1st Sept 2005

Efficiency, Information and … Daydreaming about Love

A review on the movie Brazil by Andrew Toh

An article on Straits Times, August 17 2005, featured Mark McKeon, Australia's leading work-life balance writer and speaker, who wrote a book on how and why one should take life at a slower pace. His book, ‘Work A Little Less, Live A Little More', published in 2001 has the following excerpts.

“In the 1950s, American experts predicted that automation and technology would reduce the average working week to 14 hours by the year 2000. Well, we're past the year 2000 and too many people are still working 10 to 14 hours days.”

“Brazil” , a movie produced during the mid 1980s, was one of those entertaining feature that bogged down my innocent mind back when I was just a 14-year-old lad experiencing the adolescent of life. Its comical satire of the near perfect future is truly surreal and accurately ahead of its time.

I caught the DVD after months of “procrastination”, due to the unwittingly involvement of real daily life struggles, has added more meaningful realism from that movie by Terry Gilliam.

The movie, about a dreamy romantic middle age guy struggling with the corporate system and unwittingly gets involved with an underground hero, becomes the tragic victim of his own romantic illusions. After revisiting the movie, 20 years later, I have three vociferously issues lingering in my mind.

Why are we acting so busy at work all the time?

Why do the working class, especially Singaporeans, struggles with information when half the time, we do not know what the insipid struggle is for and what to do with all those information gathered out there?

Is daydreaming socially acceptable?

Efficiency

One of my favorite and most memorable depictions from the movie was the portrayal of two different working methods by two different corporate departments.

Call it a different school of thought or a different management style but the film shows a fictitious “Department of Records”, staffs, working non-stop around the clock ONLY under the strict supervision of their boss, played by my favorite British actor Lan Holm. Once he closed his office door, his staffs were literally watching television on their computers.

As for the other department, “Department of Information Retrieval”, its staffs spend their working days trailing their boss, literally like a MRT, who seems to manage all their decision-making and the general direction of the company. Their boss, with glasses and all, seemed to be energized by their attention, and was shouting “Yes”, “No”, “Mail This”, “Send That”. And during all that time, his mindless staff just followed his directions without an insinuation of compliant.

In today's year, 2005, the film's adventure aspects are accurately designed back in the 80s with the depiction of working life these days. Despite the emphasis on “working less rewards more” corporate trend, Singaporeans are still battling the Asian social and corporate culture of the more hours you work, the more dough you harness. Don't go through that 14-hour work because it is a culture; execute it only when there's efficiency.

Many of movie's mythological references did not escape my mind. Especially that authoritative boss is acting out like a monster. Whether he or she is powerful to bring the company forward, being employees, we have to take a stand and help work together for the common good of the company. We may be the one who is “smarter” or even “knowledgeable” or the one who is “back-stabbed” during the process; one has to be clear on the responsibility one takes. Do the designed assignment properly and be flexible, but ultimately … properly.

Information

With the naive dogmatic concept of having the backing of technology and information, major decision can and only be able to be made accurately and effectively. However, in Brazil , such information could very well tear down the tapestry of life that we so much loved and worked for. There was a scene where a man was wrongly accused and came to a tragic end, just because of a typo error during paper work.

Mark McKeon, the 48 year old work-life balance writer also tip that we are now in the age of ‘Info panic', which describes the condition of having an impossible amount of information to process. Rules, regulations despite our ‘paperless' society has more proposition to mistakes and errors. And to overcome such disastrous outcomes, one has to definitely research on its authenticity and relevance.

Just because everybody is taking the information from there does not mean it's the right information. I believe that paranoia is still more of a necessity medicine rather then a permanent cure.

Day Dreaming about Love

At our present age of information, it helps to think that blending street smart and information smartness creates a whole new perception of working with information. With rigid structure and information handling, one will still create mistakes.

However with a little motivation, “daydreaming” and a pinch of love, one can excel not only corporately, but also socially. In the film, it portrays pulling connections with the upper social classes that ultimately generate unlimited opportunities in the corporate world. This realistic concept which many a time, is being derided away, might be one of the truths out there.

With a little flexibility and dare I say love, life will be meaningful especially with the rigidly insipid social and corporate satire we live in.

I believe many of the corporate working audience after viewing Brazil will be one of many Singaporean depressives but beneath the mocking ending, where Jonathan Pryce's character Sam Lowry has his brain fried like KFC Colonel Sandler's latest concoction; it helps to think that one has to have the necessity to occasionally daydream about the joy of love in this new age of society. Even if that daydream lasts for only a spilt second…or even kills you.

Finally, with the usual Terry Gilliam's style of ending that mocks the idea of "happily ever after," Brazil concludes perfectly. This is a great movie that like fine Australian wine, tasted better only with the passage of 20 years.

Ultimately Brazil represents the love dreams of a doom middle-aged individual and of course his last few desperate scuffle with the daily routine of efficiency and the vast sea of interesting, but unnecessary, clutter of useless information .

By Andrew Toh