V FOR VENDETTA is just sad.

Rating: 2/10 (17 March 2006)

V FOR VENDETTA is pure drivel. I get that out of the way at the top of this review because I know it will not be the popular opinion. But at some point I've realized that I'm nobody if I'm not honest. So I'll say it right now, V FOR VENDETTA is not an action movie, it's a propaganda film. It's a film about how great anarchy is.
About 50 or 70 years into the future Great Britain is run by a totalitarian dictator (John Hurt). Books, music, and all sorts of free expression are banned. The government has created a police state that keeps people in line. Then a shadowy masked figure named V (Hugo Weaving) steps out of the shadows and fights the government by exposing their corruption through terrorist actions. Buildings are blown up, television signals are stolen, and caught in the middle of it all is Evey (Natalie Portman). Evey, the reluctant student of the mysterious V, will play a pivotal role in overthrow of the government, whether she wants to or not.
Now where do I start. On a purely cinematic level this movie is not very fluid. Most scenes revolve around characters talking about how horrible things are. They talk and talk and then talk some more. The screenplay is so verbose that any action you may have been expecting flashes by in seconds. V's origin is told and retold at least 4 different times and there is a subplot involving an actress that just goes on and on.
As for the rest of the film, the best scene involves a humorous take on the government. It's bold and the man involved in the full on attack of the social order doesn't parade around in mask. He's bold because he puts his name and face out for the world too see. Yes he pays the consequences for his action, but he used the tools at hand to subvert the government. He didn't need bombs, he didn't need violence, he just needed to be socially disobedient.
But V this movies hero hides behind a mask of platitudes and terrorist actions. He's too proud to put his face out there for the world to see. He's like a man who writes a manifesto about how horrible the world is and signs it with an alias. Who wants to listen to a coward. V believes that the only way to get people to listen is to blow things up and to murder the men in charge. But what then? Do you start another government? Does that one become corrupt? I know its not a popular idea but did you ever just think that maybe human beings are rotten to the core? That our hearts are dark? That if given the right circumstances we all could be Hitler? I know I've lied, I've stolen things, and I've hurt the people I love the most. I've even made my wife cry and I know there are people out there that think I'm a jerk. So I ask you am I good person? I strive to be, but the human condition drags me down.
That's why we invent law. Whether it be moral law, or traffic law, laws are put in place to fight against the human condition. But Laws are so easily corrupted, from going 35 in a 25 miles per hour zone, or murdering your neighbor for his sneakers, we break laws because we are weak, selfish and at our cores we don't want anybody to tell us what to do.
V operates in a place where humans are basically good except for those that disagree with him. Government and greed are the problems. He and those who agree with him are the ones who are right. Organized religion is wrong. Politics is wrong. If we can somehow get rid of them the world will be a better place. But alas isn't he himself turning his followers into robots? What if one of his followers challenged him? Would he be labeled a traitor? Would he be sent away? The final outcome of V FOR VENDETTA may seem helpful, but why replace one tyranny for another.
I know I've gone off on a tangent here. I know my comments may make some people angry. But alas I live in America and for all the horrible things that are going wrong, I'm glad I can still thank God that I live in a country where many men and women strive to do what's right. I can question my government without having to resort to terrorist actions and where men and women can believe what they want. We are "One Nation Under God", be it a Christian God, or a Muslim God, or Zeus the God Of War. My faith in America is not in the government. My freedom is not protected by George W. Bush or V the mysterious masked vigilante. It come from some place higher, some place stronger than myself. Terrorism breeds more terrorism. Anarchy breeds nothing but chaos and V FOR VENDETTA is a horrible education in hedonism and nihilism.
Do you want change the world? It begins in the human heart. It begins when you strive to do good regardless of whether the Government is protecting you or not. It's means dying not for self, but for others and striving for truth and not empty platitudes. V FOR VENDETTA is about a coward, and that's just sad.