We are all in agreement ...

We here at the TLC have all talked it over, and those that like horror films think that "30 Days of Night" is the best vampire film we have seen in quite a while. We think that it is so good that, aside from the gore, anyone can enjoy this film.

It is not often that many people can agree on the same movie, but there are those films that seem universal, across the board, that everyone can watch and enjoy.

What films do you think are so good that they transcend their genre and become something a kin mass art?

To give two more examples: "Once" is a film that I believe everyone will like -- unless you are completely cynical. It is a musical without all the conventions people hate about musicals. It is a romance without all the stereotypes found in all other romances. It is a comedy and a drama. It is subtle and fun, without silly twists and unbelievable circumstances. This is a film that has went past its expectations and become a truly universal picture.

"Goodfellas" is another great example, even if you hate Gangster films, this is an absolute must see. The storytelling, acting and Scorsese's beautifully horrorific urban imagery make for a watchable film that, apart from some ultra-violent bits, I am sure everyone will enjoy.

What films do you think are quintessential examples of their genre and could be seen by anyone, whether they like those types of films or not?

Leave a comment with your selection and a brief reason why you think others will like the film. We are not looking for obscure films, we are looking for ones that others may not have given a decent chance. The TLC staff will vote on the three best choices and those people will win one of the following:

1 -- A framed one-sheet of the movie "I am Legend."
2 -- A $10 Gift Certificate to Tate St. Coffee.
3 -- Two Tickets to see a movie at the Carousel Theater.

If you just can't find something to watch,

We know what it is like to look at a slew of things on the shelves and have no idea what to check out. So we have started posting staff picks throughout the collection to give you some ideas. It's impossible to see everything in our collection-though Phoenix has tried-so we hope you can profit from our staff's varied interests.

There was also a big box of new dvd's that arrived yesterday. Give us hopefully a week and they can be yours!

"I want to talk to you about DUCTS" (in Brazil)

Brazil (DV165)

This blog post is presented in new LINK-A-VISION.

Follow the links for surprises galore!

Terry Gilliam works with symbols like no other filmmaker alive or dead. A result of his artistic background, Gilliam has the ability to create a visual vocabulary on screen that strengthens his script. Since film is purely a visual medium, it is important to have creators that can boil the essence of the words on the page down into striking visual metaphors that unconsciously explain the motivations of the characters and the type of world they exist in. Brazil is heavily laden with these cues and most are so subtle that it takes many viewings to untangle all of them. But out of the many symbols Gilliam uses in his mid-80’s masterpiece Brazil, the DUCTS are the most striking

Filmmaking, in general, is an expensive and well-controlled business. The director often finds themselves at war with producers who care only about getting their investment back and making a profit on the film. Because of the rigidness of the industry, very few pointless images are captured to celluloid. Each shot costs money, and as such there should not be anything extraneous within the frame. At first, in Brazil, there seems to be a lot of non-sequitors that serve no function past visual or comedic enjoyment. This statement is very far from true, although there may be some tenuous symbols, Gilliam spends lots of time on the minutest of details exhibited in and around the characters in his fictional world.

Take the aforementioned ducts: upon first seeing the film the audience may think that ducts are there to add Python-esque sur-reality, a silly joke that helps to make the visual frame more interesting. This is a misnomer; they are SO important Gilliam begins his two hour and sixteen minute epic with ducts. Even before the audience has met the dreaming, Quixotian persona of principle character, Sam Lowry, Gilliam shows us a commercial for Central Services, a giant government megalith that seems to be in charge of the maintenance of the ducts. To the observant viewer, the commercial gives many clues as to where the film is heading: “Hi there,” says the central services spokesman, “I want to talk to you about ducts. Do your ducts seem old fashioned, out of date? Central Services new duct designs are now available in hundreds of different colors to suit your individual taste. Hurry now, while stocks last, to your nearest Central Services show room. Designer colors to suit your demanding taste.”

Seems rather innocuous, but in the purely capitalistic monologue Gilliam is letting us in on the state of the unwieldy and paranoid government. These ducts are a surrogate for that government and the spokesman is telling his audience, although you can not change the government – it is already there, as old and clunky as it is, it can no longer be uninstalled – you can instead “dress” your government up in many different colors and coverlets. The citizens do not have an open democracy, so in order to feel they have some control they are given the opportunity to decorate their ducts. It is also interesting that the spokesman mentions ducts that are old fashioned and out of date, possibly inferring that the government suffers the same issue in its de-connectedness to its citizenry.

Throughout the movie, in public shops and private houses, ducts take over everything; they are falling out of the sky, leading to unknown and strange places. They fill the ceiling and take over all free space. Although it seems the citizens have gotten used to them, the ducts are constantly in the way of them living a quiet, private existence -- symbolizing the government’s overt encroachment into all the facets of the people’s life. Just as you can not look around without being reminded of the paperwork-fascism of Gilliam’s Ministry of Information, the characters can not look around without the ducts pulsating over them and invading all of their living quarters.

Almost all of the places that have ducts are not set-up to actually use them in a utilitarian fashion. Instead, it seems the ducts were quickly and sloppily installed, meaning the “big daddy” government in the film was probably quickly and sloppily installed into power. Maybe that is why the Ministry of Information seems so paranoid and why there are “terrorists” that are working against the government (although honestly I am of the opinion that there are no terrorists in Brazil, just false flags and faulty technology). To strengthen this idea, we can look at Sam’s apartment or flat, which seems to be of a much newer type. There, all the technical aspects are built directly into the walls, and it’s only when Sam’s central air breaks down are we given a look at all the hidden mechanics behind the walls. When Central Services shows up at his apartment to “fix” the issue, Sam’s flat becomes completely taken over by what should have remained invisible -- the almost organic, circulatory duct system. As a counterpoint, Sam’s mother’s apartment is extremely old and is not set up to hide the ducts; they snake around all of her antiques and furniture, looking extremely out of place, as do they at the older department stores and restaraunts.

