Several good and even great elements, but fails to be a very good film overall

Rating: 7/10 (28 April 2020)

You have to know two things about my review. The first is that I've never looked at the underlying comics before, or even knew about them, so everything in my review, which is based on the comics is an equal criticism about them. The second is that I first watched this film 15 years before it originally aired. This means that I've not only seen the wave of wannabe-Anons following the superficials of this movie, but also several of the elements on which the movie's dystopy is build on becoming true.
This is the first aspect I consider good about this film. If you have seen this film right at the start, you might consider the scenario built somewhat reasonable with 9/11 and gulf war in mind. If you watch it today and have seen several right-wing nationalists come to power these days you are ensured that this scenario is really believable. From several known dystopies I would consider this one of the more or even most realistic ones. However, why isn't this just good, not great? Because the details don't fit. The uprising of the chancellor's party is, although very shortly described, a smart approach to how the situation turned that bad. But it is also lacking of political deatils, a bit too easy-going to be believable and ultimately discredited by the somewhat silly looking Third Reich-references. This is somewhat explainable by the style the movie tries to create, but that is the next troublesome point.
Where is the movie headed? Does it try to create a visually impressive and stylish dystopy where weaker plot elements are overwhelmed by the artstyle? Could be, especially when you watch V directing a detonation at the very beginning. You have this mysterious masked man, the music underlying the explosion. Or when you look at the carefully built V-sign consisting of domino's, or the rather silly costume that Evy has to wear when she is approaching the bishop. The movie indeed shines in these moments, but it is not consistent. Because you have also the dramatic scenes. Men and women getting brutally hit, disappearing in the totalitarian system with a black sac over their heads. Shaved and naked bodies, dead and alive. You see real actor tears and even some reminiscence on better times, where you were not deported for loving someone of the same sex. These scenes are with no doubt well written and executed, and I actually felt something, which is usually good, but not so much for a film that presents a visually stunning hero who can murder a bunch of armed forces with some knives and a kevlar vest. The uneasy feel of the aforementioned scenes lets you question V's message and if you keep that in mind, an organized happening of silent Guy-Fawkes-masks-bearing protesters who wait for a firework in the form of the Buckingham Palace exploding leaves you ultimately confused whether this is a drama with comic elements, or a comic with dramatic elements. Not every movie has to restrict itself to one style, but especially a movie delivering such a strong message should better handle the balance of near-silly elements and its dramatic foundation.
When Evy gets captured and tormented by V, there is even some mindfuck in the movie. And there we have the weakest scene of the film. It was not untypical for V to do that, after all he is a weirdo suffering serious trauma and finding meaning in life when he surrounds himself with allegedly meaningful art and symbols. Taking a love interest on a joyride to make her feel his pain and hammer his thoughts and believings into her is something a narcissistic character like V would absolutely do and the character writing for V is consistent over the whole film, actually. On the other hand, Evy's well-written character gets shattered in this scene and she appears to be a blind follower of V's teachings after that. Let me explain this a bit. In the very first scene Evy if saved from some rapists by V. He is a scary and weird-talking man, so Evy has reasonable fears around him, but trusts him enough to follow him to his orchestra. In the scenes at the TV building Evy tries to stay under the radar, but when an ultimate decision has to be made, between returning the favor and keeping out of trouble, she decides to help him. Thoroughly reasonable. In his lair, she is considerably bothered about the fact that she can not leave, and when V kills the british Limbaugh, she takes the next opportunity to leave him for good. This is actually very realistic because even though she has some sympathies for his motifs, she rejects his methods and does not just stay with him for the sake of the movie.
However, if she gets caught, the reasonable and fearsome Evy changes, and not only at the very ending of it. She is shocked and scared right from the start, but from all we know before, she would immediately after that try to cooperate, help them in some way or at least try to convince them that she does not know a thing. Maybe the movie is just not showing these parts, but if she really would not talk out of fear it would be really unfitting for her previous characterisation. It even gets worse when V ultimately reveals that this has been just one big ruse to test her and make her feel the systems foot. She is again shocked, but after that she does not break out in anger, outrage or wild accusations. She does not try to flee, run away from both a system scaring her and a man actually torturing her, or try to hurt him in some way, show him a little bit of the pain she has endured or just lash out, break things and blow off some steam. She actually embraces him and his false sympathy for her and after a short visit in the rain, everything is fine and forgotten.
The last point of my criticism adresses the chancellor. Although not the antagonist alone, his ominpresent big head is clearly the symbol of the bad regime, the Hitler-cartoon to the otherwise abstract party Northfire. Similiar to the mediocre inspector, his positioning in the film is rather functional. His gargantuan face on the big telly in the bad guy's headquarter is a constant reminder that time is passing, party members get killed and no one has a clue how to deal with V. The fact that aside from his constant yelling nothing noticeable characterizes the head of this big, ruthless and smart party is really poor and he consequently gets shot in the head towards the end of the film without many more words, especially not about the details how his second in command get him captured in the first place. While the actions and the motifs of the party are interesting, sometimes even impressing, all possible antagonists fall flat at closer look.