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V for Vendetta

Posted: Sat Aug 19, 2006 9:56 pm
by snoopy
I'm curious to know what you guys thought about the political statements that this movie made.

I'm bothered by the portrayal of conservatives in it. It labels the government as \"conservative\" and insinuates a \"Christian\" government, and then continues to portray a government doing just about everything that the church stands against.

The other part I find troubling in the movie is that the move at the end seems almost toward chaos. True, V died, so one tyrant would not be replaced with another, but I can only imagine the lawlessness that would ensue is no government where established to replace the old one. The theme swings too far in the other direction, in my opinion. In general, V leads an extremely hypocritical role- where the established government is condemned for their means, while V uses the same means, to a different end, and is applauded for it.

I realise that it just a movie, but the idea of people latching on to these ideas as true in the real world scares me. Thoughts? Did everyone dismiss the movie as a fictional tale, or where others bothered by it, too?

Posted: Sat Aug 19, 2006 11:41 pm
by Duper
I haven't seen it. Never heard of it, but that point of view is becoming more previlent.

I suspect it will only get worse.

Posted: Sun Aug 20, 2006 12:26 am
by Kilarin
Great line: \"People shouldn't be afraid of their government; government should be afraid of the people\"

They removed the pro-drug message from the comic, which improved the story for me, but they also messed up a bunch of other stuff.

And, worst of all, they tried too hard to politicize it. Ok, Ok, yes, its a POLITICAL story, but they wanted to make it match their own agenda. For example, the entire sub plot about how the virus scare that caused England to go totalitarian turned out to have been perpetrated by the government just to scare the people. <sigh> It was a blatantly obvious attempt to say that 9-11 had been fake, which is not only a load of malarkey, but messed up a vitally important message from the original comic.

In the comic book, England had GOOD REASONS to be scared. But the totalitarian government they shifted to was a bigger threat to the people of England than whatever they had originally been threatened by. THAT is a very important message for today. The \"V\" movie messed it up.

Posted: Sun Aug 20, 2006 12:27 am
by Foil
It was actually quite good, as far as entertainment value.

As far as the political statements it seemed to make, I took most of them in the context of the film: a tyrannical government whose leaders rule by fear, murder any who oppose them, and (as you find out late in the film) murder vast civilian populations via a super-virus. Some of the terminology used for the tyrannical government sounded like common \"conservative/religious\" terms, but I'm not sure it was directed at the U.S. conservative viewpoint.

The thing that bothered me, was just what you pointed out, Snoopy. Although they seemed to temper it by making efforts not to hurt civilians, the protagonists of the film were using ultra-destructive, violent means to draw attention to their cause. It was essentially a statement that, \"As long as the desired end is good enough, then that end justifies the means.\" And that statement bothers me.