Vendetta -- The Freshmaker
Wachowski Brother #1: Dude, we should totally make a movie -- "The Phantom of the Opera versus the Bush Administration". Hey, what's that you're reading?
Wachowski Brother #2: Oh, some comic book.
Long ago somebody (I forget who) lent us a copy of V for Vendetta. I never got around to reading it, and months later it was returned, unread. I'm sorry for that now, because I really really want to read the comic. At any rate, I did enjoy the movie quite a bit. Rather more than I enjoyed the From Hell movie, which I also watched before reading the comic; maybe that's a good sign, I dunno. I kinda felt like I could guess more or less which parts were more of the Wachowskis ("Never bring guns to a knife fight, BITCHES!!!") and which were more of Alan Moore ("Wow, it's almost as if scenes from all the complicated subplots are flashing through my head in a non-linear way! Trippy!").
My absolute favorite part is where, after being tortured and imprisoned for (days? weeks? months?) an indeterminate amount of time, she finds out that -- surprise! -- all along it had been V keeping her in the dark little cell and torturing her and letting her think she was going to be executed! Heh heh, PSYCH! I kept imagining him whipping out a roll of Mentos and giving a thumbs-up while they all had a hearty laugh. Seriously though, for some reason I think I would have found that scene unbelievably stupid and infuriating in a normal movie; but in a movie based on an Alan Moore work, I loved it. Does that make me hypocritical? I think it's because, if it had been just any old big-budget Hollywood action flick, I would assume that it was trying to say, "Look what a cool badass antihero he is!"(*) Whereas in Alan Moore stories, there's always a scene or two that says "Hey, this so-called cool badass may actually in fact be really really messed in the head!"
(*)Maybe this is what bothers me about those scenes in The Matrix where Neo and co. are cheerfully running 'round in slow motion gunning down dozens of security guards. I always got the impression that the audience was meant to think "cool, GUNS" rather to reflect on the fact that these freedom fighters could brazenly kill dozens of people in the name of defeating the eeeeevil machines.
Wachowski Brother #2: Oh, some comic book.
Long ago somebody (I forget who) lent us a copy of V for Vendetta. I never got around to reading it, and months later it was returned, unread. I'm sorry for that now, because I really really want to read the comic. At any rate, I did enjoy the movie quite a bit. Rather more than I enjoyed the From Hell movie, which I also watched before reading the comic; maybe that's a good sign, I dunno. I kinda felt like I could guess more or less which parts were more of the Wachowskis ("Never bring guns to a knife fight, BITCHES!!!") and which were more of Alan Moore ("Wow, it's almost as if scenes from all the complicated subplots are flashing through my head in a non-linear way! Trippy!").
My absolute favorite part is where, after being tortured and imprisoned for (days? weeks? months?) an indeterminate amount of time, she finds out that -- surprise! -- all along it had been V keeping her in the dark little cell and torturing her and letting her think she was going to be executed! Heh heh, PSYCH! I kept imagining him whipping out a roll of Mentos and giving a thumbs-up while they all had a hearty laugh. Seriously though, for some reason I think I would have found that scene unbelievably stupid and infuriating in a normal movie; but in a movie based on an Alan Moore work, I loved it. Does that make me hypocritical? I think it's because, if it had been just any old big-budget Hollywood action flick, I would assume that it was trying to say, "Look what a cool badass antihero he is!"(*) Whereas in Alan Moore stories, there's always a scene or two that says "Hey, this so-called cool badass may actually in fact be really really messed in the head!"
(*)Maybe this is what bothers me about those scenes in The Matrix where Neo and co. are cheerfully running 'round in slow motion gunning down dozens of security guards. I always got the impression that the audience was meant to think "cool, GUNS" rather to reflect on the fact that these freedom fighters could brazenly kill dozens of people in the name of defeating the eeeeevil machines.