with her to the country. Also suggested was the replacement of Kamen's symphonic score with one of rock music - in order to "attract teens."
      Ultimately, this edit subverted the entire point of Brazil, making the movie a futuristic fairy tale about a man's quest for a dream woman, with a lot of action and a sub-plot about terrorism thrown in. Gilliam's original message of dehumanization and technology gone wrong was subverted by Scheinberg's edit, which sent the message that if you play the game and stay a good little cog in the machine, that one day you'll end up with your dreams come true.
      Scheinberg, upon seeing Gilliam's second 132 minute edit, decided to test the studio's version instead. Gilliam would not stand for this. Arnon Milchan, the producer of the film, began making public declarations on how the studio had taken away Gilliam's film because it was only a few minutes over contractual obligation, and began calling for critics to see the film in England, where it was available from Fox Pictures. Sid Sheinberg responded back by saying that no amount of critical praise could reverse the studio's decision about Brazil. Gilliam told Sheinberg that if he was going to release to studio's edit of Brazil that he wanted his name off of the credits, and then started an out and out publicity war. In Gilliam's own words:
      "It became a stalemate situation and Arnon Milchen, the producer said, 'We've got to get lawyers in here and we've got to deal with this' and I said 'Nah, can't get lawyers in. They've got all the lawyers in the world. They've got all the money. They don't have to release the film, it's not going to kill them. They can sit on it'. and I said 'we'll just have to approach it in a much more personalized way'. So the first thing I did was to take a full page ad out in Variety which was this blank page except for this black border and in the middle of it it said:

Eventually what happened was the LA critics became very interested in the film and some had seen it and they set up a whole series of clandestine screenings of this film around Hollywood in peoples homes. It came time to vote at the end of the year for their films and they realized in their bylaws it didn't say that a film had to be released to be able to be voted upon and so they all voted upon whether Brazil could be voted upon and they agreed it could be and then it went out and it won Best Picture, Best Direction and Best Screenplay. [The awards were] announced the very night of the premiere of Out Of Africa in New York which was Universal's big film that year. All the big brass were there in their ties & DJ's and they were told that Out Of Africa had won nothing and Brazil, this film that they won't release has won all these awards. They had to release it and what was wonderful was I was getting all these phone calls from people saying 'Oh well done, maybe now the flood gates will open we'll get films out, blahblahblah'. Of course it didn't, just like Brazil, the system doesn't change, you just escape in your madness, that's all."

- Terry Gilliam, The South Bank Show, 6/29/91

Universal finally opened Gilliam's 132 minute cut of Brazil at two theaters in Los Angeles on Christmas Day, 1985, later slowly bringing it across the country in a limited number of theatres with limited advertising.

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Brazil FAQ Copyright © 1994 - 1998 David S. Cowen.