V for very good
Sep. 2nd, 2006 10:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avanta7When spouse and I were choosing DVDs to rent last night, we followed our usual formula: an action/thriller or two, a chick flick (spouse defines "chick flick" as anything that doesn't have explosions, gore, or little green men -- most comedies, dramas and "family" films qualify under that definition), a horror and/or sci-fi; of these, at least one must qualify as a suck-fest, or a movie we rent to make fun of.
When spouse and I chose V for Vendetta, we figured it would meet both the sci-fi and the suck-fest criteria.
We were wrong about the suck-fest.
The time is some twenty years or so in the future. England is a police state disguised as a republic, complete with curfews, censorship, and random eavesdropping on private conversations. One evening, Evey Hammond (Natalie Portman) is out after curfew when she is menaced by several members of the secret police, or "fingers". Just as they are about to rape her, a mysterious figure comes to her rescue. He is masked and gloved and completely unrecognizable, but he dispatches her attackers and whisks her off to his secret hideaway. He is V (Hugo Weaving), and he has a bone to pick with the establishment. The night he saved Evey was the night he blew up the Old Bailey, accompanied most deliciously by a pirate broadcast of The 1812 Overture.
As the story progresses, we learn of the events that shaped Evey and V and brought them to this chance meeting, which proves life-changing for them both.
It could have gone so wrong. Many films based on comics or graphic novels fail to translate from one medium to the other. V for Vendetta succeeds brilliantly. I say this not having read the graphic novels, but based solely on my viewing experience. It's a beautiful film. Dark, visionary, menacing, iconic. I was particularly struck by John Hurt's appearance as Chancellor Sutler. We see Hurt mostly on a large video screen as he exhorts his underlings to find V and stop his terroristic acts. Anyone who has seen Nineteen Eighty Four will find the symmetry ironic.
If you haven't seen V for Vendetta, I urge you to rent it. Maybe even buy it. It would make a suitable double feature with Nineteen Eighty Four or perhaps even Dark City.
When spouse and I chose V for Vendetta, we figured it would meet both the sci-fi and the suck-fest criteria.
We were wrong about the suck-fest.
The time is some twenty years or so in the future. England is a police state disguised as a republic, complete with curfews, censorship, and random eavesdropping on private conversations. One evening, Evey Hammond (Natalie Portman) is out after curfew when she is menaced by several members of the secret police, or "fingers". Just as they are about to rape her, a mysterious figure comes to her rescue. He is masked and gloved and completely unrecognizable, but he dispatches her attackers and whisks her off to his secret hideaway. He is V (Hugo Weaving), and he has a bone to pick with the establishment. The night he saved Evey was the night he blew up the Old Bailey, accompanied most deliciously by a pirate broadcast of The 1812 Overture.
As the story progresses, we learn of the events that shaped Evey and V and brought them to this chance meeting, which proves life-changing for them both.
It could have gone so wrong. Many films based on comics or graphic novels fail to translate from one medium to the other. V for Vendetta succeeds brilliantly. I say this not having read the graphic novels, but based solely on my viewing experience. It's a beautiful film. Dark, visionary, menacing, iconic. I was particularly struck by John Hurt's appearance as Chancellor Sutler. We see Hurt mostly on a large video screen as he exhorts his underlings to find V and stop his terroristic acts. Anyone who has seen Nineteen Eighty Four will find the symmetry ironic.
If you haven't seen V for Vendetta, I urge you to rent it. Maybe even buy it. It would make a suitable double feature with Nineteen Eighty Four or perhaps even Dark City.