Finally, let’s just take a look at the official definition of “Duct.” This is from Answers.com :

Ducts (n.)
1. An often enclosed passage or channel for conveying a substance, especially a liquid or gas. …
2. A tube or pipe for enclosing electrical cables or wires.
[Latin ductus, act of leading, from past participle of dūcere, to lead.]

What impresses me the most about the above is the epistemology of the word, it comes beginning to end, lead us through Gilliam’s film; ducts are there with us at each important point in the story. Sam meets Harry Tuttle, a rogue heating engineer, when his central air is broken. Tuttle is classified as a terrorist because he wants to work on the ducts without having to do paperwork. Sam loses from the Latin ductus and means the “act of leading,” which slaps the fact across your face that the ducts are tied to the government’s inability to lead in a useful way. Ducts are enclosed systems, much like Brazil’s world -- even when Sam is outside it feels like he is indoors. The Ministry of Information is an enclosed world, the head (Helpmann) enters his penthouse office through an elevator located in the bowels of MOI – the lift could be seen as a duct and although Helpmann moves among them, he never has to be bothered by all the lowly drones. The ducts, from his house due to faulty ducts and lack of appropriate paperwork. Each time we go to the Ministry of Information there are large vacuums connected by ducts sucking up all the dirt (yet another metaphoric symbol). Ducts even send information from one part of the MOI to another and Sam’s final breakdown begins with his destruction of those paperwork carrying ducts, much like when Tuttle switches the air and sewer tubes at Sam’s flat, Sam’s vandalism of the ducts is a direct assault upon the body of the beast, an organic upheaval – the butt where the mouth should be and vice versa.
The only place in Sam’s life that ducts do not interfere is with his dream woman, Jill. Could this be yet another level of attraction that ties the two together? But, as is proven by the ending, the ducts do not care about being ignored or exposed and Sam pays the ultimate price for his actions against the system.

Brazil is a very intricately put together film and all the little pieces that Gilliam gives you total up to a world with parts missing. It is easily one of the best movies ever made and in it Gilliam is challenging the viewer to connect the dots of the plot by themselves. All the clues are there, it is just a matter of how well the audience can read them. Gilliam best metaphor is his use of ducts, which he employs in a very expressionistic fashion, allowing them to symbolize a lot about the government, from its paranoid encroachment upon its citizens to its inability to function correctly. Instead of telling us, Gilliam shows us, that is the essence of a visual art like film, and as viewers, our job is to enjoy and decipher them. Brazil will keep you lost in the large intestine of its never ending system of symbolic ducts and oppressive tubing, a trip that would make anyone crazy.



Here are the other Terry Gilliam films in the TLC's collection:

With Monty Python's Flying Circus:
Monty Python's Flying Circus, Volumes 4, 16, 17, 18 (VH415, 416, 417, 418)
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (VH4556)
Monty Python's Life of Brian (DV88)
Solo:
Time Bandits (VH6122, 6205)
The Fisher King (DV339)
Twelve Monkeys (VH6583)
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (DV1340-1341)
The Brothers Grimm (DV2449)
Tideland (DV3767-3768 & 3769-3770)

Terry Gilliam is currently in production on a film that seems like a return to his earlier dream trilogy (of which Brazil and Time Bandits are a part) called The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

written by Phoenix "Brazil is only, like, one of my most favorited movies eh-ver." Mangus

Kudzu of capitalism slinks to the Eastern Block in Czech Dream-Reality TV Meets Documentary

Two Czech students give reality shows a whole new incarnation for their final project in film school with an idea even Morgan Spurlock of Super Size Me fame covets. They fashion and promote a capitalist dream- a shop till you drop big box store (or hypermarket as the Czech lingo goes) which in reality is but a 100 foot façade supported by scaffolding in the back.

Fashion make-overs transform and groom the filmmakers into store managers. A top notch and expensive ad team steps up to the plate with logos, graphics and slogans. Customers are invited to dream up store names. Amore, Harmony and Cornucopia are contenders. A soggy “We are the world” anthem groans throughout the background. Focus groups assess the pitches. One market analysis even equips a potential customer with a head camera that measures what part of the ads she focuses on just to make sure all manner of manipulation has been explored.

Do they fall for it? The proverbial first in line is there 3 hours before opening, but the numbers soon swell to 2000 by the time opening ceremonies start. The herds assemble for the lure of unbelievable savings-they seem to all want the digital camera-and free gifts. As the ribbon is cut, the gates open, and the blood lust of bargain shopping takes over. Those first to confront the hoax laugh, cuss or just feel like idiots. If it is too good to be true, it probably isn’t.

But do the hungry bargain hunters now looking like mindless sheep grazing in the adjacent meadow punch anyone out? Remarkably no. They focus on the realization that the experience is not that far from the empty promises of a manipulative government. As one points out, “Our politicians make fools out of 10 million.”

Oscar winners on the way!

The next couple of weeks will bring a slew of dvd's we've been waiting for. Be on the look out for:

Atonement
No country for old men
There willl be blood

Poster Giveaway!

This week we are giving away our back log of movie posters.

How do you get one?

Leave a comment telling us the title of your favorite movie. Below your movie leave your name and three posters you want, in order of preference. In the event that more than one person wants the same poster we will randomly pick the winner.

Here are the posters we are giving away:

Introducing the Dwights
White Noise 2
Joshua
Sunshine
Once
Michael Clayton
Saw IV
Dragon Wars

This is first come, first get and is good for this week only: Monday, March 3rd through the 10th.