V for Version

[sdelmonte]

Finally saw V for Vendetta. As a movie, it's really quite good, if a little clumsy and blatant (if properly so) in its politics. Hugo Weaving is amazing for a man in a full mask, and Natalie Portman is better than I've seen her in a while (though still not great yet).

As an adaptation? Well, I guess this is par for the course. That is, it takes the framework and some of the essential ideas, and then changes everything else so much that it's really not the thing that Alan Moore created all those years ago. (We've seen that with Constantine, and we saw that with LXG)How could it be, given the jumping off point in the 80s what Thatcherism and the Cold War? Still, some of the changes are good, some unsettling, and the ending really changes the meaning of things.

Still, it's more than worth seeing, and if the Watchmen film is this good, I will be able to live with the fact that the original comic is probably as unfilmable as any work of literature has ever been.

Comments

[osewalrus.livejournal.com]

I thought it worked well as an adaptation in remaining true to the spirit of the original. Although I agree the ending is far more positive and hopeful than Alan Moore's more cyncial original.

But since Moore portrayred an apathetic public, we have seen people moved to rise up against dictators in the hope of a better world. From Tienanmen Square to the "Cedar Revolution" to the current protests in Pakistan. I like to think the modifications to the end reflect these world events.

[yakalskovich]

I really, really like the movie - and if you say the original is much different, and probably more interesting (different ending?), then I feel the sudden urge to get the original graphic novel and read that.

Because, even better than that movie? Wow. I'd want to know that.-

Also, there seems to have been a trend to put really good actors into masks and full swathing clothes and then give them a chance to act through that handicap and impress the hell out of everybody -- Edward Norton did it as well in 'Kindom of Heaven'.-

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

As agrumer noted, it kept the main sequence that's the core of the graphic novel.

I very much enjoyed the movie, and would probably enjoy watching it again. But, I'm a sucker for happy endings.