Okay. I’ve been following the trailers, and re-reading the graphic novel. A lot. I squeed a lot when I saw the first trailers, but then…
Originally opening November 5. Important to the plot! Cool day to open it…
Then moved to March. The dumping ground for movies you figure aren’t gonna make it.
Okay, I can live with that.
Now trailer #2. Some minor changes (like why Evie is out so late), but doable… But then…
An army of V’s?! NOOOOOOO!
I mean… Isn’t… That… Totaly anti the actual story? I keep praying it’s the nightmare or hallucination of one of the characters… But I suspect it isn’t…
Please, please someone explain this to me in a way that won’t make me hang my head and weep!
What are you talking about? I can’t find anything on IMDB about a forthcoming movie titled V. What would it be? An adaptation of the piece-of-shit SF miniseries from 1983? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085106/
The OP is referring to V for Vendetta, a film adaptation of a much lauded graphic novel by Alan Moore and David Lloyd. I haven’t read it–graphic novels aren’t really my cup of tea–but the word is that the Wachoski Brothers (of The Matrix fame/infamy) have significantly altered plot elements and that the film has gone back to major editing a couple of times owing to poor test screenings. (Plus, as I indicate [post=6161638]here[/post], they’ve made Natalie Portman appear in her list attractive visage to ever grace the screen.) Since they’ve shifted release to the January though March crap movie dumping ground, we can guess that the distributing studio (Warner Brothers) either doesn’t have any faith in it, or doesn’t understand how to distribute it (given their recent past poor marketing movies with films like Spartan and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, it could be either/or). But odds are that the film will be critically panned and disappear like a bad magic act.
Pity; I rather like dystopian stories, though they don’t generally do well at the box office (Brazil, 1984, Strange Days).
I’ve read V for Vendetta several times. I liked it a lot, although I have to say that graphic novels are my cup of tea. I expect that Hollywood will butcher it (if it hasn’t already) the same way they screwed up Judge Dredd and Tank Girl. Natalie Portman is a terrible choice to play the heroine. Sigh.
I think that Hollywood has a real problem putting English writing on the screen. US comics and pop novels do well, but US directors seem incapable of understanding English culture.
My advice to SDMBers is to avoid the movie in droves, and spend your money instead on the original novel. The artwork is a bit retro by today’s standards, but the writing is simply blistering.
…ignore the nay-sayers. Early preview screenings at the Aint it Cool Butt numb a thon apparently left viewers wowed. From an early review:
…If your a fan of the graphics novel, I don’t see the harm in dropping a few dollars to go see the movie. If you end up hating it, feel free to sue me. However, a call to “avoid the movie in droves” seems unwarrented for anything but the most appalling of movies, and from the sounds of things this movie will be anything but.
Yes, but that’s Aint it Cool News, aka the movie site to ignore. I’m waiting for a reputable news source to say something positive, not a website known for overweight nerds talking about how Spiderman makes them cum in their pants.
I’m reminded of a joke from America: The Book in which Thomas Pynchon sued the makers of the TV series, a case which was heard five times (The final case was V v. V V).
…many people saw it at the preview screening, and the buzz was pretty damm good: so just because the review turned up on the AICN site, it is not a reason to dismiss it outright. Do you suggest that people avoid the movie in droves, as 633squadron has suggested? Or should people give the movie a chance?
I’m saying neither. Merely that I shall ignore any press that comes from AICN and wait to see what a reputable source has to say before I decide to see it.
I think you’ve got that backwards. AICN, like all the many nerdtopias on the Internerd, is a place where they’re gibbering to dislike anything based on a comic book or other extant source material no matter its actual charms. If the dweebs there dig it, that means they can find nothing to criticize in either the movie-cum-movie or in its success as an adaptation. And given how much folks of that stripe love to savage stuff in adaptations that doesn’t exactly mirror the way they think it should be (“Organic web shooters? THOSE BASTARDS!”), the fact that the hypercriterati are on board says, IMHO, the exact opposite of what you think it says.
–Cliffy
P.S. Hypercriterati – I’ll have to remember that one.
My standard urge to smack someone upside the head whenever they assume that every comic book is about superheroes is sublimated in this instance by my uncontrollable giggling at the idea of V being considered a superhero.
What are you talking about? I can’t find anything on IMDB about a forthcoming movie titled V. What would it be? An adaptation of the piece-of-shit SF miniseries from 1983? 
However, a call to “avoid the movie in droves” seems unwarrented for anything but the most appalling of movies, and from the sounds of things this movie will be anything but.