But surely you would know that, with a title like **DID-YOU-LIKE . . . ** that the thread was not intended for you and if you decided to venture in it would be at your own risk?
Spoiler boxes are a pet peeve of mine because:
I think they’re over-used. When I want to avoid spoilers I tend to stay away from ANY discussion of the subject matter.
My browser hates them, thus this thread has been a nightmare of trying to figure out what the hell everyone is talking about.
I just saw this movie tonight, and I enjoyed it – I think I’ll read the graphic novel next. I wish they had gone a little deeper with V’s character, but I was satisfied and I thought the issues the movie raised were interesting. I also thought it was beautifully shot.
I have one question, though. Near the end, when Evey is dancing with V, she’s wearing a shirt and skirt. Then, in the subway station, she’s in a blue jumpsuit. And then, when she sends V on the train away to glory, she’s back in the shirt and skirt. Is that supposed to indicate that her final goodbye to V was…what? An illusion? Not in chronological order? Was that just an editing mistake? (I sincerely hope not – it’s so obvious.)
Was this established better in the comic book, and I missed it in the movie? I don’t remember any establishing scenes in the movie. As I say, I didn’t watch it all that closely.
Well, that’s true, and since I didn’t read the comic, maybe I didn’t have the background I needed to appreciate/understand the appeal of the movie.
But ISTM that a movie needs to appeal on its own. If the film makers expect me to offer up that special willing suspension of disbelief, they have to offer something in the film to make me want to do this - an interesting character, some justification that makes sense in the context of the film up to that point, something. V for Vendetta didn’t seem to do this - just presented the character in the Guy Fawkes mask and said, in essence, “Here you go - listen up to this character’s pontifications and don’t ask too many questions”.
That’s something I liked about the Harry Potter films (if that is not too much of a hijack). I am thinking especially of a shot in The Goblet of Fire movie, where Harry and his friends have Apparated to the location of the Quidditch World Cup. They are coming up over a hill, and as they go over the crest, the scene opens up and you see the vast encampment of wizards. And you are drawn into the magical world. Much like going into Diagon Alley in the first film. From zoom to pan, from the limited and painful world that Harry grew up in to the vast unknown of the wizarding world. And you have an interesting or sympathetic character (Hagrid in the first film, the Weasleys in HPatGoF) to carry you in.
Nothing like that in V, I thought. Maybe, as I said, if I had read the comic. But based on the movie, I have no particular desire to.
Regards,
Shodan
Well, it’s clearly established that V disguised himself as Rookwood, and you can assume that Evey’s interrogator(s) are V because the voices are similar.
In regards to my earlier question – uhhh, never mind. I just watched the making-of and I could see that the blue jumpsuit was really a blue coat over her shirt and skirt.
Oh, I love it.
I saw it in the theatre upon release (I don’t go out to the movies much anymore, for reasons amply elucidated in a fresh Pit thread every couple of weeks). I loved it then. I left the theatre thinking “Damn, I have to get the DVD just to turn on the captions so I can catch every word.”
I’ll confess I was a bit nervous though. I went to see “The Matrix” in the theatre, and thought it was cool as hell. Sci-Fi? Check. Wicked action shots I’d never seen before? Check. Brain-bending comments on the nature of reality? Check. Hot woman in leather kicking ass? Check. When the DVD came out, it was a no-brainer to purchase it. So I settle down to watch it at home, expecting a glorious evening, and, now that I had seen it once (months ago), all I saw this time through were the flaws and gaping plot holes. It was a disappointment. I was worried that the same thing might be true with “V”.
I bought it the first week it was out, and just finished watching it for the 4th time on DVD, and I like it more than ever.
Hugo Weaving was just fantastic. I have no superlatives sufficient for the job he did. Here is an actor, locked into a mask and obscuring outfit, who manages, purely through inflection and body language, to create an emotional, complex character. I would swear that static mask had at least one hundred different expressions. I was amazed in the theatre, and am even MORE amazed after repeated viewings. Mind, I’m not claiming he is the greatest actor since Edwin Booth—I recognize the absurdity in that I grant greatness to an actor able to overcome the confines of a rigid mask, when I would take the same actor to task for being too rigid in other films when he wasn’t wearing a mask…
Hey, never once in this movie was I compelled to add a mental “Mr. Anderson” to the end of his lines, unlike in a certain fantasy trilogy…
I was also (moderately) impressed by Portman (I was grading on the curve). I thought she was marginal in everything I’ve seen her in but “Garden State”, but she did a decent job in this one. (Note—I’m talking about acting and roles here—not about how she looked in a torn shirt—that is an entirely different classification 8-0) I liked Stephen Rea (Finch) better, but, if your DVD player has a good freeze frame and step motion, Portman rolling off the bed in the “schoolgirl seduce the bishop” scene is much more interesting—hint hint, wink is as good as a nudge, eh?
