R for Review
I can't believe that no review I've read so far of V for Vendetta has mentioned its close cousin, Brazil, possibly my favourite film ever.
They all talk about 1984, which isn't exactly surprising, as Brazil itself uses 1984 as its jumping-off point. More about this later...
V For Vendetta's story is very simple. It's the UK, in the near future. A fascist government has come to power via a set of machinations in which the fear surrounding a series of 'terrorist attacks' gave the government (and one man in particular) huge executive powers to rule the country as he sees fit. Curfew is imposed, soldiers and corrupt policemen roam the streets. The single media outlet (the British Television Network) spouts patriotric and anti-dissenting vitriol via a very Bill O'Reilly-ish mouthpiece. Into the fray steps Evey (Natalie Portman), a lowly office worker at the BTN, whose parents suffered at the hands of the government. An ill-advised evening walk sees her falling into the hands of some aggressive policemen, only to be saved Batman-style by a man in a long coat and Guy Fawkes mask, calling himself 'V'. He takes her back to his Batcave where he has a collection of forbidden art, and they talk. And talk. And talk. If you remember the endless conversation of nonsense between Neo and The Architect in the second Matrix film, Reloaded, you get a feeling for these scenes.
[SPOILERS - skip this paragraph if you don't want to know the end of the film]
A series of these exchanges takes Evey through a personal transformation that leads her into collaborating with V to destroy the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, not to kill people (although he does manage to enact some personal revenge on the people in the government who led him into his mask-wearing state), but as a symbol for everyone in England, to mark a change. Along the way, love is declared, opinions declaimed, Evey gets her head shaved, people we like die, the bad guys get it, and stuff gets all blowed up. [END SPOILERS]
My favourite character in the film was Finch, Stephen Rea's chief inspector character, because he travels the furthest across the length of the movie. Finch is in the very upper echelons of the corrupt government, and at the end of the film is clearly on V's side. We're supposed to sympathise with Evey and her journey, but since she'd already suffered the government injustice first-hand, knew what they might be capable of, it doesn't seem like a stretch for her at the end to collaborate with V as she does, although the film puts her through the ringer to get there.
The film was adapted from a comic book that was written back during Thatcher-era Britain. Comic books as an art form have really come into their own in the last twenty years, but I feel that they do not translate well onto the screen without considerable adapting, unless like Sin City, they commit whole-heartedly to making what I call a 'moving comic book' rather than a fully realised film. Perhaps I've not read enough graphic novels, but in the ones I have read, subtlety is not a word that springs to mind. Characters can't just be bad - they have to be puppy-killing, hate-spewing humourless caricatures. The heroes are also humourless, tortured in ways that we are constantly reminded of, page after page. And the film suffered from some of the same heavy-handed approach, hitting us over the head with what it wanted to say. For instance, the cops who assault Evey in the street aren't just corrupt, they're sexual assaulters as well, as if we needed that to tell us they were unsavoury. V's backstory comes out over the length of the film, but once revealed, the film never assumes that we'll remember it later, it keeps flashing back to it as if our attention spans are like goldfish, denying us the chance to see parallels between the different threads in the film, hitting us over the head with them instead.
V For Vendetta felt frustratingly like a missed opportunity. There's never been a better time for a big budget movie tackling the notions of patriotism, repressive governments, the limits of power, the responsibility of the individual in a society, and terrorism, to come out in the USA. People (not just Bay Area activists) are unhappy with the way the war is going and discomfited by the feelings dredged up by the war and everything that has happened subsequently. It's not as simple as disliking George Bush's policies and seeking an alternative in the Democratic position - they too are floundering around trying to come up with a distinct point of view, and in doing it's clear they're driven by the same interests that the Republicans are, the drive for power, the fear of appearing unpatriotic, the fear of going against the tide, not any kind of notions of what is right for the citizens of this country or any other. When V For Vendetta blows some stuff up and does the messy business for us, it cheats us out of truly examining our position in society and our responsibilities as individuals towards the condition of that society.
A film that I think tackles all these problems, takes us on a more personal journey, and ends up on a much more honest note is, no surprise after the first line of this entry, Brazil. In Brazil, the corruption is more subtle, and more real - bureaucracy, paperwork, information, those are the weapons the Government yields. There's surveillance, tracking, departments of 'Information Retrieval' and 'Information Dispersal'. Government offices have vast lobbies, huge fascistic statues dot the city. Unseen and unknown terrorists plant bombs in public places, restaurants, department stores. Posters admonish people to 'Don't suspect a friend, report him' and 'Suspicion breeds confidence'. Most people go about their daily business in the world trying to keep out of the way of trouble. The only supposed terrorist we are introduced to in the film is Tuttle, played by Robert De Niro, his only crime to live as an independent heating technician, defiantly off the information grid that the government uses to maintain order. Into all this steps Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce), a lowly Ministry of Information employee with a well-connected mother, and friends encouraging him to take the career opportunities available to him, to move up through the system, even while he claims to be happy at the bottom of the ladder. Outwardly expressing satisfaction, nonetheless his dreams are of soaring above the earth, of heroically fighting faceless demons and giants to rescue the woman he loves. His dreams express defiant individualism and pursuit of personal fulfillment, feelings that simmer below the surface of his workaday life. When he catches a glimpse of his dream girl out in the waking world, he pursues her. As he comes closer to realising his personal ambitions and becoming a fully realised individual, the more trouble he gets into with the government, to the point where he himself is considered a terrorist, and tortured during interrogation beyond breaking point. The pursuit of happiness indeed.
What Brazil manages to do that V For Vendetta does not is show both the horror and humour in a government that sees all its citizens as potential terrorists. The deputy minister chides the terrorists for not being gentlemen and sighs, "..if they would just play by the rules". Much of this macabre humour comes from ex-Monty Python director Terry Gilliam's gift for art-direction and design, and in Jonathan Pryce's impeccable performance as the everyman Lowry. Making the film not about a specific country or place, and showing the effects of an burdensome and paranoid bureaucracy on ordinary people's lives, it makes its themes universal without hitting you over the head with them. And, I'm warning you now, Brazil does not have a happy ending.
So, go rent Brazil.
V For Vendetta | Brazil | Movies | Guy Fawkes
