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V for Vendetta [2006]

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Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review

"Remember, remember the fifth of November," for on this day, in 2020, the minds of the masses shall be set free. So says code-name V (Hugo Weaving), a man on a mission to shake society out of its blank complacent stares in the film V For Vendetta. His tactics, however, are a bit revolutionary to say the least. The world in which V lives is very similar to Orwell's totalitarian dystopia in 1984: after years of various wars, England is now under "big brother" Chancellor Adam Sutler (played by John Hurt, who ironically played Winston Smith in the movie 1984) whose party uses force and fear to run the nation. After gaining power, minorities and political dissenters were rounded up and removed; artistic and unacceptable religious works were confiscated. Cameras and microphones are littered throughout the land, and the people are perpetually sedated through the governmentally controlled media. Taking inspiration from Guy Fawkes, the 17th century co-conspirator of a failed attempt to blow up Parliament on November 5, 1605, V dons a Fawkes mask and costume and sets off to wake the masses by destroying the symbols of their oppressors, literally and figuratively. At the beginning of his vendetta, V rescues Evey (Natalie Portman) from a group of police officers and has her live with him in his underworld lair. It is through their relationship where we learn how V became V, the extremities of the party's corruption, the problems of an oppressive government, V's revenge plot and his philosophy on how to induce change.

Based on the popular graphic novel by Alan Moore, V For Vendetta's screenplay was written by the Wachowski Brothers (of The Matrix fame) and directed by their protégé James McTeigue. Controversy and criticism followed the film since its inception, from the hyper-stylized use of anarchistic terrorism to overthrow a corrupt government and the blatant jabs at the current US political arena, to graphic novel fans complaining about the reconstruction of Alan Moore's original vision (Moore himself has dismissed the film). Many are valid critiques and opinions, but there's no hiding the message the film is trying to express: Radical and drastic events often need to occur in order to shake people out of their state of indifference in order to bring about real change. Unfortunately, the movie only offers a means with no ends, and those looking for answers may find the film stylish, but a bit empty. --Rob Bracco

view from a distance?
Review date: 2008-06-21 Rating: 6 out of 10

I enjoyed this film, I enjoyed the moral ambiguity at the centre of the character V, and I enjoyed the absurdity that many here found irritating. Cliched imagery works because they are cliches - obvious symbols known and (too readily?) understood - but the film works only at a distance: it probably would not merit re-watching, and, as many reviewers have shown here, it doesn't submit well to scrutiny.

It offers a colourful and entertaining warning to the logic of tyranny, but is neither convincing or plausible about the content: fascism of the 1930s European kind in the UK is a notoriously difficult to visualise, partly because it failed even in the circumstances of the 1930s. Slightly outside the cacotopia genre, more convincing portrayals are the surreal movie BRAZIL, which depicts British authoritarianism as an over blown and (still) incompetent bureaucracy, replete with sporting metaphors and shopping malls, again with terrorism at its heart, So too, in a different way the TV series A Very British Coup. But BRAZIL was a commercial failure on release, and A COUP was hardly sci-fi, being basicallt an attack on the British establishment.

The difficulty with main stream sci-fi is that the politics has to be reduced to very crude sign posts or flashbacks - or as in V footage of riots, people in pubs and families on sofas. GATTICA and, to some extent, EQUILIBRIUM are slightly more successful in depicting the context of a totalitarian system, but V DOES try hard to show the banality of evil, and the sense that, superficially at least, it might look rather similar to what we have now.

Much of the imagery here is clever but not seemingly thought through. I was confused (as many reviewers were) by the reference to Guye Fawkes. Only a catholic and a recussant would have seen the attempt to blow up Parliament in 1605 as the triumph of an `idea' worth emulating - many saw Fawkes as indeed as a foreigner working to subvert the English way of life. Perhaps, like V's treatment of Porter, this is a deliberate attempt by the film to confuse its moral purpose - certainly the final stages of the film are impressive and symbolic indeed - but strikingly ambiguous. I was also bothered by the mass grave scenes, partly because they needed more careful placement. I do not object to the referencing of the holocaust, and to an image that returned to Europe as recently as the 1990s in the Balkans, but I wanted to know the moral shortcut that led scientists to do that in more detail - fear does make us complicit in our own terror, but can it by itself strip us of humanity so quickly? Is it so skin deep?

