Who wants to go help me assassinate the Watchoski brothers?
Why? The Movie was bloody brilliant!
Sure it felt more like a blatant jab at the Bush Administration in a post 9-11 world but that doesn't mean it was bad!
Have you read the book?
-edit: I'd like to say that, on the whole, this is my only real complaint with the movie. By itself, as a movie, it was great. I could tell that both the acting and direction were incredible. However, having read the book first, I was absolutely disgusted with the script. While I appreciated that they kept small chunks of the dialog, it was mostly small unimportant bits. Lilliman saying "Mea Culpa, my child, mea culpa", for example.
What, exactly, was the point of that conspiracy stuff, anyways?
I didn't know there was a book. Loved the movie, though.
Haven't read the book, loved the movie. And it seemed quite like that to me as well, EE.
I had no beef with V. But some blood needs to be spilled over Speed Racer...
Quote from: LatroI had no beef with V. But some blood needs to be spilled over Speed Racer...
To ARMS! :protest:
It was a good film. The book was still better, but the film wasn't bad.
My only real beef with the film was that the book's ending was better, and they should have stuck with that one.
I haven't seen the movie, but I strongly recommend the book.
I really liked the film, and I usually don't like allegory. You have me interested enough to read the book now.
Wait... i thought it was based on a Graphic Novel... I wouldn't call a Graphic Novel a 'book' any more than I would call books based on D&D 'fine literature.' :)
That's a book. It's made of paper and has words in it.
Some of the bits that I didn't like:
[spoiler]
*Creedy was the man who shot V near the end. It should've been Finch. Okay, so this is a fairly small complaint, and I guess it should be an acceptable change, but it's like a near-silent hum; it's just barely enough to bug me.
*They actually made up an excuse for V's lack of identity. Sure, it would've been easy for the comic to simply say-- as the movie did-- "oh, the experiments made him forget his entire past when they ruined his mind", but this takes away a bit of symbolism. For V, ideas and beliefs are more important then men, and this was strongly emphasized by the fact that you see the ideas and beliefs of V, but you don't see the person behind V. Now that I think about it, the only people who wanted to know who V was were the people who didn't understand the importance of what he was.
* V and Evey's relations were very overplayed. V was a passionate man, to be sure, but he never seemed passionate about people.
* Finch mentioned that he visited Larkhill. Did they show it in the movie? No! In the book, he took a large dose of LSD upon arriving there, with the idea that losing his mind at the camp would help him understand V better. It was a brilliant scene, but they took it out entirely.
* As I asked before, what the hell was that conspiracy all about? It had nothing to do with anything, other then providing a bit of unnecessary backstory to the Chancellor. The movie would have been just as good without that. I know this because the book didn't have that conspiracy, and it was even better.
* They barely touched upon mentioning the war. In the featurette, it seemed not even the actors understood why USA didn't exist anymore. The war went very far in explaining the setting in the book, but in the movie, they just handed the viewers the setting, lightly commenting 'oh yeah, and there was a war. Y'know bombs and stuff.'
* A lot of it seemed like a very American attempt to imitate English culture. It seemed as if they felt that the extent of British humor was Benny Hill, and that the only British slang that exists is the word "bullocks", which is said whenever an Englishman feels the simultaneous needs to swear and reaffirm that they are, indeed, British. While I'll concede that they probably do eat "eggie in a basket" over in England, it isn't as cultural as the movie makes it seem. I've had it over here in New England. We call it a bullseye. It goes great with a layer of cheese on one side, and it provides a handy excuse to make bad puns about buttershots.
* Many, many good lines were taken out. Aside from some of the quotes that V used (I was especially upset that he didn't mention The Law, as V believes in it strongly, quoting it twice in the book, but only loosely paraphrased it once in the movie), there were some other good lines that got removed, such as:
"You've got it all wrong. First you'll do anything we want, then we kill you."
"I remember Mum saying 'Africa isn't there anymore.' That's all she said. I thought about all the lions and elephants being dead. It made me cry. I was only seven."
