V For Vendetta

There are not enough good things that I can say about the graphic novel V for Vendetta and its Genius author Alan Moore. In my opinion, once the literary world gets off its hoity toity ass and recognize the graphic novel as a respectable medium for fiction, Alan Moore will be the first one to get honored for the genius that is his work. And I am not exaggerating either. The guy is that good.

From the ode to 19th century fiction that is the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, to the amazingly historically accurate depcition of London during the rampage of Jack the ripper that is From Hell, to the geniusly constructed critique of human nature, world politics and what it takes to achieve world peace that is Watchmen, the man is a master of complex, dark and intricate narrative. I was introduced to his work in that order, and I loved every single one of them, with Watchmen being my absolute favorite. That is, until I read the epic masterpiece that is V for Vendetta.

The story is set in Britian in the late 1990's, but it could apply to any country at any time, and it's about facist tyrannical rule and the human spirit that rebells against it. This book and its narrative is the kind of work that english lit, philosphoy, psychology and political science majors could write numerous essays on easily. It is that good. It is that rich. It's the story of what it takes to take down an entire facist regime. Just one person, man or woman, who will say: NO!

It's a story that every libertarian would enjoy, because it shows that distinct difference between anarchy and chaos, between a strrugle for freedom and the struggle for Order. It's a rallying cry against any government that thinks it is well in their right to do whatever is necessary to impose order and protect their rule against the rights and freedom of its people. It can be applied to any totalletrian government or rule, Nazi Germany, Communist USSR, Talibani Afghanistan. You name it, this story applies to it, because, let's face it: All the authoratarian regimes are the same, even if they have different ideologies. They all use the same methods: Fear, control, restrictions and violence. This is the story of the human spirit that refuses to cower and succumb to those methods, and becomes the catalyst that brings it all down. To rebuild the country from the rubble, for a future where the managment isn't in the hands of Killers whose only virtue is their reliance on ruthlessness and weapons. It's a truly great Book.

And this is why I HATED THE MOVIE. Comapred to the Book, the movie is simply horrible. A butchering job at it's best. It's akin to the number of people who died so that Frankenstein can make his monster. That's how bad is it.

First of all, I truly despise the Wachowski brothers for the hatchet job that they did to this story, which was so bad that Alan Moore refused to put his name on this movie in any way. I don't blame him, for what they did with the movie ruined it completely. They, like many Hollywood idiots before them, thought they could take a work they could not create ot equal, and improve upon it, by taking some of the great stuff in it and then adding their own "creative thought". And I use the word "creative" very loosely when it comes to the Wachowski brotehrs, because they are nothing but hacks. The Matrix story you all very excited about? That's basically the story of Jesus if he learned Kung Fu. Yes muslim people, you were cheering for the most christian flick since the Passion of the Christ. What, you didn't know? Shame on you. Follow the clues:

Neo is called Mr. Anderson, ander being man, which makes his name "Son of Man", the name used to describe Jesus, get it? And he is Neo, so he is the New Son of Man. And of course, as Jesus, he walks around with Trinity. He fights to protect Zion and its chosen people. His mortal enemy is called Smith (starts with S- get it?), a being with abilities that equal Neo, who manages to imbed itself into every human being in the world, and when Neo gets clairvoyant, he sees that he is made of Fire. Can we say SATAN? And then, in the end, how does Neo beat Smith? By losing, by dying, by sacrifising himself, which spoils Smith's plan and erases all of man's previous sins and starts a new page for Humanity. Hell, in that final scene, you even see light coming out of him in the shape of a cross. Watch the movies, it's all there. They stole the oldest story in christianity, and made one good movie and 2 shitty sequels, and you watched them all. Good job.

Now back to V for Vendetta. Their hatchet job included them not telling the story of V and how he became what he was, they completely changed the TV message he sent out to Britian, the plot development, how the regime crumbles and the ending of the Book. They even cut short the most genius part, the part where Evey and V confront each other, and where Evey finally frees herself from her fear. The best scene in the book, and they cut it short. And let's not even mention the travesty that was the "Love story" they created between V and Evey. That was just foul. The attempt to add some human elements to V is excatly the opposite of what V is supposed to be in the book. He is the man that transcends his humanity and becomes an Idea, and who shows us all how we can become like him. And let's not even mention the action sequence. Ahh, just thinking about them makes me wanna puke.

Now the question begs itself: why did they have to fuck with the story? I mean, the beauty of the graphic novel medium is that it gives you the story and the visual look at the same time. The story was there, the dialogue was there, and it worked marvously. WHY FUCK WITH IT? Didn't they watch Sin City? This is why Sin City rules: it stayed faithful to the material, because its source material was perfect for what it intended to do. Why couldn't they just do that? What, too much to ask to get paid to do nothing? You have to show that you did some work, even if it's horrible? How does this work again?

Now, let's ignore that for a second, and focus on the other reason why this movie sucked: it is entirely politicized, and it has one big target: BUSH, 9/11 and the war on terror. The movie implies that a) Bush is the one who is really behind 9/11, b) America will be detsoryed and c) Voting for the right is evil, for the left is good. And the movie's release date got pushed from November 5th 2005 to April 2006, and 2006 is an election year in America. What are the odds?

What I also love about this movie that besides stroking the penis of the world muslim population's paranoia with the "Bush is really behind 9/11 despite