Brazil

Brazil 

Screenplay by                             Terry Gilliam

                                                 Tom Stoppard

                                                 Charles McKeown

Produced by                               Arnon Milchan

Directed by                                Terry Gilliam

Cast List:

Jonathan Pryce                         Sam Lowry

Robert De Niro                                    Tuttle

Katherine Helmond                 Ida Lowry

Ian Holm                                   Kurtzmann

Bob Hoskins                            Spoor

Michael Palin                           Jack Lint

Ian Richardson                         Warrenn

Peter Vaughan                         Helpmann

Kim Greist                               Jill Layton

EXT. CITYSCAPE – SUNSET

A beautiful golden sun is setting. The sky is on fire. The CAMERA starts to move downwards. A large neon sign rises into shot. It rests on top of a skyscraper and fills the frame. The building is neither past nor future in design but a bit of both.

Slowly we pan downwards revealing the city that spreads below... A glittering conglomeration of elevated transport tubes, smaller square buildings which are merely huge, with, here and there, the comparatively minuscule relics of previous ages of architecture, pavement level awnings suggesting restaurants and shops... Transparent tubes carry whizzing transport cages past us... an elevated highway carrying traffic composed primarily of large transport lorries passes thru frame. As we descend, the sunlight is blocked out and street lights & neon signs take over as illumination. Eventually we reach the upper levels of a plush shopping precinct.

INT. SHOPPING PRECINT – NIGHT

Xmas decorations are everywhere. PEOPLE are busy buying, ogling, discussing, choosing wisely from the goodies on display. SHOPPERS are going by laden with superbly packaged goods... the shop windows are full of elaborately boxed and be-ribboned who-knows-what. In one window is a bank of TV sets – on the great majority of the screens is the face of Mr. Helpmann – the Deputy Minister of Information. He is being interviewed. No-one bothers to listen to Helpmann.

INTERVIEWER

Deputy minister, what do you believe is behind this recent increase in terrorist bombings?

HELPMANN

Bad sportsmanship. A ruthless minority of people seems to have forgotten certain good old fashioned virtues. They just can't stand seeing the other fellow win. If these people would just play the game, instead of standing on the touch line heckling –

INTERVIEWER

In fact, killing people –

HELPMANN

– In fact, killing people – they'd get a lot more out of life.

We PULL AWAY from the shop to concentrate on the shoppers. Helpmann's voice carries over the rest of the scene.

INTERVIEWER

Mr. Helpmann, what would you say to those critics who maintain that the Ministry Of Information has become too large and unwieldy... ?

HELPMANN

David... in a free society information is the name of the game. You can't win the game if you're a man short.

Fur bedecked shoppers pass in front of what appears to be banks of snow but as we pan along with them the "snow" turns out to be fire-fighting foam. It oozes out of a shop front that is a charred twisted mass of metal frames. WORKMEN are busily sealing the opening with plywood sheets, SHOPPERS pay no attention to this. Xmas carols are being played by a Salvation Army style band calling themselves Consumers For Christ. Santa Claus's grotto is busy, all is well with the world.

INTERVIEWER

And the cost of it all, Deputy Minister? Seven percent of the gross national produce...

HELPMANN

I understand this concern on behalf of the tax-payers. People want value for money and a cost-effective service.

INT. OFFICE – NIGHT

CUT TO TV screen with Helpmann still talking.

HELPMANN

That is why we always insist on the principle of Information Retrieval Charges. These terrorists are not pulling their weight, and it's absolutely right and fair that those found guilty should pay for their periods of detention and the Information Retrieval Procedures used in their interrogation.

PULL BACK to reveal a rather clinical office. The TV rests on a desk. A WHITE COATED TECHNICIAN is sorting out his in-tray. Several Christmas cards are amongst he paperwork. He comes upon a Christmassy package which he rips open, to discover a shiny, metal "executive toy".

