Brazil

The Gist: In a dystopian future society, the government is saddled by huge amounts of inefficient and complicated bureaucracy. It's also a paranoid police state that strictly controls everyone's actions. Unfortunately, the technology employed is quite dated, and one day a clerical mistake ends up fingering the wrong man for execution. Sam, a low level but highly stressed technocrat prone to day-dreaming, finds out about the mistake and tries to correct it, but he only ends up making things worse for himself and everyone around him.

As made very clear by my grade, I did not like Brazil. The cast, which includes big names like Jonathan Pryce, Bob Hoskins, Robert De Niro, Ian Holm, and Jim Broadbent, likely performed as directed by Terry Gilliam, but this level of weirdness and camp is bound to be a huge turn off for me.

The Bottom Line: Once again, this movie has many rabid fans that swear by its greatness, and that will likely accuse me of heresy, so perhaps I just didn't "get" it, but I found it ridiculous, boring, and even irritating. Watch out, perilous inanities ahead.

Grade: 4