Something 4 The Weekend by
Welcome ladies, gentlemen and film
fans everywhere to entertainment manchester's weekly
feature 'Something for the Weekend'. Every Friday, we
deliver to you the best (and, in the interest of balance,
worst) of this week's new cinematic releases. If, as
Forrest Gump once might have said were he a film fan,
cinema really is like a box of chocolates, then think
of us as your mini-menu, steering you away from the
coffee creams and towards the Turkish delights of the
movie world.
A masked vigilante with a penchant for Guy Fawkes. A female side-kick shorn of all her hair. The Houses of Parliament blown to bits amid the sounds of Big Ben's once proud bells dying a strangulated death. It could be one of those absurd scare-mongering drama-documentaries that the BBC produces about possible disasters like asteroids hitting the earth, but is in fact the latest film based on the work of graphic novel guru Alan Moore, V for Vendetta, or as the Daily Mail dubbed it "the film Blair should fear."
Talk like that will no doubt delight the film's producer Joel Silver, who has an uncanny knack for picking up on the most scandalous thing about a film he's trying to sell and hammer it home until every man, woman and child believes it too. Except, with V for Vendetta you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to work out why the writers at the Mail are getting all hot under the collar.
Written by the Wachowski brothers and directed by Matrix alumni James McTigue, it's the tale of V, a freedom fighter/terrorist who stands up to a dictatorial British regime through a programme of bombings and violence. Moore's original comic began life in underground publications in the late 80s, with the dictatorial regime clearly echoing the Thatcher government. Here, the Wachowskis have updated it to reflect the post 9/11 world, added a bird-flu alert here and there, got the marketing men to whip up some snazzy Soviet-inspired posters and, presumably, thrown in a bit of bullet time for good measure.
Still, in typical fashion, the reclusive Moore isn‘t happy and, as he does with all films based on his work, has totally disowned the movie. In a rare, rare interview he explained to Empire magazine why he turned his back on Hollywood. "Right from the start when there was talk of films - I'm talking back in the 80s now - I was dismissive,” he revealed. “When the From Hell film came out, I got ten minutes into it; it was a travesty, so I turned it of. The majority of films feel like a waste of two hours of my life. This is probably because I'm an increasingly cranky and reclusive wierdo."
But weird or not, it's hardly surprising Moore has such an aversion to the world of cinema. Although works like The League of Extraordinary Gentleman and Watchmen are very cinematic in concept (The Fantastic Four of literary heroes and a city's superheroes being stalked and killed respectively), they are pulled off with a very literary conviction, Watchmen especially breaking the story down into chapters through the use of 'real-life' letters, articles and photographs written and taken by the characters within the story.
Transposing that to film often makes for very uneasy viewing, with Jack the Ripper film From Hell trashing an interesting conspiracy theory and the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen going on to become one of the most critically reviled films of the last five years and even landing Moore with a lawsuit.
So what makes V for Vendetta different? Well, judging from the cast which includes Stephen Fry and John Hurt (the star of 1984 ironically playing the dictatorial Chancellor in what is little more than a latter day version of George Orwell's classic) the script must have something going for it, and the idea of a modern Hollywood blockbuster tackling a subject as serious as the difference between terrorism and freedom fighting is certainly an enticing one.
But the success of V really depends on if they can find the right balance between smart and fun. Too intellectual and they risk alienating the core audience of 15 year old boys. Too action-packed and the controversial topic of terrorism will be left moot and unjustified in a hail of flying knives and big explosions.
One film which does manage to strike a fine balance, however, is Tsotsi, also released this week. You can read the official review here, but director Gavin Hood has created a gritty but hopeful (and now Oscar-winning) film about slum life in South Africa. It follow a young hoodlum called Tsotsi (meaning thug), as he is landed with a baby which goes on to change his life. From that description, the film could become very clichéd and trite, but Hood pulls it off with a style and verve which even recalls early Martin Scorsese.
However, the same probably won’t be said of The Pink Panther remake, also released this week starring Steve Martin and Beyonce. Now V, sod blowing up politicians, here’s a good target for your rage…
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