Quick DVD review: V for Vendetta

Okay folks, this is one of the movies I’ve been waiting to see, and I’m glad I saw it.

"There’s something terribly wrong with this country, isn’t there?"

Well yes, but you wouldn’t see it quickly. England still goes strong, the cars are still going, the people are still in their homes watching the "Tele", and they’re still going about their daily lives. But THERE IS something wrong with this picture. Curfews and corrupt secret police, censors and totalitarian slogans, church and state merging in… oh, wait, we’re talking England… forget that last part.

This is a story about the slow creep of totalitarianism. Something that people wouldn’t think happens, and didn’t realize it until it did. This is a story about a young girl named Evey (Natalie Portman) who is caught wandering out after curfew and would have been raped if not for the arrival of a man in a mask. This man, who wears a Guy Fawkes mask, has an incredible grasp of the human language, which is hard to hear BECAUSE he wears a mask. (Moments like this make me glad for subtitles.) But after a lengthy diatribe whereby he uses words that start with the letter "V", we hear that "V" is indeed his name… or at least the only name that we known him as.

We actually see four sides to this story. The first is through Evey’s experience. The second is through the Chief Inspector (Stephen Rea) who is investigating V’s terrorist actions, and discovers what connects him to the totalitarian government that has taken over the country. The third comes from a hidden journal, the fourth is a letter written on toilet paper in a prison cell. They all have a connection, and by the time the story reaches its climax, you will see out how the pieces fit.

Having read the graphic novel that this was based on, I was impressed by how much this movie stayed within the original story, although they had to make some obvious changes to it.

There was just one thing that was really out-of-place here, and that was the music played during the closing credits. Hey, I don’t mind a good song by the Rolling Stones, but putting it right after the ending, it just didn’t seem to fit. You’ve got to see it to know what I mean.

Now I ended up getting the 2-disc Special Edition, with some good bonus features, but sadly they were a bit lacking. The one good bit with the second disc, though, was the Easter Egg, which I won’t tell you what it is or where to find it, but it is good and a bit shocking.

As a freedom-loving individual, I certainly consider this movie to be a must-see, and something that is worth comparing with the current course of events here in America.