V for Vendetta

Last night Baylen and I saw V for Vendetta, the new Wachowski brothers movie about a tortured, crazy, anti-authoritarian hero who battles conservative media moguls and fascists in a near-future England. I liked it better as V, the 1980s sci-fi TV series about a journalist who battles the media, fascists AND aliens from outer space. (I also liked it better as The Patriot, Mel Gibson's revolutionary tale of a farmer battling illegal aliens from England).

Vendetta's overall political message is certainly something every American needs to hear: the rise of a conservative, homophobic, nationalistic, civil-liberties-hating, war-loving, national security state has placed us just a catastrophic disaster away from a totalitarian nightmare. Hell, the part of town we saw the movie in already has police surveillance cameras so that the DC government can monitor its citizens.

It was certainly great to hear a main character in a box office smash say things like, "People shouldn't fear their governments, governments should fear their people." (a statement that at least one reviewer doesn't believe in - yes, I'm calling you out Roger Ebert , you fat, fascist fuck.) But, the movie suffers from weak acting, a stupid love-interest subplot (barf), a prolonged scene of character "development" that really turned me off (I won't give it away, but you will say, "WTF?"), and very cartoonish characters (in defense of the Waschowski brothers the movie is based on a graphic novel comic book). On the other hand, the main character seeks to blow up the British parliament and bring down a fascist regime, so who am I to complain.

I disagree with the many movie reviewers who claim the movie blurs the line between terrorists and freedom-fighters. It doesn't. The main character is not a terrorist. He doesn't kill innocent civilians, nor does he indiscriminately kill agents of the state. He's clearly a freedom-fighter. That the government and the media call him a terrorist holds real-life lessons. But, to suggest - as many reviewers are doing - that the movie blurs the line between terrorism and fighting for freedom shows how far our culture has sunk into the abyss of moral relativism. There is a world of difference between someone who blows up a government building to bring down a fascist regime (freedom-fighter) and someone who blows up buses and grocery stores full of innocent people (terrorist). It is not terrorism to wage war on governments. It's revolution. And we should all get to do it at least once in our lives. Especially if there is dancing involved.

Finally, I find it very strange that while the movie's main character battles against intolerance - most notably homophobia and anti-Muslim sentiments - he glorifies a man who conspired to blow up the British parliament because the King had a different religion than him. Guy Fawkes may be the only person to have entered the British parliament with good intentions, but he's no libertarian hero. I will have a few drinks and smoke a cigar in his honor on November 5th anyway.