[WARNING: contains spoilers]
Why should you go see V for Vendetta?
It’s not the examination of the terrorist/freedom fighter angle, i.e., the question of when, if ever, violence is a valid response to oppression. Nor is it the film’s portrayal of a dystopian future in which governments in the West turn to faith based fascism as their raison d’etre. Nor is it because the filmakers, the Wachowski brothers of Matrix fame and their hand picked director Joel McTeigue, have crafted a sumptuous visual delight, one married to one of the best plotted blockbuster films I’ve seen in ages. The movie is cinematic entertainment on a grand, even operatic, scale.
These are all good reasons, of course. Who wouldn’t want to see a film that delivers both great images and a great message that is all too relevant to these troubled times in which we find ourselves beset by fanatics both at home and abroad. But my reason for advocating you go and spend your leisure time in a darkened theatre to watch this film, and then tell your friends to watch it too, is one that is just as important, and maybe more important, than all those I’ve enumerated above.
If you’ve seen the film perhaps you can guess why I’m recommending it to you. It’s a small thing, really . . .
(continued below the fold)
. . . and one you would think that shouldn’t be very surprising in this day and age. However, to my mind it was one of the most remarkable, and, in its way, revolutionary, aspects of this movie.
You see, V has a great and tragic love story buried within the heart of the film, a subplot that doesn’t involve the the two main characters and stars, Natalie Portman and Hugo Weaving, except in a very peripheral manner. And another subplot involves a minor character, who demonstrates the meaning of what true loyalty, friendship and courage mean. A man who pays the ultimate price for his loyalty to his friend.
Pretty standard stuff, really. Blockbuster movies always need some additional story elements to weave in admidst the bursting bombs and other action scenes where the protagonist fights against the usual parade of villains and their henchmen. Such films need this “filler material” to give their audiences a rest now and then from all the special effects wizardry and out-sized violence that permeates the genre.
But what is remarkable for this movie is the fact that the people portrayed in these two subplots are far from standard. You see, the doomed romance involves, not a man and a woman, but two lesbians. And the courageous friend? He’s gay, and in this cinematic world, also deep in the closet (literally). People who are portrayed with great sympathy and dignity by the filmmakers. People who are, in fact, the real heroes and heroines of this movie.
Now I know what some of you may be thinking. What’s the big deal here, Steven? Hollywood has represented gays and lesbians sympathetically in many films, and that true enough, as far as it goes. But most of those films have been “small movies” and I say that not in any derogatory sense. The vast majority of films that portray gay and lesbian characters realistically have been independent films, made on limited budgets with lesser known actors in the starring roles.
Even Brokeback Mountain, last year’s supposedly breakout hit drama about a love affair between two gay cowboys was intended as a small film, with a production budget of only $14 million. And despite the fact that it has been phemomenally successful for such a modestly budgeted movie, it still hasn’t surpassed $100 million at the domestic (USA) box office.
Most large Hollywood films, the ones with the big stars and hefty budgets, have shied away from portraying gay characters except in supporting roles, and then usually as stereotypes for comedic effect See, for example, Harvey Fierstein’s role as Jeff Goldblum’s ineffectual and flamingly gay office friend in Independence Day, who stereotypically panics in the face of danger, principally for laughs (much like Hollywood used African American actors, like Steppin Fetchit, to portray blacks in stereotypical fashion in an earlier era). Of course, being gay, Harvey’s character is killed off in the first 30 minutes of the film.
Even in those rare occasions when Hollywood has chosen to portray gay men and women in leading roles, they have not been portrayed realistically. A good example is Robin Williams in the American version of La Cage Aux Folles, aptly rendered in English as The Birdcage. Here’s the plot summary of The Birdcagee from The Internet Movie Database website:
Plot Outline: A gay cabaret owner and his drag queen companion agree to put up a false straight front so that their son can introduce them to his fiancé’s right-wing moralistic parents.
Stereotypes abound.
Most Hollywood films that have portrayed famous gay men or women have shied away from an open portrayal of their sexuality, if they have discussed it at all. Lawrence of Arabia scarcely alluded to the well known fact that T.E. Lawrence was a gay man. And Michelangelo was portrayed as a raving heterosexual by Charleton Heston in The Agony and the Ecstasy even though he was also known to be far more interested in sex with men than with women. A recent film about the life of Cole Porter focused more on his relationship with his “official” wife (whom he married to avoid specualtion about his true sexual orientation) than any of his many male lovers.
This is why V for Vendetta is so revolutionary. The gay characters are the ones whose humanity is portrayed most realistically and sympathetically. It is everyone else in the film who is merely a rough sketch, from the many villains in the piece, to Natalie Portman as the stereotypical ingenue in distress who requires saving by the film’s protagonist, V. The truly heartbreaking moments in this film, the ones that raise this movie far above its peers in the action adventure genre, are those involving the gay and lesbian characters.
And that is why I recommend it to you, because for all the political incorrectness of the film, for all the controversy surrounding its message, this may be its most radical departure from the norm: that it dares to portray gays and lesbians as real people, with the same fears, the same doubts, the same hopes and dreams as any of the rest of us. Their stories are the emotional core of this film. More than any other reason this is what will upset right wing religious conservatives the most about it.
And that is precisely why you should go see it.
