FINAL CUT: Terrorism Saves the Day

It's funny. I don't feel like I've been watching that many movies lately. My Netflix list barely seems to have moved. And yet, while I found myself battling a very unpleasant cold all weekend long, I definitely devoted a good portion of my time to the movies. Among other things, I knocked off the odd DVD double feature of An American in Paris and The Ice Harvest, was treated to some unusually mediocre TV screenings of films I would never have watched had I not been incapacitated (like the ludicrous timebending, serial killer hunting, father-son bonding mishmash Frequency and the willfully, eagerly dumb The Librarian: Quest for the Spear, featuring a first-ever fight scene showcasing Bob Newhart), and scanned through the newest additions to my home library (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and the MST3K version of The Wild World of Batwoman, which concludes memorably with Tom Servo's plaintive cry, "ENNNNNNND!!! ENNNNNNND!!!"). So now it looks like all I do is watch movies. Which I'm pretty sure isn't true. I swear.

This weekend's film frenzy got underway with an IMAX screening of the latest comic-to-cinema effort, V for Vendetta. Movies that adapt graphic novels are getting much better, as filmmakers who actually like the comic medium are given the reins, and Vendetta has just such a pedigree. The script is written by the Wachowski Brothers, the minds behind The Matrix and acknowledged fans of comic books and animé film. Of course, they're also the minds behind The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions, so there is cause for concern. Also, they've handed the director's megaphone over to one of their assistant directors, James McTeigue. Almost sounds like they couldn't be bothered.

Someone who definitely refused to be bothered was the author of the original comic, Alan Moore, who insisted that his name not appear in the credits and refused to take a penny from the film's producers. His stance led me into a conversation about whether viewing the film would strike a blow to his rights as a writer, which is a subject I'm very sensitive to, since I would like to be a writer and thereby have rights. Moore has been most displeased with Hollywood's approach to his works, and from what I've heard of From Hell and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, that's understandable. My only exposure to Moore is through a recent reading of the genre landmark Watchmen (my review of which is coming soon to BookADay, I swear it). What it comes down to is, can you separate the book from the movie? I haven't read the book, so it's incumbent upon me to make the distinction, to say that what I'm seeing may have nothing to do with what Alan Moore initially set down on paper. I think we can all get behind that. V for Vendetta will have to stand or fall on its own merits.

In fact, Vendetta has a lot more going for it than against it. The production is visually rich, with striking images that show their origins in comics, but retain the movement and fluidity of film. And it features a stellar cast working hard to overcome pedestrian roles, including Stephen Rea as a hangdog cop tracking a terrorist despite his misgivings, Stephen Fry lending a wry ignorance to a TV star who pushes his luck a bit too far, and the always-entertaining John Hurt, making fun out of a dictator whose intentions are only the most obvious.

Of course, the real star of the film is Hugo Weaving, best known for his turns as Agent Smith in The Matrix and Elrond in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Though engaging in those films, these are not roles of great nuance and variety. In a way, neither is the role of V here, in which the actor's face never emerges from behind a mask of the fabled English rebel Guy Fawkes. But Weaving is sensational. Roger Ebert has complained that anything that talks ought to have moving lips, which must mean he collapses into a fit of apoplexy every Halloween. But Weaving hearkens back to the glorious days of Greek theater, managing to convey a tremendous range of emotion and inner thought despite being obscured by a grinning mask from start to finish. There were so many moments that I watched this concealed man seething with a baroque rage or pleading for sympathy, and all I could think was, "This should not be working." In particular, a scene featuring this dashing man of violence dressed in a kitchen apron manages to overcome the inherent absurdity. But that's acting for you, and though Weaving won't get the credit he deserves, it's a tour de force performance.

Of course, he may just seem exceptional because he's cast alongside Natalie Portman. I don't care who I offend by saying this, but I think Natalie Portman is a terrifically overrated actress. Everything I see her in, she tries very hard to convey seriousness and gravity, but all you really get is the trying-really-hard part. (Exception: the deeply unsettling scene in Closer in the strip club when she taunts Clive Owen with no inflection whatsoever. The rule: every scene in which she appears in the Star Wars prequels.) So let it be said: she's not bad in this. I discovered that I actually like her better with a British accent. I just wish she had chosen a single British accent to use throughout the film. And she's not called upon to be an action heroine, so her she's not straining credulity. I would have liked to see a stronger actress in the film, someone with a definitive personality and not such a pushover. But she doesn't wreck the movie. Faint praise, I guess.

I've been going on about the actors, and I guess that's because I'm dodging the jist of the film's plot, which is quite simply a manifesto in favor of terrorism. That sounds extreme, but consider that the main character blows up a building at the start of the film, and promises to blow up another at the conclusion, while the intervening time is spent rallying the nation to his cause. To be fair, the film stacks the deck against the existing social order, a dictatorship with overtones of fascism so overt (screaming leader, marching troops, pervasive symbol on a red field in a white circle) that the only thing missing is a tiny mustache. So it's easy to root for the apathetic populace to rise up and initiate their own liberation. But the result, while appearing triumphant (complete with fireworks and uplifting music), is deeply unsettling. Maybe I'm just hard-wired to look for peaceful resolution. But even if this were not a world obsessed with terrorism, I still think I would be very uncomfortable about celebrating a hero whose only means of galvanizing the public and effecting change is through destruction. And then I realize that America is a country borne out of that very notion, and I blanche at the thought that I would have stood in the way of the American Revolution. Supposedly, Thomas Jefferson suggested that there should be a revolution every 50 years, so there's clearly a time and place to say to hell with social order. But that doesn't make the prospect any more palatable.

(I have to include my suspicion that this movie will play very differently in Britain, where Guy Fawkes is a sort of perverse cultural icon, and where the final act of terrorism will evoke a deep sense of history, rather than a harsh reminder of current events. But maybe not.)

Any film that generates that much internal debate has a lot going for it. But I don't know if anyone is putting that much thought into the picture. V for Vendetta is that rare creature in the cinema: a popcorn movie with something to say. Unfortunately, I think we're so used to movies with nothing to say, we may not even recognize the real deal when it comes along. So Vendetta sits there looking incredibly irresponsible, having fun with uncomfortable reminders of public buildings being destroyed.

It's enough to make you long for a Bob Newhart fight scene.