If you thought Christmas with the family was a nightmare, welcome to Terry Gilliam’s dystopian cult classic. In Brazil, Christmas is but a handy backdrop for exploring ideas of rampant consumerism, bureaucracy, terrorism, alienation and the role of the totalitarian state.

For lowly bureaucrat Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) the only escape from the Kafkaesque government whose mistakes lead to torture and death is the liberty of insanity. Look out for the banner-carrying ‘Consumers for Christ’ who pass by as a small child asks Santa for a credit card.

Humorous and absurdist, it’s a reflection of Britain in the mid-eighties; mired in unemployment, downcast and downbeat, with Yuppie greed on the rise amid the threat of IRA bombs.