V for Vendetta

Director: The Wachowski Brothers
year:2006
Genre: Thriller, Action, sci-fi

V for Vendetta is a film set in the future, in England where the country has sunken into a cruel and ruthless dictatorship and is unable to free itself from it. The film is directed by the Wachowski brothers (the matrix trilogy) and stars Hugo Weaving and Natalie Portman.

We join the film on a blank screen with a monologue of “remember, remember the 5^th of November, gunpowder treason and plot, I can see no reason why the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot” this simple childhood rhyme is said without a shred of emotion or happiness which gives us the impression that it is not only relevant to the film but also that it has a less that happy relevance to the plot. The voice then goes on to describe about how Guy Fawkes was not only a man but an idea, and that ideas are more powerful that any man ever could be. As this monologue continues we see Guy Fawkes trying to destroy parliament but failing and being apprehended by soldiers. All the time the monologue is going he is lead to a gallows and hung before a very solemn crowd. Again the screen fades to black and the monologue explains that it was not an Idea that made her remember the 5^th of November but a man (loosely introducing us to the main character) and the screen lights up as a “v” encircled in flame roars into existence. And the film title “V for Vendetta” emerges from the flames.

The next scene shows a poorly lit room with a large ornate mirror and a television showing a program that we hear the audio of as both a diargetic and non-diargetic sound. In the mirror we see the reflection of a man, V (weaving) putting on a Guy Fawkes mask (in this scene we at no point see his face) this mask is of course symbolic as later on in the film we realise that he is a rebel, a visionary revolutionary that tries to break England out of its oppression. Whilst this scene plays out we hear the man on the television saying that the “former united states” is asking Britain for aid. This leads us to believe that the rest of the world is in a state of relapse and although the dictatorship in England is cruel it is obviously keeping England alive.

The camera then pans through the mirror to a room where an attractive young woman called Evie (Portman) is getting ready to go out in front of another mirror; this camera angle is made to make us think that the two crucial and influential characters of this film are sitting mere feet from each other completely oblivious to each other. We also notice that in the background of Evie’s room the television is playing the same program. Which further links the two characters together before they even meet.

In V’s room it is dimly lit and the walls are brown, all in all the room is very bare but you’re attention is instantly drawn to the mirror and the figure with his back to the camera. The figure has long hair and before leaving the room straps a set of ornately handled knifes to himself and covers himself with a cloak. Also with a flat/wide rimmed hat makes him look very intimidating and dark. This image conforms very strictly to our typical view of what Guy Fawkes may have looked like. Of course these wholes outfit is very symbolic to the role of V in the film later on.

By contrast Evie’s room is very well lit and has white walls; she is taking lots of care to look good. She very defiantly turns of the television to convey that she is not standing for what the biased, uplifting programming is drumming into the minds of the common man. This further shows that before the two even meet they are already standing for the same thing.

We leave the opening scene with both characters leaving their homes and going out into the night leaving us wondering what will happen as we know that the whole country is under curfew of the dictatorship.