CUT TO:

THE BEETLE

Droning up near the ceiling.

The Technician is disturbed by the buzz of the BEETLE as it whirrs around the fluorescent light. He rolls up some paper and forms and gets up to swat the insect.

INT. OFFICE – NIGHT

The Technician gets up and balances a chair on top of his desk. He climbs up onto it attempting to swat the Beetle still buzzing about the room just out of reach. Beneath him an automatic type-writing machine rattles away compiling a typed list of names under the heading "Information Retrieval, Subjects For Detention & Interview". The machine is being fed from a spool of paper which is being rhythmically chopped by an automatic guillotine which neatly leaves each name on a separate sheet, with the title above each name, each sheet following its predecessor into a holding basket. In CLOSEUP we see the names on the sheets of paper building up in the holding basket: "TONSTED, Simon... TOPPER, Martin F... TROLLOPE, Benjamin G... TURB, William K... TURNER, John D..." Every name begins with T.

INTERVIEWER

Do you think that the government is winning the battle against terrorists?

HELPMANN

On yes. Our morale is much higher than theirs, we're fielding all their strokes, running a lot of them out, and pretty consistently knocking them for six. I'd say they're nearly out of the game.

The Technician is tottering on one leg on the chair on the desk as he strains to swat the Beetle. Swish, swash, oops, WHAP! Gottcha!!

INTERVIEWER

But the bombing campaign is now in its thirteenth year...

HELPMANN

Beginner's luck.

The Beetle's career comes to a halt... squashed flat on the brilliantly clean ceiling... or has it? As the Technician clambers down from the rickety heights, the Beetle's carcass comes unstuck from the ceiling and drops silently into the typewriting machine which hiccoughs, hesitates and then types the letter "B" and hesitates and then continues so that the next name is Buttle, Archibald. The Technician fails to notice this and the machine continues smoothly "TUTWOOD, Thomas T... TUZCZLOW, Peter..."

INTERVIEWER

Thank you very much, Deputy Minister.

HELPMANN

Thank you, David... and a very merry Christmas to you all.

EXT. HOUSING TOWERS – NIGHT

ZOOMING past foreground outdoor Xmas decorations we TIGHTEN in on one of several massive residential tower blocks that loom over what appears to be a poorer part of the city

INT. BUTTLE FLAT – NIGHT

Helpmann and Interviewer are on the TV, the end credits rolling over them to the beat of a Mozart theme tune. PULLING BACK we reveal that the TV is in a conventional sitting room, conventionally decorated for Christmas; out the room is oddly encumbered by huge metal conduits that snake unpleasantly across and through the walls. Smaller conduits radiate from the main one connecting the various services that Central Services (the name emblazoned on the metal) supply to this household. A conventionally poor but proud family occupies the room. MRS. BUTTLE is reading Dickens' Christmas Carol to GIRL BUTTLE who is about six. BOY BUTTLE plays quietly with a toy machine gun and some action men dressed in security gear. MR. BUTTLE is putting the final touches to a neatly wrapped Christmas present which looks identical to the "executive toy" we have just seen in he Technician's office.

Faintly from outside comes a burst of laughter. A tilt of the CAMERA indicates that the laughter is coming from the floor above.

INT. JILL'S FLAT – NIGHT

The flat is very bare and basic. The laughter is coming from a cheap portable television showing "Sgt. Bilko. From BILKO'S POV we look through an open door of a bathroom straight at a mirror propped up by the bath, to enable the person in the bath to watch the TV. The person in the bath is JILL LAYTON, washing the grime off herself while she watches Bilko in the mirror. From her POV in the mirror, the TV screen is suddenly obscured by part of the body of a MAN in uniform.

JILL

(scared)

Who's there?

INT. BUTTLE'S FLAT – NIGHT

The Buttle Family as before. Mrs. Buttle is closing the book.

MRS. BUTTLE

There, that's enough for tonight. He won't come Xmas Eve if you don't get plenty of sleep.

