V For Vendetta: The Movie

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Right The AV Club like this, so I'm ignoring reviews (and this thread) until such point as I can actually see it.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 11:30 (eighteen years ago) link

denby is a thickie.

― The Man Without Shadow (Enrique), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 11:38 (eighteen years ago) link

j-ho on guy fawkes day:
"England's not-quite 9-11 (a pretext for a crackdown on Catholics and foreigners), this thwarted conspiracy—celebrated every year as Guy Fawkes Day—has an even more hysterical significance. Had it been successful, the explosion would have vaporized half of London and thus, in its state-of-the-art carnage, offered a foretaste of Hiroshima."

i'm not an expert on explosives but: o rly?

Um. No. There was a show last year at a MoD range, presented by Richard Hammond, where they exactly replicated the blast (down to authentic gunpowder). It would have been a very big bang, and certainly would have as good as destroyed parliament and caused fairly significant damage for about a mile radius (through the blast wave and thrown rubble), but wouldn't have caused that sort of effect.

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 12:42 (eighteen years ago) link

i'm eagerly awaiting more of the reactionary american responses to the film that don't really seem to grasp the fact that almost every major thing about the flick is anglocentric(barring the two leads and certain filmmakers).

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:13 (eighteen years ago) link

let's not even get into, you know, the early history of the american republic...

― The Man Without Shadow (Enrique), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:19 (eighteen years ago) link

fighting tyranny is terrorism now.

― The Man Without Shadow (Enrique), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:20 (eighteen years ago) link

Well, yeah, but even past all that, the cultural warrior bloviation about this flick should reach War on Christmas/Fahrenheit 911 levels of entertainment.

"It doesn't matter that they all have funny accents, this movie is CLEARLY an attack on america and the president!" etc

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:34 (eighteen years ago) link

How much of the CCTV bits made it into the flick, or have they just updated the technology particulars?

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:35 (eighteen years ago) link

cctv is definitely part of it. we get shown a lot of news flashes and things. stuff about america. food rations. media spin of the terrorist events. etc.

i hope the movie isn't demonized... because a) we all need to be reminded that our country isn't this bigbro+nazi++ totalitarian regime... and b) where our country is like this country, we need to be thinking hard about that...

i wish people would see a movie like this and not dismiss it.
m.

― msp (mspa), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:57 (eighteen years ago) link

it will be condescended to in the uk.

― The Man Without Shadow (Enrique), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 16:59 (eighteen years ago) link

I am super-disappointed to hear that that Rose Almond and Helen Heyer aren't in the movie at all - if there's any indictment of the fascist society and how it makes lives of the average citizen totally horrible and meaningless, its in those characters' subplot (the death camp thing that V survives is indeed "in the past", is portrayed very heavily as theater, and is not presented as an ongoing function of the state)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 17:00 (eighteen years ago) link

Almost no CCTV stuff in there.

haha, xpost!

um, 'newsflashes and stuff about america' != CCTV

― JimD (JimD), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 17:01 (eighteen years ago) link

almost no cctv? ??? did we see the same movie?
m.

― msp (mspa), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 17:05 (eighteen years ago) link

Well there's bits of footage and stuff, but it's never something that's explicitly referenced the way it is in the original, cos CCTV isn't a big deal any more, is it? It's something everyone takes for granted.

― JimD (JimD), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 17:11 (eighteen years ago) link

perhaps i'm confused.
m.

― msp (mspa), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 17:33 (eighteen years ago) link

CCTV isn't a big deal any more, is it? It's something everyone takes for granted.

that's what I meant. is there an updated thing in the flick that takes the place of the threat/symbol of CCTV circa 1980?

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 19:06 (eighteen years ago) link

Not really, no. There's a thing that looks a bit like a TV Licence detector van (er, assuing non-UKers know what they look like) which monitors conversations inside houses, but that only crops up once. In general though, nah, they don't bother with the techno-fear thing.

― JimD (JimD), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 19:11 (eighteen years ago) link

So all of the "action" sequences that took a few panels or a page in the comic are going to be ten minute knife-throwing, camera-spinning, slow mo extravaganzas, right? Because the violence looks cool and stuff.

― mike h. (mike h.), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 19:12 (eighteen years ago) link

Anybody found the tracklisting yet?

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 19:14 (eighteen years ago) link

TV DETECTOR VANS?? i am quaking with phj34r, etc

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 19:20 (eighteen years ago) link

okay... i did get confused. my badmittens.

yeah, there are little nods to stake out vans... and "88% of conversation indicates that people still think xyz".... and office rooms being bugged, so the good cops pull out some kind of jammer device or something... etc.
m.

― msp (mspa), Wednesday, 15 March 2006 19:33 (eighteen years ago) link

ouch. salon shredded the movie.

yeah, maybe my opinion is awful. what do i fuckin know? it was free and i had a good time.
m.

― msp (mspa), Friday, 17 March 2006 16:31 (eighteen years ago) link

i'm avoiding reviews but come on who gives a fuck about salon!?

― Real Goths Don't Wear Black (Enrique), Friday, 17 March 2006 16:34 (eighteen years ago) link

the TV ads are awful.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, 17 March 2006 16:34 (eighteen years ago) link

can we mention here that the original comic isn't *that* great? the pop culture refs are dire.

― Real Goths Don't Wear Black (Enrique), Friday, 17 March 2006 16:37 (eighteen years ago) link

That's what I felt it was missing - ok so maybe today's dictatorship ensures its citizens have some degree of comfort, but if there's *no* privation or repression - and I didn't get much of a sense of any from the movie - then what is the point in rebelling?

― ledge (ledge), Friday, 17 March 2006 16:59 (eighteen years ago) link

There was a throwaway line about not having had real butter in years - oh you poor thing. But no nuclear winter = no collapse of farming - so the ruling elite must have amassed an *enormous* butter mountain for their personal consumption.

