V for Vendetta

The milieu:
9:30 pm, 02-Apr-2006.
I was waiting in line at the Prasad’s Multiplex in Hyderabad to try and get tickets for my friends and myself to any damn movie, to kill some time. Now this Multiplex happens to be one among only 220 venues in the world to house an IMAX 3D screen, also this Multiplex features the world's most powerful projector that beams on 29 meters wide and 21.93 meters high screen, but frankly, I wasn’t thinking of all that, I just stood there in line amusing myself with all the eye-candy in the vicinity, and before I knew it, it was my turn to ask for tickets, and thanks to good karma, he had just 3 tickets, the last three tickets for the night. The tickets were for a movie, I had never heard of before (I am ashamed of myself for this now), and they were considerably expensive as opposed to other movies being screened at the time, because this movie was being played on the IMAX screen!

My friends were highly skeptical about the movie. They pointed towards the movie’s poster and gestured me to look, grinning all the time. The poster showed a bald girl and a funnily masked guy, this brought fresh doubts into my mind, I considered returning the tickets, and quickly decided to nudge my luck a little more and hope the movie turned out good. Nearing the entrance to the hall, I heard my friends scornfully murmuring to themselves that “V for Vendetta’ could be part of a sequel, whose first movie was probably called ‘A for Apple’!!

The history:
05 – November-1605, The Gunpowder Plot.
Guy Fawkes is arrested while attempting to blow up the Parliament of England.


The poem:
"Remember, remember, the 5th of November
The Gunpowder Treason and plot;
I know of no reason why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot."

The participants:
V (lead male) played by Hugo Weaving
Evey Hammond (lead female) played by Natalie Portman.
Director – James McTeigue

The movie:
The movie is set in an England of the future. (No, its not sci fi). America is in Civil war, and England is ruled by an extremely right leaning government. The government is shown to posses all the undesirable characteristics that governments in the big rich democracies of the world today seem to have. The government has controlled media, secret police, surveillance and the government works by scaring the people with hoaxes and prearranged catastrophes, and finally the government has voters thinking the way the government wants them to think. An example quoted in the movie is that after an outbreak of Avian Flu, one pharmaceutical company shows profits in millions, and the chief of the company turns out to be a top party worker for the government. Slowly the people lose confidence in their government but the government’s chief, Adam Sutler, has created a post called the Vice Chancellor and exercises a whole lot of power, and continues to rule the country, using brute force, lobbyists, religion and whatever it takes to stay in power.

Evey, a girl working for a popular TV station breaks a curfew and is harassed by the secret police. Out merges a Masked Man to save the girl and an amazing action sequence ensues. The masked man then invites the girl to witness the blowing up of ‘The Bailey’, he claims responsibility to the illegal action, and his actions were meant to outdo the government, to bring down symbols that represent the government. Later he hijacks the most popular TV station (which is obviously fabricating news in favor of the government), and relays his plan to blow up the parliament one year from then, on the next 5th of November through this station. This causes the government to go after the masked guy, and a surveillance camera, reveals that Evey was with the Masked Guy on the day the bombing of ‘The Bailey’ occurred.

Then we get a peek into the life of this guy who wears the mask of Guy Fawkes, loves Shakespeare, is great with alliteration, sword fighting and possesses extremely sweet manners and calls himself V.

After this the movie gets all the more interesting, the story grips you to your seat!
The movie has spirituality, motivation, politics, action, poetry, suspense and everything required. I was a firm believer in the system of democracies, this movie opened my eyes to a new hidden dimension.

There are a few extremely cool dialogues in the movie, just like in ‘The Matrix’, well weighted and precise, such as:
“It isn’t the people that should be afraid of the government, governments should be afraid of its people”

My overall rating of the movie: 8/10.