GIRL BUTTLE

Father Christmas can't come if we haven't got a chimney.

MRS. BUTTLE

You'll see.

The Girl exchanges goodnight kisses with her parents and leaves the room.

GIRL BUTTLE

How will he get down from upstairs?

BOY BUTTLE

It's a secret.

We follow Girl Buttle out of the sitting room into...

INT. HALLWAY AND CHILDREN'S BEDROOM – NIGHT

Girl Buttle enters her bedroom. There is little or no light there, and she sees a bulky figure apparently lowering himself into the room from the direction of the ceiling.

GIRL BUTTLE

(unalarmed)

You've come...

As she moves, the light from the hallway shows us the figure of what looks like a commando on a night raid, slowly sliding down a pole in he middle of the room. The pole at the top end disappears through a hole in the ceiling. Things become immediately clearer

INT. BUTTLE SITTING-ROOM – NIGHT

Crash! It's a raid! Battle-dressed SECURITY TROOPS smash trough the door. Another one, swings from a rope, kicks in the window from the outside and enters that way. Most alarmingly of all, a shower of plaster comes down from the ceiling in which a fairly neat round hole appears and through the hole comes a fireman's pole down which slide TWO MORE SECURITY TROOPS. The whole thing is short, brutal and violent.

Buttle is grabbed violently and stuffed into a baglike canvas device that covers him from head to waist. A metal clamp goes round his neck, a metal bar slides up the back of the bag. His hands are handcuffed to the metal bar. In seconds he has become a canvas parcel. Meanwhile, Girl Buttle has been carried out of her bedroom and dumped into the lap of her screaming mother. Boy Buttle has his toy machine gun knocked out of his hands by a Trooper who we see is identical in dress to the action men Boy Buttle has been playing with. He rushes to his mother as guns are viciously trained on them. Troops are kicking open the doors of other rooms and generally doing a good job. An OFFICIAL, wearing plain clothes, now enters from the front door and during the turmoil is reading aloud from an official document. It goes something like this:

OFFICIAL

I hereby inform you under powers entrusted to me under Section 47, Paragraph 7 of Council Order Number 438476, that Mr. Buttle, Archibald, residing at 412 North Tower, Shangri La Towers, has been invited to assist the Ministry of Information with certain enquiries, the nature of which may be ascertained on completion of application form BZ/ST/486/C fourteen days within this date, and that he is liable to certain obligations as specified in Council Order 173497, including financial restitutions which may or may not be incurred if Information Retrieval procedures beyond those incorporated in Article 7 subsections 8, 10 & 32 are required to elicit information leading to permanent arrest – notification of which will he served with the time period of 5 working days as stipulated by law. In that instance the detainee will be debited without further notice through central banking procedures without prejudice until and unless at such a time when re-imbursement procedures may be instituted by you or third parties on completion of a re-imbursement form RB/CZ/907/X...

... and more of the same, most of which is part of the audible wall paper while the chaos reigns. As the front door slams behind the captive relative peace returns, broken by Mrs. Buttle's anguished sobbing.

OFFICIAL

(proffering a pen and a thick book of pink receipts to Mrs. Buttle)

Sign here please.

MRS. BUTTLE

(dazed; she signs weakly)

What? Where have you taken him?

OFFICIAL

(taking the book)

Thank you.

(he hands her another book, this one of blue receipts)

(indicating place to sign)

Same again please. Just there.

(checking first book of receipts)

Press harder his time. Good.

MRS. BUTTLE

(signing again)

What is this all about?

OFFICIAL

(tearing out sheet from pink book)

That's your receipt for your husband.

(taking blue book from her)

Thank you. And this is my receipt for your receipt.

(he turns to leave along with troopers)

Jill's shocked face appears looking down through the hole in the ceiling. The faces of the workmen BILL and CHARLIE also appear, above and behind her.