Finch: "I thought Lilliman was a Bishop."
Bishop Lilliman: "No, merely a pawn."
Evey (reading out loud): "V. V. V. V. V."
V: "Evey, Evey, Evey, Evey, Evey"
And quite a few other good lines.
* The ending, as LC mentioned, was changed dramatically. I liked the ending in the book, better.
I probably could go on if I watched the movie again, but this should be enough for now...[/spoiler]
Quote from: Elemental_ElfWait... i thought it was based on a Graphic Novel... I wouldn't call a Graphic Novel a 'book' any more than I would call books based on D&D 'fine literature.' :)
That's because you haven't read any of Alan Moore's, I expect. You should give them a try. They definitely qualify as fine literature.
Quote from: Luminous CrayonQuote from: Elemental_ElfWait... i thought it was based on a Graphic Novel... I wouldn't call a Graphic Novel a 'book' any more than I would call books based on D&D 'fine literature.' :)
That's because you haven't read any of Alan Moore's, I expect. You should give them a try. They definitely qualify as fine literature.
Listen to the English Professor, here. I'd also add Neil Gaiman, Will Eisner, and Art Speigelman to what would sure be a very long list of graphic novelists who's work would qualify as "fine literature". Sometimes they even manage to do things that wouldn't be possible in traditional novels.
By the way, LC, have you ever considered using graphics novels as study material?
Quote from: Luminous CrayonQuote from: Elemental_ElfWait... i thought it was based on a Graphic Novel... I wouldn't call a Graphic Novel a 'book' any more than I would call books based on D&D 'fine literature.' :)
That's because you haven't read any of Alan Moore's, I expect. You should give them a try. They definitely qualify as fine literature.
Does calling a comic a book suddenly give the comic any more meaning or depth than it had prior? No, absolutely not. So lets not let the pot call the kettle black. I don't have a problem with calling Comics 'Literature' or 'art' since it is a valid medium in which to express ideas. However a 'book' is something entirely different that relies on the written word rather than the written word and accompanying pictures.
And yes there is a bit of crossover, especially when we look at children's books but common sense should guide everyone to identifying what is a book and what is a comic.
Quote from: Sdr$g$n1984Listen to the English Professor, here.
Are you an english professor? If not, I am very confused about why everybody seems to be under the impression that I am.
EE, apologies if I interpreted your earlier comment as pejorative when it wasn't intended that way. I should warn you, however, that at the moment I am much less interested in debating semantics than in recommending Alan Moore.
The book focused more on anarchism, and seemed to be what V was aiming for, instead of just "getting rid of the corrupt government."
And everyone here should read Alan Moore, especially Watchmen.
Watchmen is way better than V, at any rate. I'm looking forward to the upcoming film, and I hope it does it justice.
Quote from: Luminous CrayonQuote from: Sdr$g$n1984Listen to the English Professor, here.
Are you an english professor? If not, I am very confused about why everybody seems to be under the impression that I am.
EE, apologies if I interpreted your earlier comment as pejorative when it wasn't intended that way. I should warn you, however, that at the moment I am much less interested in debating semantics than in recommending Alan Moore.
Its fine, I just wanted to explain myself... and yes debating semantics is so very boring (which is why I can never understand rules lawyers), I'd mush rather read Moore's work... too bad the nearest book store in 12 miles away (read as: I have no gas). Still, next time I'm at B&N, I will pick up V for Vendetta or maybe the Watchmen (always wanted to read that but never got around to it) :)
High five, then, bro. :yumm:
Watchmen is great. I honestly don't think Watchmen is as cinematic as a lot of people seem to think, though. A lot of what was done in that is stuff that can only really be pulled off in a comic, where you can combine have the ability to flip back and reread parts, while still being in a visual environment. You lose the visual environment in traditional books, but you lose the ability to reread in movies.
Other then that, though, I just hope they do the story at least some justice.
It would have been much wiser of them to pull the book off in cinematic form as a 4 part HBO special or something... I have doubts that such a large, fantastic book can be condensed very will into a 2 hour movie...