As to the plot holes? Well, I’m about to argue both sides and pretend it is all good. First off, I never read the graphic novel, so I’m only going by the movie. From what I saw in the movie, I’m assuming a few things (yeah, I know, when you make an assumption, you are ass-humping…erm, wait, *that’s not right….)So my movie-assumptions (mostly unsupported by the actual movie—we’re talking things I decided on a whim)are:
All that said, there are still a few groaners. Check out Creedy’s magical revolver in the tubes…
–jack
The superhuman abilities are explicitly stated in the movie. The burns, however, are clearly from the fire.
If any, the latter.
I think it’s made totally clear that V caused the fire to break out.
This is exactly the case in the graphic novel.
I just watched the movie for the third time, and noticed that there is a nod to this concept in that Evey says “Do you like music?” to mr Finch, just like V did to Evey the night they met.
Impossibly dull, pretentious movie,* although nowhere near as bad as Ultraviolet. Main character looks like the Burger King and seems to be addicted to long, mumbling speeches about nothing in particular.
My first reaction after seeing it was that I must have missed a lot of the subtext and that’s why I disliked it. After reading around the 'net, I was mistaken. I mostly got it…and was still bored out of my mind.
Just not my cup of tea. It would have been greatly improved by being about an hour shorter and full of gratuitous nudity.
It’s the best movie with a message done for years. If you don’t get the message, it’s because you are just another sheep amongst the flock.
Rats fight
Bees sting
Bullets strike
And tigers spring
While love whispers
Money talks
But Guy Fawkes
Guy Fawkes
Must burn!
Burn!
Burn!
Penny for the Guy
Penny for the Guy
Penny for the poor old penniless Guy
He was a failure
Didn’t have a cent
Couldn’t even blow up
Parliament!
Advice: This stuff doesn’t go so well around here, whether you’re serious or just being ironic (I’m betting on the latter but these days you never know).
It wasn’t my intention to cause any discomfort. For that, I apologize.
As to which party is responsible for the viral attacks, I think it is purposely left ambiguous. Anyone else share this thought?
I hope a week isn’t too long for resurrecting this thread. Honestly, I’ve had the DVD for longer than that and just gotten around to watching it last night!
I thought it was a pretty intense movie, really well done and it reminded me a lot of 1984. The scenes of Natalie Portman getting “processed” and tortured were too much for me - her crying seemed very real, not your typical action movie heroine stoicism. I couldn’t watch that. And even if V could argue that it made her a stronger person, yadda yadda, so had his ordeal but I doubt he’d have CHOSEN it like it was chosen for her. That seemed really hypocritical. It just made him kind of a sick fuck and lowered him immeasurably in my estimation. I would have shot him in the face first chance I got if I were her.
I, too, was SO HAPPY that V was never unmasked - it avoided a cliche, but mostly because I didn’t want/need to see just HOW horribly mutilated he was.
No one’s mentioned the gay/lesbian substory, which, being a lesbian I found to be particularly horrifying. It’s still depressing me, partly because in the deep reaches of my paranoid subconscious, I fear I could live to see the day wherein it would happen here. And, as in most movies, all the gay characters were eventually murdered sigh. Heroic, yes, but dead nonetheless. I advised my spousette not to watch it and sent it back to Netflix, because I know she’d be poppin’ Ambien for a month if she watched it.
I’m getting the graphic novel though.
Good this is still going - I’ve only just seen the movie, and am a huge fan of the comic.
Loved the movie, but can understand why Moore was pissed off, as there’s a lot changed and left out, not all of which can be justified just to modernise things (for instance, I miss the whole subplot about the cop’s widow who actually kills the dictator at the end). I’m really glad the Valerie story is still there, though. I thought that was very well-handled.
I thought it was very well acted, and conveyed a message that , even if not the same as the comic, I at least didn’t find too dumbed down and offensive. A lot of the difference in tone is by making Portman’s Evey a lot stronger and more independent that comic-Evey. Didn’t mind that at all.
Don’t know why this was spoilerboxed - but when did he use a sai? All I ever saw were double-edged daggers with a distinctly triangular blade, not the parallel edges of a sai.