JILL

Mrs. Buttle, are you alright?

The helmeted Security Troops in Buttle's flat drop to defensive positions and swing their machine guns up towards the hole in the ceiling. All three faces retreat.

INT. JILL'S FLAT – NIGHT

CHARLIE

(starting back from the hole with Bill and Jill)

Eh! Eh! Eh! We're Department of Works! Department of Works up here! Careful with those bloody things!

Jill, Charlie and Bill are hustled aside by a SECURITY MAN who clears the fireman's pole from the hole. We can see the Troops in the room below leaving. A SECOND SECURITY MAN has untied a rope hanging out of the open window. He coils the rope up neatly and the two Security Men leave the flat.

BILL

(to Jill as they watch this highly efficient operation)

Don't take any notice, love, it's their training makes them like animals. Best in the world, though.

JILL

Who are you?

CHARLIE

Don't you worry love, we'll have everything shipshape in a jiffy.

BILL

That's it. Nothing to worry about.

CHARLIE

It's Buttle downstairs who can worry, eh?

JILL

There must be some mistake... Mr. Buttle's harmless...

BILL

We don't make mistakes.

So saying, he drops the manhole cover, which is faced with same material as the floor, over the hole in the floor. To his surprise it drops neatly through the floor into the flat below.

CHARLIE

Bloody typical, they've gone back to metric without telling us

INT. BUTTLES' FLAT – NIGHT

Mrs. Buttle stands stunned in the middle of her decimated flat. The kids wail. Slowly Mrs. Buttle collapses – slumping to the floor with the receipt in her hand: we tighten into CLOSEUP of "Receipt".

JILL (O.S.)

Mrs. Buttle? Mrs. Buttle?

INT. RECORD CLERK'S POOL

We come in on a CLOSEUP of a pink version of the RECEIPT being stamped and impaled on desk spike as we PULL OUT to reveal an infinite expanse of regularly arranged metal desks, each desk with a built-in TV console, and each (except one) occupied by a CLERK. Every desk is snowed under with pieces of paper much like the receipts seen in the previous scene. More pacers are delivered to each desk intermittently by way of pneumatic tube. OFFICE BOYS bustle about with even more paperwork. From the back of the room we get a view of the screens which show graphs, tabulations, figures... All of this activity is supervised from an elevated walkway by MR. KURTZMAN. Satisfied that all is well with his clerks he turns and walks towards his glass enclosed private office at the top of the room, his name lettered on the opaque glass door. Mr. Kurtzman goes through this door and as he closes it behind him, all activity in the Clerks pool ceases. each Clerk adjusts his TV screen with the flick of a switch, and all the screens change to something which looks very like "The Good, The Bad And The Ugly".

INT. MR. KURTZMAN'S OFFICE – DAY

Mr. Kurtzman also has a TV console. He sits behind his desk, reaches for his In-tray, and without looking at the console he turns his screen on. He looks through a number of files in his In-tray. He is surprised to hear a VOICE say, "Turn around real slow, amigo". Mr. Kurtzman turns around real slow, his expression relaxes, he thumps his TV console with a large fist, and the screen obediently flicks to a display of figures. He picks up a file which we see as marked "Buttle, Archibald". He opens the file and starts punching the keyboard of the console. The TV starts bleeping in an alarmed way. Mr. Kurtzman is puzzled. He punches more figures. The screen starts to flash "Error, error, error". Mr. Kurtzman sighs with frustration. He presses an intercom.

MR. KURTZMAN

(into intercom)

Mr. Lowry, will you step in here please?

He returns his attention, puzzled to the file. Nobody comes into the office. Mr. Kurtzman gets up and walks over to his door and opens it. Beyond the door the room full of CLERKS is obediently concentrating on the bleeping and whirring consoles. From Mr. Kurtzman's POV we see that in the centre of the room is an unoccupied desk.

MR. KURTZMAN

Does anyone know where Lowry is?