V For VendettaMovie. The impressions that came to mind: Overwrought, overhyped, overrated...
It is that kind of a movie with run-of-the-mill themes that the public* loves: anti-establishment ideals , guerilla tactics, violence, revenge, the underdog...
It's been done to death previously. In films, in books, in comic books and more. Nothing new under the sun really. Nothing revolutionary except a paper-thin plot of explosions and sophomoric dialogue disguised as wit.
However, really, what's new under the sun? How
clichéd can this get? The comic may have been an alarmist dagger thrust in the face of the Thatcher administration of the eighties but in today's context and Homeland Security? Really now.
The comic by the highly regarded Alan Moore and David Lloyd is a concoction from the eighties, a period of Thatcherite excesses as leftists would have it. With its rather lacklustre drawings, a step above Beano but lacking the charm, the whole work is a drag to say the least.
The many subplots, each detailing the obsessions and perversions of the elites and common people actually detract from the main plot which is paper thin but they do well to disguise it.Guy Fawkes? The Gunpowder Plot? Yes, remember him. However, what does he really stand for? Roman Catholic conspirators attempting to blow up the king and the parliament? Religious fanatics using violence to achieve their ends? Is that what is celebrated? In this age of Islamists wearing belt-bombs?
Lastly, the irony regarding the whole 'V for Vendetta' phenomena is the huge corporate machinery that is sustaining this effort, a packaged anti-establishment message geared towards exciting the masses with vanilla revolutionary thoughts, perhaps, to sate the 'bloodlust' of the downtrotten. The 'underground' for sale. Doh...
If one wants something really anti-establishment and revolutionary, there are many many tomes with inflammatory** and strong messages that are truly something, not this inoffensive day-glo piece of work.
V For Vendetta: It's the safe, beautifully packaged*** 'underground' for the middle-class, the secretly rebellious, with repressed anger at bosses, teachers and what have you. And C, is for Cliché.
*Don't forget the pseudo-intellectual. 'We know...no one else but us knows.'
** At least to the authorities.
*** In all senses of the word. Physically as well as literary and conceptually.
4 comments:
IIRC, the movie's prologue introduce Guy Fawkes as a... (wait for it!)... FOLK HERO. No wonder Alan Moore is so effin' pissed off!
I did enjoy the comic for its efforts in presenting a 'serious' story - the story of the gay woman who died in the cell next to V was pretty affecting - but in the movie, the moment was jarred by the censors' attempt to not let us see two girls kiss on screen.
'ARE YOU ENTERTAINED?!'
yes.
P.S. My 'word verification' reads: scpmmgff ... that's roughly what I muttered when I heard the 'folk hero' bit. :P
I think the writing for the comic's brilliant. Yes, it's dated, but that's no fault of the comic. If anything, it's the fault of wannabe's.
Moore pissed off! I can imagine it. Yes, the comic did present a serious story, a political one, a story that shows a fascist of the near future. The story of the gay woman was probably the strongest and most touching bit of the whole comic. Heheh. Well, some years ago our censors did censor a scene Xena kissed her sidekick in a bathtub...
I wonder about it being dated too. Equating a Thatcher administration to that of a facist state? That is a bit rich... This is already very derivative when it first came out. Perhaps just not in a comic book format.
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