Post by HStorm on Mar 19, 2006 22:25:35 GMT
Another film I saw the other day. (It has substantial political implications, but isn't written by any prominent political commentator, so I've posted this in the Off-Topic forum instead.) V For Vendetta is a future dystopia set in London twenty years from now. I wrote up the following thoughts about the movie for the Gunpowder Plot Society website...
Well, I saw the film yesterday. In terms of the overall plot, it was really just Nineteen Eighty-Four redrafted for the post-Thatcherism era. Don't get me wrong, it's still enthralling for all that, it's just after you've watched it you'll probably get the feeling you saw it all last time you watched Blake's 7.
I think the acting was quite dodgy, at least in the first half an hour. As Evey, Natalie Portman does a passable English Rose accent, but she can't quite get the manner of an English girl right; in emotional moments Evey sounds very American in the force she puts into her lines, even though the accent sounds English.
Similarly, some of the dialogue isn't written too carefully. The writers have done the right thing in as much as the colloquial slang is British rather than American, but there's still too much of it and written with the kind of forcefulness you'd get in L.A., not in London. People are saying, "Damn it!" at the tops of their voices far too often to be Brits. It's clear in the early stages of the movie that some of the actors are feeling a bit awkward, although they seem to get used to it eventually.
Top acting credits go to John Hurt (has he ever acted badly in his life?), and to Stephen Fry for proving he really can do a serious role if he puts his mind to it.
So, onto the details more relevant to this site; -
The portrayal of Fawkes' arrest at the beginning was painfully inaccurate. (This was probably just for dramatic effect, but I still feel uneasy when movies do things like that.) They had him arrested while he was carting the powder into Parliament's cellars, when in truth he'd gotten that done weeks earlier, they had him resisting arrest by drawing a sword and fighting the palace guards, when in truth he surrendered straight away and tried to bareface his way out of it by claiming to be 'John Johnson', and when he was hanged, there was no sign whatsoever that he'd been through days of blood-curdling torture.
Folks, don't watch this film if you want a history lesson!
But do watch it if you're looking for politically-insightful entertainment, there's no denying it does a fair job of that.
I think the acting was quite dodgy, at least in the first half an hour. As Evey, Natalie Portman does a passable English Rose accent, but she can't quite get the manner of an English girl right; in emotional moments Evey sounds very American in the force she puts into her lines, even though the accent sounds English.
Similarly, some of the dialogue isn't written too carefully. The writers have done the right thing in as much as the colloquial slang is British rather than American, but there's still too much of it and written with the kind of forcefulness you'd get in L.A., not in London. People are saying, "Damn it!" at the tops of their voices far too often to be Brits. It's clear in the early stages of the movie that some of the actors are feeling a bit awkward, although they seem to get used to it eventually.
Top acting credits go to John Hurt (has he ever acted badly in his life?), and to Stephen Fry for proving he really can do a serious role if he puts his mind to it.
So, onto the details more relevant to this site; -
The portrayal of Fawkes' arrest at the beginning was painfully inaccurate. (This was probably just for dramatic effect, but I still feel uneasy when movies do things like that.) They had him arrested while he was carting the powder into Parliament's cellars, when in truth he'd gotten that done weeks earlier, they had him resisting arrest by drawing a sword and fighting the palace guards, when in truth he surrendered straight away and tried to bareface his way out of it by claiming to be 'John Johnson', and when he was hanged, there was no sign whatsoever that he'd been through days of blood-curdling torture.
Folks, don't watch this film if you want a history lesson!
But do watch it if you're looking for politically-insightful entertainment, there's no denying it does a fair job of that.