Dreaming... Brazil

Terry Gilliam explains how the title of the film Brazil evolved- from the experience of a coal-dust beach at Port Talbot: [1] &quot;Brazil came specifically from the time, from the approaching of 1984. It was looming. In fact, the original title of Brazil was 1984 1/2. Fellini was one of my great gods and it was 1984, so let’s put them together. Unfortunately, that bastard Michael Radford did a version of 1984 and he called it 1984, so I was blown. And so Brazil became the title—because of the song. Brazil started when I was sitting out on a beach in Wales—Port Talbot, which is a steel town. They bring the coal in from the ships on these great conveyor belts. So the beach is pitch black. It’s covered with coal dust. It was a miserable, awful day, and I just had this image of some lonely guy sitting on that beach and tuning in a radio and suddenly [Hums the tune to “Brazil”] this music he’s never heard before—there was no music like that in his world—was there. And that would trigger him to believe there is another world out there, a better world. And that was America in the Forties. We were always going south to Rio, and I grew up in that dream time. And it seems like the dream world was somewhere in South America, where everything would be perfect&quot;: <a href="http://www.believermag.com/issues/200303/?read=interview_gilliam">www.believermag.com/issues/200303/?read=interview_gilliam</a> [2] In the book _The Battle of Brazil_, Gilliam explains where the inspiration stemmed from, while he was in Port Talbot, Wales: &quot;Port Talbot is a steel town, where everything is covered with gray iron ore dust. Even the beach is completely littered with dust, its just black. The sun was setting, and it was quite beautiful. The contrast was extraordinary, I had this image of a guy sitting there on this dingy beach with a portable radio, tuning in these strange Latin escapist songs like 'Brazil.' The music transported him somehow and made his world less gray.&quot;: <a href="http://www.faqs.org/faqs/movies/brazil-faq/">www.faqs.org/faqs/movies/brazil-faq/</a> [3] &quot;Brazil was a film that sat around for some years,&quot; Gilliam remembers. &quot;I mean like ten years I'd been sort of thinking about this thing. It's all about my own frustrations and my seeming inability to achieve what I wanted to achieve and my inability to affect a system that is clearly wrong. The fears of Brazil are not so much that the world is spinning out of control because of the system, because the system is us. What Brazil is really about is that the system isn't great leaders, great machinating people controlling it all. It's each person performing their job as one little cog in this thing and Sam chooses to stay a little cog and ultimately he pays the price for that.&quot; Gilliam wanted Brazil to emulate Port Talbot, a small steel town in South Wales where everything the eye can see is blanketed with a fine layer of gray iron ore dust. &quot;Even the beach is completely littered with dust, it's just black. I had this image of a guy sitting there on this dingy beach with a portable radio, tuning in these strange Latin escapist songs like Brazil. The music transported him somehow and made his world less gray.&quot; Over time, this man on the beach evolved into Sam Lowry: <a href="http://www.rotten.com/library/culture/brazil/">www.rotten.com/library/culture/brazil/</a> [4] Brazil When hearts were entertained in June We stood beneath an amber moon And softly whispered 'some day soon' We kissed and clung together Then Tomorrow was another day The morning found me miles away With still a million things to say Now When twilight beams the skies above Recalling thrills of our love There's one thing I'm certain of Return I will To old Brazil