V for Very Fucking Annoying

[angelophile]

So, I finished work about 8 tonight, despite the deadline, so thought it'd be nice to go see a movie or something and relax. Decided to go see V for Vendetta, despite the missed reports I'd heard.

I walked out of the cinema half an hour ago and still feel like punching someone VERY HARD In the face.

I loathed this movie.

I despised this movie.

This movie was bullshit.



Oh, don't get me wrong, this wasn't a BAD movie. Okay, some parts were very bad indeed. Sorry Natalie, but you still act like a piece of wood and your final goodbye for V was a cheesefest that should have had everyone who complained that Star Wars prequels were corny on their feet and screaming at the screen). No, this movie transcended badness and became a new level of annoying.

From the moment V appeared onscreen I hated it.

From the moment he SPOKE, I hated it more.

From the moment he hijacked a TV station and beamed his bollocks into everyone's houses and people stared enraptured at the TV sets like he was saying something GREAT I wanted to reach out and slap someone.

From the moment he brutally murdered a bunch of policemen moments later, I was close to walking out.

But I stuck with it. And then the movie started to pick up.

Then V appeared again.

I don't think I've hated a fictional character so much for a long time.

You know things are bad when you start rooting for the mass murdering fascists.

Now, I say there's been mixed reviews on this. Mostly mixed by nationality. Most US guys who've seen it seemed to enjoy it. Most Brits didn't, despite it being set here with a strong British cast.

I'd like to think it's because most Brits think like I do – that it's going take more than a poncy, pretentious prick in a stupid hat who tortures young girls and pretends it's some kind of life affirming exercise to start everyone rioting on the streets of Luton.

The ending was that bad.

Yeah, people power, we get it. Nice idea but fucking hell, you could have had everyone in the V masks suddenly break into a chorus of "Let's Face The Music And Dance" with a big musical finale and it couldn't have been any more gut wrenchingly, sugary, bullshity sweet.

Are you getting how much I hated it yet?

No one would follow V. He's a prick. He's a smart arse, murdering prick that thinks he knows what's best for everyone and as such, the Brits in the audience probably knew that ending was bullshit. If he'd addressed the nation there probably would have been a fair few feet through TV screens. We're more likely to rise up in anarchy and follow Matthew Kelly than we would be that flouncing, pretentious little arsewipe.

…

As a piece of film making it was acceptable. Far too many slow mo bits trying to make things look kewl. Yeah, rose, we get it. No need to go all slow mo and arty on me. And sorry, but I really don't thing watching a guy kill a load of people in excruciatingly violent slow motion makes you want to sympathise with the murdering, silly hatted freak.

But, the movie did look lovely and amongst the supposed message there were some admirable performances. Oh, Hugo Weaving was massively annoying. Maybe it was just the characters but please, shut up. But I have to say Stephen Rea was wonderfully downbeat, Tim Pigott-Smith as Creedy was unbelievably sleezy, corrupt and hateful. The stand out scenes were with Stephen Fry who was wonderfully likable and witty as well as bringing real pathos to the role of the tragic Gordon.

So, it wasn't all bad. In terms of the actor's performances, mostly the supporting cast, I would have given this the thumbs up.

But I can't get past the bullshit, sachrine sweet, pretentious message they try to hammer down our throats wih as much subtlety and a punch in the throat.

It even managed to be even more up its own arse than American Beauty and that's REALLY saying something.

Comments

interesting

[happy-hacker.livejournal.com]

Interesting. Yours is the first negative review I've seen of V. I wonder if you read and enjoyed the original Alan Moore graphic novel? I know you like his work, and I'm curious, having neither read it nor seen the movie.

-HH

Re: interesting

[angelophile.livejournal.com]

Never read it. I'm not a huge Moore fan - I find he's big on ideas and sloppy on execution.

Like I say, I HAVE seen a lot of negative reviews of it. Pretty much entirely from Brits.

[(Anonymous)]

It's a Hollywood blockbuster movie - you can't think when you're watching that stuff, you have to switch off your brain or you'll get angry (ie, how you reacted to V shows you're an intelligent, and sensitive, human being.)

I, of course, loved it.

[bareedy.livejournal.com]

Er, that as me :)

[angelophile.livejournal.com]

But they clearly WANTED you to think. There was a not particularly subtle message behind the whole thing.

Presumable that it's okay to kidnap, shave, strip and torture young girls, and pimp them out a prostitutes to horny bishops if you wear a silly hat.

(Cos the actual message about being free from fear was bullshit).

"I'm a man of wealth. And taste."

[(Anonymous)]

You ought to read the comic. V still wears a silly hat and tortures girls, but in the comic he's not the hero at all. After I read the comic, I have been unable to bring myself to see this stupid film - comic V would never say something as trite as "They made a monster out of meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!". The ending was also completely different, and it had no stupid message about the evils of the Bush administartion. Except after watching the movie it's going to be hard to bring yourself to read the comic, but still. - Mightyrobot

Vedux

[happy-hacker.livejournal.com]

Just finished reading V for Vendetta, the comic. It's food for thought, certainly, and not a comic one can easily put down nor forget. As usual, it sounds like the movie folks have dumbed down the story and lost the subtlety that made it work. Here are the salient points of the story as Moore wrote it. (Well, as filtered through my own head, obviously.)

1. Freedom is fundamental to functional society.
2. Freedom can all too easily be given away due to fear, and the result (in this case) is fascism. Stupid and/or crazy people will then take over, because they can better embrace it. Under the surface of such a society, anger will roil until something happens.
3. In order for a society to be free, the people have to free themselves from their own prisons of ideas and fears.
4. Freedom requires responsibility.

Lots of other stuff. And I agree completely with the fellow who posted that in the comic, V is distinctly not a hero. He is, in fact, the anti-hero. This is a Moore comic, after all; up and up heroes are not to be trusted. Moore went to a lot of work to make this comic an English comic (he says so in the afterward to this edition), so there are probably a ton of cultural references I'm missing as an American.

I think you might want to read the comic. It's typical older Moore; as you said to me privately, a little sloppy about the story; but it is interesting. As usual, Moore's gone for an artist with an interesting style rather than a well drawn style, which is annoying, but Lloyd was integral to the creation of the story as well, so I guess we have to put up with him.

I don't agree with everything Moore says in this comic, certainly. But it's good, and it's thought provoking, and if you enjoyed League and don't mind that V was written in the late 1980s and that Moore was a lot more political in it than in League, it's interesting.

-HH