― ledge (ledge), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:02 (eighteen years ago) link

but if there's *no* privation or repression then what is the point in rebelling?

Don't answer that...

― ledge (ledge), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:03 (eighteen years ago) link

I think the comic is kind of in the middle range as far as Moore and quality are concerned (and I think he knows this too, his preface to the book says as much) - it is a bit adolescent, some things seem kinda forced, etc. Really what saves it for me is David Lloyd's artwork, which is amazing, particularly in the latter third of the book that revolves around the Almond/Heyer/Evey's boyfriend Gordon subplots... speaking of which, I think that's where the story really shows how fucked up it is to live in such a society - shortages, black market, ruled by thugs, reduced to prostitution and constantly living in fear, no freedom of mobility or speech. Really it bears more of a resemblance to Soviet Russia (particularly immediately after the collapse of the regime) than anything else. Its the cabaret scene where Bunny gets beaten to death that's the most effective indictment of the dystopia.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:35 (eighteen years ago) link

(er, not Bunny, I forget what the character's name is... Bunny is the guy from the Ear, I think...?)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:36 (eighteen years ago) link

The reviews are all over the place--and seldom harping on/celebrating the same things.
This is a good sign.

― Grey, Ian (IanBrooklyn), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:36 (eighteen years ago) link

then there's this bit, reposted from the NY Post:

Portman Bold ... and Bald ... in 'V for Vendetta'
Thursday, March 16, 2006
By Michael Kane

Natalie Portman, why must you grow up? You were just so perfectly pixie, skating around and doing the "doo, da-doo, da-doo" from that Lou Reed tune in "Beautiful Girls," or getting teary-eyed at a funeral for a hamster in "Garden State."

Now you're playing a gangsta rapper on "Saturday Night Live" and blowing up British Parliament in "V for Vendetta."

And, Natalie, can we talk about the hair? Does a nice girl go out and get her head shaved?

Meet the radical new Natalie, 24 years old and graduated from Harvard. Out of "Star Wars." And out to change the world, one subversive psychodrama at a time...

and it goes on, etc

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:42 (eighteen years ago) link

can i just say, as boring an opinion as it may be, that having seen ms portman make the talk show rounds this past week, that she is the most beautiful woman i have ever seen?

i have never seen her give a good performance in a movie, however.

― amateurist0, Friday, 17 March 2006 17:48 (eighteen years ago) link

Am v. excited to go see this Saturday.

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 17 March 2006 17:51 (eighteen years ago) link

http://img133.imagevenue.com/loc24/th_87423_sey_10.jpg http://img23.imagevenue.com/loc24/th_87460_sey_12.jpg

― amateurist0, Friday, 17 March 2006 17:57 (eighteen years ago) link

http://img128.imagevenue.com/loc24/th_87523_sey_18.jpg

― amateurist0, Friday, 17 March 2006 18:04 (eighteen years ago) link

http://www.theastrocowboy.com/Mlist/awwyc.gif

― amateurist0, Friday, 17 March 2006 18:06 (eighteen years ago) link

http://www.qag.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/image/21818/Mighty_Peking_Man_1977.jpg

help me out here dudes

― amateurist0, Friday, 17 March 2006 18:10 (eighteen years ago) link

OK i saw the movie tonight ... and all i have to say is

― vahid (vahid), Saturday, 18 March 2006 09:04 (eighteen years ago) link

Well, I liked it!

Anyone else think the guy playing the ranting TV journalist had modelled his look and mannerisms rather closely on Christopher Hitchens?

― Soukesian, Saturday, 18 March 2006 11:25 (eighteen years ago) link

i thought it was pretty good too. in a lot of ways it improved on the comic book, i thought. i was really glad they got rid of the whole subplot where the high chancellor falls in love with his computer. and the gordon stuff was much more interesting. did not care for the ending though, much weaker than in the original.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Saturday, 18 March 2006 15:07 (eighteen years ago) link

also i wonder why they made evey a nice young tv worker instead of a desperate girl out to turn her first trick.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Saturday, 18 March 2006 15:08 (eighteen years ago) link

I didn't like this very much at all. VERY forced, and Portman was terrible.

― The Brainwasher (Twilight), Saturday, 18 March 2006 18:00 (eighteen years ago) link

i liked it a lot

― kingfish da notorious teletabby (kingfish 2.0), Saturday, 18 March 2006 18:04 (eighteen years ago) link

I liked it okay. I'm still trying to decide why I didn't like it a lot -- probably the accumulation of small dumbnesses and inconsistencies. But overall it was pretty good.

― pixel farmer (Rock Hardy), Saturday, 18 March 2006 18:21 (eighteen years ago) link

I didn't like it at all, except for Fry and Rea. Politically, I found it pretty suspicious. It's like a Y2K-bunker-mentalist's fantasy movie ("The government are poisoning our water supply!").

― Chuck_Tatum (Chuck_Tatum), Saturday, 18 March 2006 19:33 (eighteen years ago) link

The best comic adaptation I have ever seen.

It totally kicked @$$ and I'm going to see it again!

― Michael Vanier, Saturday, 18 March 2006 20:12 (eighteen years ago) link

wow this movie was totally shitty. and i loved the comic.

― chaki (chaki), Saturday, 18 March 2006 23:55 (eighteen years ago) link

Ladies and gentlemen, it looks like the panel is split right down the middle on this one.

― Soukesian, Sunday, 19 March 2006 00:02 (eighteen years ago) link

I really am baffled that anyone sees anything special about this movie.

― The Brainwasher (Twilight), Sunday, 19 March 2006 00:43 (eighteen years ago) link

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