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March 17, 2006
In case "New movie by the Wachowski Brothers" still means something good to you
Personally, I've been pretty sick of V for Vendetta since last summer, when we all heard all about how it was scheduled for release, but then delayed out of sensitivity to the London Underground bombings, and we read all over the place about how Natalie Portman liked "shedding that level of vanity" by having a shaved head. Lately the press has centered on Alan Moore, who wrote the comic that the movie is based on, and what "rubbish" he thinks the Wachowski script is. (Moore has had really bad luck with movie adaptations of his books--he's already suffered through some bad adaptations of From Hell and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Hasn't learned his lesson, I guess.)
And really, come on. Did you see those last two Matrix movies? Do you really think this movie is going to be anything other than a big-budget arbitrarily-stylized illogical waste of time? It's like the pairing of Hugo Weaving and Natalie Portman brings together the worst elements of The Matrix and Star Wars and hurls them into a fantastical new world of crap.
Anyway, this damn movie is finally coming out today. We've already seen those big Parliament explosions one thousand times in the previews, but let's look at what some of the funnier critics are saying about the movie.
Inevitable questions and objections have been raised about whether V for Vendetta turns a terrorist into a hero, which is precisely what it does do. Predictably, the filmmakers, actors and media savants have floated the familiar formulation that one man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter, as if this actually explained anything about how terror and power (never mind movies) work. The more valid question is how anyone who isn't 14 or under could possibly mistake a corporate bread-and-circus entertainment like this for something subversive.
Stephen Hunter, Washington Post. For all that the film gets out of its putative star, Hugo Weaving (Agent Smith from "The Matrix" movies), it could just as easily star a radio. Weaving is a fruity, stagy voice emanating from a hole in the polyurethane phiz clamped over his real mug... V for Vendetta is a piece of pulp claptrap; it has no insights whatsoever into totalitarian psychology and settles always for the cheesiest kinds of demagoguery and harangue as its emblems of evil.
To say that the Wachowski brothers, who made the Matrix movies and wrote this picture from the graphic novel that has since been disowned by its creator Alan Moore, are not up to Orwell's level is not to say much. Nobody's Orwell. Nobody writing today has the guts as well as the talent to be Orwell. But they should have come up with better stuff. They say they want a revolution? Then give us a revolution, one that's believable, frightening, heroic, coherent and not a teenager's freaky power trip.
I would like to send a special thank you to Stephen Hunter for his reference to the "eternally underwhelming" actress Natalie Portman in his review. What has she made now, one good movie? Hey Natalie, try to get cast in just one more movie in which you're not the weakest link, and you'll have Winona Ryder beat.
Perhaps not surprisingly, Roger Ebert gave the movie three stars. But clever readers can see through some of the Ebert outpouring of love for everything in the world in his mention of the "audacious confusion of ideas" and "their manic disorganization."
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Comments
I haven't read the graphic novel or seen the movie, so I can't comment on the merits of either. But I do take exception with your claim that Hugo Weaving was the worst element of the Matrix series. Honestly, I think he made the first movie as good as it was, and by the end of the thing he was the only person involved worth a damn.
As for Portman, meh, she's okay. I don't fault her for the Star Wars stuff. Those scripts sucked the life out of far better actors. She never stood a chance. Overall, I think she slides by on her ability to very convingly laugh and cry on cue.
Posted by: Matthew Saunders at March 19, 2006 11:37 AM
Jeez, Amy. You are pretty harsh. I agree with Matt that Hugo Weaving was far from the worst thing about the Matrix trilogy: the worst thing about them was Keanu. Had someone else taken that role, the movies would be so much better and would probably be taken a lot more seriously by non-fanboys. Likewise, Natalie's sins in Star Wars are far outweighed by those of Hayden C., who turned in two full performances that were absolute and total crap and brought both movies down (esp. Attack of the Clones). Besides that, you can't really blame her for the shit dialog that Lucas wrote for her. I think she is a decent actress. Maybe, as you've said elsewhere, she doesn't have much/any range, but when she's in the right roles she does well. "Closer" is a good movie and although I know you didn't like her in it, a lot of people (including me) thought she did a good job. Which movie did you mean when you said she was only in one good one? "The Professional"? Of course, she is terrific in that, and she's also very good in her small role as the messed up daughter in "Heat." Granted, those were 10 years ago, but I think it's a stretch to say she's a poor actress or that she makes otherwise good movies bad. Sure, she doesn't have a ton of range, but in the right roles, she has good presence and can be convincing.
Posted by: ADM at March 20, 2006 12:58 AM
Oh, I phrased that sentence about Hugo Weaving and Natalie P. and their respective roles in The Matrix and Star Wars badly. I didn't mean that they were the worst parts of those movies, I meant that both were stars of movie series that both ended up being pretty bad, and bringing the two of them together for V for Vendetta has unfortunately resulted in another movie that looks bad. Maybe both of those actors tend to pick action movies that turn out badly? At what point do we stop being excited about movies that star good actors, like Hugo Weaving, when so many of their movies are terrible? Like what's happened with Robert de Niro, whose inclusion in a cast used to be the mark of a good movie. I don't know.
Neither of those actors are at fault for the badness of Matrix and Star Wars, though. Sorry for the confusion, I love Hugo Weaving and meant nothing bad against him. I just wish he would appear in more movies that I actually want to see.
Posted by: Amy at March 20, 2006 11:47 AM
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Tracked on December 19, 2006 10:08 AM