The Boys From Brazil
Year of release : 1978
Run time : 2h5m
Genre : Thriller / Sci Fi
Cast : Gregory Peck, Laurence Olivier, James Mason
The British-American co-production is based on the 1976 novel of the same name by Ira Levin.
Barry Kohler, a Nazi hunter, is in Paraguay, on the tracks of some Nazis he found gathering, preparing for an operation. He follows them around, taking pictures of them, and manages to convince a kid working at one of the nazis’ houses, whom he recognized as Nazi doctor Mengele, to carry a tape recorder around, so he could listen into their conversations and record them with his own device.
Barry calls Ezra Lieberman, another Nazi hunter, living in Vienna, and tells him about what he found. Ezra doesn’t believe him, and dismisses his claims.
Ezra lives with his sister, in a rented apartment, with water running from the pipes in the ceiling, and the landlord somehow thinks it’s his fault…
Barry listens in on the Nazi’s conversation, in which doctor Mengele gives orders to his men to k1ll 94 men, age 65, in the next 2 years, without wanting to say more, as in why, what did these men do, just that, their deaths must seem accidental.
While listening in, the guard walking around, catches the kid with the radio, as it starts to broadcast Mengele’s secret meeting with his fellow Nazis.
He brings the kid to Mengele, and they frantically start looking for a listening device, destroying and trashing everything in the process. They find it, and ask the kid who put him up to it.
The kid takes them to Barry’s hotel room.
Barry called Ezra again, playing him the recording, but he, once again, tells him he wants nothing to do with whatever he has planned. The Nazis walk in on Barry and k1ll him. Mengele then tells his men to k1ll the kid.
Their conversation is cut short by the Nazis who k1lled Barry, and Ezra finally starts doing his research. Now he’s the one who’s not being taken seriously, as nobody knows anything about Barry, and nobody wants to help him.
Persisting, Ezra finds something which blows the mind, as all the men who died “accidentally” are 65 years old, were domineering fathers, while the mother is in her 30’s, and is very lenient. Oh, and the kids all look-alike, pale, with black hair, and disturbing blue eyes .
The first part of the movie kinda bored me, but after the one hour marker, after the clone talk, they really got my attention, and I liked the subject they approached, as I found it fascinating. If it’s true, that it’s that easy to clone someone, and create the conditions the person had in their first, real life, in order for the clone to become just like the “real” person, it’s mind blowing!
Mengele always wears white.
I liked the scenes with the dogs, as I found it fascinating again, how one can train a dog in such a way!
I do not know why the movie is called “The boys from Brazil” as the movie takes place anywhere but in Brazil. I think it might be called like that, minus the name of the country, due to the clones.
The acting was fine. I personally liked Laurence Olivier’s interpretation.
I didn’t like the soundtrack.
The movie received positive reviews from critics and audiences alike (with a 72% critics score and a 66% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes; and a 40 critics score on Metacritic ), and grossed 19 million dollars at the box office, against a budget of 12 million.
The movie received 3 Oscar nominations for Best Actor, Best Film Editing and Original Score; and 6 Saturn Awards nominations. Gregory Peck won the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Motion Picture-Drama.
You can watch the full movie for free, if you follow this link :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvG_ORNxrO8
Rating : Worth a watch !