3 more reviews

1. ›REVIEW : “Fahrenheit 451” (1966) - Movie by Francois Truffaut@mandibil2504d

   Sometimes, after watching a movie, that “on paper”, should prove an interesting and engaging experience, it leaves me baffled and slightly concerned that I must have missed something.

   Fahrenheit 451 is a complete mystery to me. Practically nothing works in this movie and I mean nothing. The direction is directionless and pretentious, the acting is bloody awful, the special effects are ridiculous, the music, not exactly bad, but sounds more like something from Psycho than a sci-fi movie (yes it is the same composer). The cinematography is mostly goofy and amateurish except for a few well shot and artistically inspired scenes (that really do not fit the feel of the movie). And... its a science fiction movie that does not want to be a science fiction movie.

   

   

   Now to give it some credit I have looked up the back story, the behind the scenes, and it was a complete mess to be fair. Truffaut was out of his safe, intimate story telling. He obviously thought that after having interviewed Hitchcock in his famous seance with hin, that he could just pull of a Vertigo or something of that calibre. He basically fell out with the lead male actor and went on to tell the story of it while the movie was being made.

   Truffaut is far from anything like the stature of his great idol Hitchcock. The dialogues are stiff, the tracking shots are keystone cops like, the expression of the actors are all but gone and leaves me thinking. Is this the so called father of the new wave of cinema directing this piece of junk!

   

   

   In fact is not the first time I get this stiffness feeling when watching Truffaut, it is rather a common feature of his style. Here he just takes it to the next level. It is bloody awful.

   It is not like the plot and the story, based on the novel of Bradbury is bad as such. In fact I am intrigued by these types of dystopic Orwellian tales, where you get a different angle on what may be the problem already in the real world.

   

   

   But Truffaut is just about the worst choice I can think of directing this type of thing. I do wonder what a serious director like Kubrick could have done with it. I really do not understand why Truffaut felt an urge to make this movie, since neither before or after did he do anything like it. So much for the better i suppose.

   Oscar Werner plays the main role as Montag and the two female roles are played by the one and same Julie Christie. If Julie Christie´s performance is somewhat wooden, Oscar Werner’s performance is stiff as cast iron. It is hard for me to understand that a movie with actor performances and inappropriate directing like this slipped through the portal of quality at Universal. What were they thinking!

   

   

   It is apparently well known that the “cannot be bothered” attitude of Werner clashed with Truffaut´s pretentious ideas of his own worth as a director. But it sifts through to the screen and all you can think of is, please let this end soon rather than later.

   This movie certainly is both an anomaly in the resume of Truffaut but also in general cinema. I really had in the back of my head that this was one of those movies where the rumours precedes it, and for quality reasons. After watching it for the first time I can only be baffled why. Maybe the book is great, the movie certainly is not.

   

   

   I enthusiastically do not recommend this movie. Avoid unless you are a diehard Truffaut completist or want to make a review like I do. I see no other reason to sit through it

   3/10

   

   

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2. ›The TV movie adaptaion of "Fahrenheit 451 " by Ramin Bahrani - review@godflesh2963d

   The idea to borrow with Ray Bradbury's fantastic classic "Fahrenheit 451" does not sound like a particularly inspired idea. From the trailer it was obvious that this would be one (at best) framed as filming and endlessly boring as a new adaptation of the book plus annoying political correctness. And ultimately, that's Ramin Bahrani's movie ("99 Homes"). This is basically. The whole review can be exhausted by one paragraph. For which he has not read the book or missed the 1966 film of Francois Truffo, the story tells of young firefighter Guy Montgo (Michael B. Jordan), who abandons his role as a law enforcement authority and confronts his captain and mentor Beatty Shannon), trying to restore his humanity to an anti-utopian future where documentary history and books are forbidden by law, and the work of "firefighters" is to burn them ... HBO's production is premiered today, May 19th. In addition to the lead role, Michael B. Jordan has also taken up production. The boy is currently on the wave crest and apparently alongside the inertia of "Creed," and the "Black Panther" has decided he wants to take part in a movie of social significance. But the only significant thing in "Fahrenheit 451" is the degrees of the title.

   

   As a structure everything is more than clear - in the first half the hero is excellent, trains young minds in how dangerous the books are, he drink pills that suppress his memories, but after meeting with a fatal rebel for the world in which he lives. Everything, of course, is painted with inspirational quotations and paper covers of half of American school literature. If we ignore the fact that every third has read the book and every second has watched at least one anti-utopia in life, we can safely assume that there is no place for surprises. Perhaps only at the casting level some will be frustrated by the black Montgrave who will surely take some jokes in other reviews. But if we take a little of the political correctness, the artistic qualities that are most important remain. Beyond the precarious premise, the film could have earned its strands with an interesting and authentic look at the characters and their world. However, this does not happen. "Fahrenheit 451 " drives quietly on the highway of the banal. The whole movie looks like the next day in the office of a big movie (or TV) studio, where notes are written over each computer with the words "update" and "make up-to-date". That's why besides paperwork, large computers burned with Wikipedia archives are burned in the screenshot, and blueprint colors and advertisements spill in the streets. For this reason, there is no room for a dog-like robot from the culmination of the novel, which might have seemed ridiculous, but at least it would have been something of a pleasure in the bizarre equal boredom. The film also does not give quality attention to its characters. Montag shifts too sharply from a fireman's hero to a book rat, and the genius boy who grows a bird and remembers every word on every page is a definite insult to the good taste. And all the sentiment to the books, I'm not sure it'll be fond of people who really have libraries like those in the movie. The cunning attitude towards literature leads to the top 10 things-which-you-have-to-read, but not to delusion in the works.

   

   If we have to play the producers' game and look at "Fahrenheit 451 " through the modern prism, we can (surprisingly) find a perhaps unconscious critique of political correctness that is currently slowly corrupting free speech in America and Europe. As mentioned in the film itself, the feminism movement has considered some books about the awkward, black community - others, and ultimately everyone wishes to forget the provocative readings. This is a meaningful and useful message in the contemporary cultural landscape, a reminder of what will happen without these fundamental freedoms. So, in this paragraph, the movie comes just in time. The problem is that hardly anyone will think seriously about these issues of so much screening, let alone catch Kafka or Dostoevsky's "Notes from Underground ". On top of that, when the sentiment of the books begins to work and the burning of a huge library begins to look really tragic, an elderly lady puts on her penguin and reveals a ridiculous "explosive" of books attached to her hips. "If you burn my library you will have to burn and me! "she says, and dries herself. There is also a moralizing tone that has snuck into the bottom of the film. The bad guys are psychopaths, the good ones are sentimental good - they read and keep books. Everything is reduced to the permissible minimum, to the limit beyond which it will become insult. It is dropped on top and is beloved like for kids. And maybe they should have targeted the movie.

   In the end, "Fahrenheit 451 " is not a nightmare, nor is it something special. Which is the most unpleasant result of an artwork - apathy and shoulder-raising. I do not think who the new adaptation might be interesting to, maybe teenagers who are just getting acquainted with the ideas developed in anti-utopian classics. Perhaps some of them may eventually come to the works listed in the film. Honestly, I do not believe it.

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3. ›FAHRENHEIT 451 Official Trailer # 2 (2018) Michael B.Jordan, Michael Shannon@movietrailers3004d

   FAHRENHEIT 451 Official Trailer # 2 (2018) Michael B.Jordan, Michael Shannon © 2018 - HBO

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