Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

Matrixiole Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

ThedevilChoose When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

OphisPeristera I love the fact that the film took place during the time the book did and how they made all the scenes look grim, gritty, and late 1940s ish. My main problem is the lack of development of Winston and Julia. He goes from hating her to making love to her and no in between. He also says he hates all goodness and purity for no reason. And the Room 101 dream scenes were more strange and confusing to anyone who hasn't read the book than the Maze Runner dream scenes. TL;DR: If you haven't read the book, you won't understand the film.

framptonhollis This brilliant adaptation of George Orwell's immoral classic of the same name nearly matches its source material in terms of quality (which is quite the achievement, considering the fact that "1984" is by far one of the greatest novels I have ever read). The chilling direction and pitch perfect performances help make this disturbing vision all the more of a truthful gut punch. The fact that such a hard hitting and seemingly over the top story remains entirely relevant in today's chaotic political climate is both a disgrace and a testament to Orwell's genius, and the cinematic capturing of Orwell's classic is one of practically unbeatable quality. While little to nothing is added to the plot, the visual accompaniment of the story enhances its impact. The cinematography is fittingly dull, soaked entirely of the joys o color. The performances are simply perfect, making this one of the few novel adaptations I have seen in which I felt that the actors absolutely nailed their performing of the original work's dialogue. At the center of this terrifying satire is the performance of Richard Burton who is both subtle and mind blowingly horrifying in his indescribably villainous role, while John Hurt provides a sometimes timid, sometimes paranoid, and other times absolutely petrified protagonist that attempts to escape from the norms of the totalitarian society he is forced to live in.While not necessarily a "horror" movie, there is no doubt that "1984" is among the most genuinely SCARY films that I have ever seen. Both the book and film have succeeded in making me shake like drug addicted pepper and salt shakers. The dystopia depicted here accurately displays the horror of an overly controlling and oppressive government system forcing its propaganda upon those below, and outwardly embracing anti-free speech and pro-war beliefs. I must restate how sadly relevant this work remains.

MisterWhiplash "Power is tearing human minds apart and putting them back together in new shapes of your own choosing." I think it's easy enough to say that the book by Orwell of 1984 is still valuable because, simply, it is, from the quote above to many, many others, its a cultural touchstone - though there's two things that may be taken for granted: first, that the film itself gets to the dark, horror-movie tone of paranoia and grime and decay and moral impoverishment (and the desperate search for it) that was in the book, and secondly that for all of the lines that people quote, people may not fully grasp how much emotion is conveyed in this story, that when one looks at the *people* there's so much to mine there. This is actually what makes the book so great, and the film too, though it's one of 'those' great films I'm not sure when I'd have the heart to watch again (Brazil, a massively looser version, is more-so but then thats a comedy in a lot of ways, but I digress).What I think Radford does so well along with Roger Deakins's soaked-in-a-dirty-rag cinematography (which I mean as a sincere compliment) is get us into this world and it's one of oppression, devastation, and totalitarian control and keeps us there, so that when it comes time to see the "green world" of that landscape with the trees and those hills, it's more impactful and more like Winston (and us by proxy) being exposed to what is closest to... art, to beauty.When I say emotions, I mean that it's in the actors conveying it - Hurt (who I miss all the more now seeing this a few months after his passing), Suzanne Hamilton to an extent, and in his way how Burton is so completely and wholly wound tight (is it the same as restrained, I'm not sure) - but it's also in key moments that Radford gets right. It's one thing to get the full weight of the terror that Winston feels when he's strapped to the table in the last third and things get rougher and harder to watch than before (Hurt sells it especially, but it's Burton with his cold demeanor that sells it furthest of all, we know he's done this countless times before and will do it again), or those little moments between Hurt and Hamilton when in bed together, naked and open to each other, and how their 'love' is stifled/compromised to a large extent by how they were raised and the world they're in. But there's more.Take the woman who lives below Winston was an extraordinary touch, and it's something that got me thinking after the movie ended (as it did in the book, but this is something that a movie could and does do better): Winston observes that it's so out there to think that a song that was made up by a machine could be performed by this woman so beautifully. In just that there's the capacity to see how someone lost in their seeming day-to-day affairs, can bring artistic depth and expression and feeling. While Radford and Deakins don't show her too close-up, that's fine: we know how Smith reacts to it (and maybe Julia, though perhaps her connection to her comes too late, if (spoiler) it's real at all), and that's what counts. Or to another example, the other man who Smith briefly talks to about lending razors who shows up when Winston is imprisoned - what did he do exactly? All that matters is he is there and fingers Smith. But, again, the actor is fully organic in this world.If I could nitpick (or maybe it's a legit criticism, I may feel different about the movie later on or even tomorrow), I wondered if there could have been *more* Big Brother imagery - we get that one face in the screen looking on, and then the woman's voice, coming in like the rancid school-marm, on the intercom. But there were a scene or two I wondered if there would be more cameras watching things, or if it was only on the TV screens. Again, a nitpick, since the message is still conveyed and the more important aspect of Big Brother and it's control of society is shown by Radford and company: language and the control of it. This is the part, along with critical thinking in society, that remains relevant as when Orwell wrote it in 1948 as it did in 84 when the film was made and today in 2017 when now Orwell gets quoted this way and that on Twitter and Facebook (but of course the *quotable* bits, I'm not sure how many would want to mention the bit about the rats much).The tricky thing with the film adaptation of this was to make it either *too* oppressive in its drama and horror, which it almost goes to, or trying to soften it or veering too much into satire. There is inherent satire in the text - Orwell constantly did that as a writer and thinker - but one needs to take this as a work as if it's happening as we see it. The remarkable thing and power of the film is that it simply works as a film unto itself, showing us through the power of cinematic grammar, dream-like imagery and occasionally in the cutting, and performance and music (hey Eurythmics, that's some atmospheric s*** right there), that this story not only retains its intellectual power but it gains a little in the pathos department. And that final scene in the cafe.... damn.