(PS anyone reading this might help me out with a question: the BBC produced in the late 1970s or 1980s a TV drama about a fascist British state - any clues as to what it was called?)

Reviews

really good
Review date: 2008-06-06 Rating: 6 out of 10

didnt quite know what to expect with this movie but i have too say its really rather good,the action is well staged and the acting solid.this is great offbeat fun ,check it out

V Is For Very Good
Review date: 2008-04-11 Rating: 8 out of 10

I enjoyed this movie a lot more than I thought I would have. It Really is worth viewing in my humble opinion and is nowhere near as bad as some professional critics claim it to be. I thought V was a very good character and Hugo Weaving did a great job of portraying him on screen. It's taken me awhile to get around to this movie but now I've watched it it's on my "to watch again" list for sure. Great stuff!

Strange Guy
Review date: 2008-03-04 Rating: 6 out of 10

This is a film about a Britain which has been taken, through fear, into a future of mind control and physical coercion, a kind of mad extrapolation of the trends which many perceive in the "real" Britain of today. One "terrorist" or "subversive" has been through punishment and detention and had part of his face destroyed, after which he uses a mask of Guy Fawkes to hide his former identity. I have to say that it seems to me that Guy Fawkes (who wished to bring back Roman Catholic obscurantism to the England of the 17th Century) seems an odd hero to emulate.

There are well known actors in this film, not least John Hurt, as the "Leader" figure who, in tired cliche, is "Chancellor" (i.e. like Hitler). Also, the radical extremist Stephen Fry, who, despite his Jewish roots in Central Europe, has become famous playing very "English" roles: Jeeves, Oscar Wilde (yes, Irish, but culturally English) etc. Fry plays an "approved" person who is, in reality, a dissident. His main crime is to have a copy of the Koran. Here we see that the English or "English" political extreme of today seems to find common cause with the Islamist extremists (meaning in reality, not in the film). Fry's character does not forget to have "banned" posters on his wall, particularly one which shows the Union Jack with a Swastika superimposed on it. If this film were real, the forbidden book would probably not be the Koran, but the Bible or, even more likely, Mein Kampf (which, significantly, has been out of mainstream publication for decades...I wonder why?).

Perhaps this film is best viewed as an idea of what might happen if certain trends continue: surveillance of all kinds; control of the expression of some opinions (though Fry himself is very against so-called "Holocaust" "denial" , that is, free historical enquiry... one person's freedom another's licence??). Britain as it is now can be seen in some of this film. The causes of the film's nightmare Britain are not examined: the dead-end and impossibility of real multiculturalism (even the Labour Party and their similar "opponents" have begun to wake up to that); mass immigration; laws (and unwritten laws in the media and politics) which have restricted free speech on topics like race and associated culture for decades.

The denouement is, causally, a bit disappointing, but the final scenes are well crafted and I had to clap when the Palace of Westminster was blown into a million pieces. Stunning!

Overall, a bit naive in many parts, but this is still a very entertaining and, more than that, thought-provoking film. As we read almost daily about surveillance of individuals and families in the UK (not only by counterintelligence, security and police, but even by local council officials!) it can be seen readily why this film does resonate. Try making, for example, a "racist" comment (eg in support of the --regretfully now gone -- white minority rule in Africa) and see how far your career gets at the Bar, in "mainstream" subsidized politics, or elsewhere...

Odd mish-mash!
Review date: 2008-02-14 Rating: 4 out of 10

A bizarre blending of Zorro, The Phantom of the Opera and 1984 - only this time John Hurt is playing Big Brother - all in the style of the TV cult series of the sixties, The Avengers. Sadly, Natalie Portman is no Mrs Peel! It's mildly diverting but anyone looking for something really deep and meaningful will be wasting his or her time. Not an original idea on show.

Product Details/Specifications

Actor(s):
Natalie Portman
John Hurt
Hugo Weaving
Stephen Fry

Recording label: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
EAN: 7321900824835
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 1
Format: PAL,
Release date: 2006-07-31
Audience rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 133 minutes
Theatrical release date: 2006
Language: English (Original Language)

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V for Vendetta [2006]

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