Martybear (V For Vendetta)
V For Vendetta
Directed by James McTeigue
Screenplay by Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski
Based on a graphic novel by Alan Moore
Sometimes my lameness surprises even me. Having spent several years pointedly NOT reading V for Vendetta based on the erroneous assumption that it was going to, in some way, bastardize my fond childhood recollections of Dr. Seuss (A is for Air Assault, B is for Bomb, C is for the Cannon fire at the break of dawn… *shudder*), I finally buckled and queued it up on Netflix. It was the one time that seeing Alan Moore’s name attached to a project actually made me resistant to experiencing it.
In the end I relented; curiosity has always been my weakness. There was another problem, though. I, and I’m guessing most Americans, had no idea who Guy Fawkes was. So, of course, I wondered if he was made up for the story or an actual folk hero. Turns out that “Remember, remember the fifth of November” is not just a cleverly constructed rhyme, but an actual historical event in England, which might be just enough to earn this flick the dubious description “inspired by actual events”.
Go figure!
As the story unfolds we find that England is the last bastion of civilization in the world, dystopia though it may be. A fascist theocracy has locked all the doors, barred all the gates, and their god has seen fit to provide for the people’s meager survival. Enter V, stage right. A virtuous vigilante played to vaudevillian perfection by Hugo Weaving. V is a guy in desperate need of a new thesaurus. His old one seems to be down to just the V’s. Verily, his visage veiled beneath a veneer of vagaries, our vigilante acts as vanguard…
Crap, now I’m doing it too!
What I meant to say was this masked vigil… erm… guy. Masked guy. He, on his way to revel in his own genius feat of domestic terrorism, finds a young girl who is about to have a very bad night at hands of some crooked cops. Well, not really their hands… more like their… authority.
You know what? Moving on.
Anyway, masked man saves a young girls… *sigh* virtue, and the two of them flit away to listen to some music, do some dancing, and blow up as many government buildings as possible. There’s a larger point to all of this, of course. We can’t very well blow things up without a reason. What kind of lesson would that teach our kids? But if we can have some grand, poetic purpose and only blow up the people who deserve it, well then the sky’s the limit!
For some inexplicable reason, the police arm of the fascist neo-conservative regime can’t seem to find this destructive duo’s lavishly appointed bat-cave—despite it being located within spitting distance of a bus stop. We’re lead to believe that this is because all police work in England is micro-managed by a big shouting head (John “Anything For a Nickel” Hurt) that tells people what to find and where to find it. Unable to adapt to the fact that this isn’t the best way to run an investigation, Big Brother’s spanking arm sits impotently by whilst, one-by-one, all the top ranking officials of the regime are systematically assassinated—proving once and for all that the Republican party will inevitably be defeated by it’s own old stodginess.
Yes, it’s time to stop beating about the Bush. A shouting head tells people what to believe. Bible-thumping pedagogues get their way. Homosexuals are outlawed and persecuted. Military installations do what they please in the name of public safety. A listless and apathetic middle class blindly accepts the yoke placed upon them.
This movie isn’t about a British anarchist uprising as much as it is about thinly veiled, left-wing propaganda. Interesting, considering the timing of the DVD release—around the height of the 2006 mid-term election campaign season—although, I am the first to admit that I’m probably reading too much into that.
The bottom line is that the movie is an enjoyable experience. The acting was fine and the story was human. It might be lacking the purity of Orwellian tragedy that Moore had originally intended, but Hollywood needs neat endings. That’s what sells.
Review by Martybear