sddavis63 The movie comes across as robotic, passionless and bleak. And that is not a criticism. It's exactly the way it should be. This is George Orwell's "1984" after all - his frightening portrayal of a future fascist state and its desire to turn its citizens into mindless and passionless robots existing in a bleak society. It's a movie adaptation of a book, of course (a book I read many years ago) and so there can be quibbles about how well or how poorly Michael Radford (who directed this and wrote the screenplay) captured the novel - but I thought that certainly in terms of the mood he created he did a marvellous job. Even the repeated exchanges of "I love you" between Winston and Julia were robotic and passionless - a robotic rebellion against a robotic society. Basically I thought this was very well done. John Hurd did a good job as Winston, and Richard Burton as O'Brien, who comes to represent the fascist state for us as he tortures Winston in an attempt to "rehabilitate" him was quite good in this - also cold and passionless throughout. Suzanna Hamilton's Julia was almost eerily robotic, in spite of the fact that she was really the lead protagonist, leading Winston into rebellion against the control of Big Brother.The portrayal of the state was interesting as far as it went. Winston's job was the constant re-writing of history so that the past would always support the party line of the present (summed up by the motto "whoever controls the past controls the future, and whoever controls the present controls the past.") In addition to that there was the relentless propaganda, constant surveillance, and continual war as a means of controlling the population and giving them an enemy to vent against (probably by doing so preventing them from releasing their frustration against their own country.) The internal "enemy" revolved around the figure of Emmanuel Goldstein. Did he really exist? I'm not sure. Or was he just a mythical figure invented by the state, so that anyone who didn't buy into the society could simply be denounced as a follower of Goldstein and Goldstein's ideas; a part of an organized conspiracy against the security represented by the state. Even the concept of "Big Brother" is intriguing - and the question was raised in the movie. Was there really a Big Brother, or was there just "the party" who invented this leader image of "Big Brother" (complete with the ubiquitous portrait that looked down on everyone?) I'd guess the latter.What I found most unsettling about this was actually how relevant it remains today. Propaganda, the manipulation of news, image politics and the idolization of "leader" figures, unending war, the rewriting of history to suit the present, the willingness of some politicians at least to outright lie (and to be believed by many even as they lie shamelessly) - all of this is a part of the reality of many (perhaps most) Western "democratic" countries today. Orwell was writing fiction - but was he also a prophet of sorts?It would help to have read the novel before watching the movie, because by their very nature novels can give more details and background, but in terms of the overall mood and bleakness of the society: the movie captures this brilliantly. (8/10)