Bland and empty political commentary with some cool explosions.

Rating: 4/10 (24 May 2010)

Another movie based on Alan Moore's work, another failure in every way. Written by the geeks who created (and destroyed) the matrix franchise V tries so hard to be two things at the same time: an action movie and a socio-political commentary of sorts. It mostly fails at both, but specially at the second area.
The premise of a single man taking over an entire government is not an easy premise to develop in a believable and convincing way. In the case of V we have a character that want's to revolt the masses to turn against the authorities. The problem with this script is that it never makes up it's mind on how it wants to present "V", he's a terrorist, but he's looking for revenge, he's a loony but he's sophisticated. At the end he's really just the charismatic Shepperd leading the flock. He's just another authority figure trading places with the other authority figures. He just happens to wear a very cool mask, and a suit full of knifes.
The movie also has no idea what to do with all it's political commentary, how to aim it properly, how to give it any weight whatsoever. England is controlled by a cartoonish religious/fascist state, complete with an evil big brother guy in a big TV always throwing orders at his inept employees. Went it comes to dealing with V this forces of the law seem to be unable of doing even the most simple and logic task. How can a man that is searched by the entire state can ship a bunch of masks to thousands of people across the country? Using every-day shipping service?
Once more, is not that the premise can't give us a good story, and good characters, is just that the wachachoskis have not even the slightest idea of how to handle the material. Other phony "evil" characters appear here and there, and at the end the entire logic of the movie is nothing more than a black and white picture where V is the good guy and the state is bad and that's it, there's your entire plot development right there. There's a very solid supporting cast doing what they can with the material. Sthepen Rea cringes at every line he spokes, Hugo Weaving at least has the mask to cover himself from the embarrassment. John Hurt hams it up, Stephen Fry brings some charm. Natalie Portman on the other hand gives yet another high-school-musical level of performance. This woman has nothing to do in front of a camera.
Sure, watching stuff blow up with the 1812 overture is cool to watch, but when there's nothing to back up all those images then there's a big problem with the material. The wachowskis should never, ever try to write anything else in this vein again. Think of the children please.