V for Vendetta (2005)

Premise: Out one night past curfew, Evey Hammond (Natalie Portman) is accosted by government henchmen that have a far more sinister plot in mind for her than a fine. Rescued by a man in a Guy Fawkes mask who introduces himself as V (Hugo Weaving), he invites Evey to witness a sensational performance: the bombing of Old Bailey. Through a series of events, Evey becomes embroiled in V's plot to pick up where the real Guy Fawkes left off to put a stop to England's totalitarian regime.

Oh, dear. Oh dear oh dear oh dear.

The Wachowski brothers produced a script that they cowrote and had it directed by their protégé, James McTeigue. That doesn't exactly sound like the recipe for a film I would like, does it? They made those other movies together that didn't work for me; movies, in fact, that I have spoken out against. And, see, the secret truth is that I kind of like the first movie. The second is so awful that I never saw the third, but that's neither here nor there. The first movie? Was a pretty okay action flick with a nice dose of serious subtext. It was everyone's obsession with it that made me, well, hate it. I used to like to watch it from time to time, say of a lazy Saturday afternoon on TBS or the like. But all that bother about its religious underpinnings? No, thanks, folks.

All of which is to say that it makes it seem like I wouldn't want to walk down another similar road with the Wachowskis. Except for the fact that I did. Unlike Sars, it wasn't a love of Weaving that drew me in. As much as I adore Portman, I'm skilled at avoiding the unfortunate tripe she all-too-frequently appears in.

It is an adaptation of a graphic novel, which like their "lowbrow" counterparts, are turned into movies I generally enjoy. Yet writer Alan Moore deliberately had his name removed from the project, which doesn't speak well of it.

Also, the original V, James Purefoy, stepped out of the role, and Weaving had to step in.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because I knew it before I saw the movie, and the knowledge may have skewed my expectations. Maybe I'm trying to do the same for you. Because, really, this movie has no business being as good as it is.

The reviews so far have hovered around the good to very good zone, but I tell you that those all understate what I saw. There are a million things to put my finger on to point out what made this movie above and beyond my expectations, but I'll just try to give you the highlights.

First and foremost, Weaving and Portman. I get why Purefoy would want to walk away - acting behind a complete mask (not even the eyes show) can't be easy. Entirely encased in an elaborate costume, V's manner and attitude come across as a little artificial at first, but his beautiful baritone seduces the viewer. With a penchant for theatricality (V likes to quote Shakespeare while dispensing of his enemies), his ostentatious style comes across not as camp but as a vaudevillian indictment of his government's puppeteering. Over the course of the film, even the mask seems to disappear. Though it never leaves Weaving's face and though it is itself a fixed entity, through lighting and camera angles and imagination the mask seems to emote. Sometimes the smirk looks, well, smirkier. Sometimes it seems as though the jolly little eye slits start to turn down. It is as though V's humanity, not his ideals, begin to possess the mask and contort it.

Which is how, I suppose, Weaving manages to create such a sweet chemistry with Portman. I'd be surprised if even she could see his eyes, but the two of them manage to catch fire anyway. Portman could have easily made Evey a somnambulist and gotten away with it, but she didn't. She lets all of Evey's vulnerability show how beautiful her weakness and, later, her strength made her. She makes all of her varied feelings about a person that she never sees completely plausible. Hell, even I was starting to feel as she did in the end.

Moore may have intended his graphic novel as an incrimination of where he felt Thatcherism was leading his nation, but it seems more powerfully relevant today. The brothers and McTeigue call up Abu Ghraib, the Gulf Wars, and Nazism as part of their own incrimination, and all of it feels just as important as anything George Clooney did last year (which is not to denigrate Clooney. Cloons, love ya!). Plus, they throw in a slick action flick for your viewing pleasure.

Sure, I freely admit that the quickly paced and tightly drawn first act is followed up by a somewhat turgid second one that dives perhaps a bit too deeply into V's hazy backstory, but, what're ya gonna do? Sometimes people think you need a whackload of backstory. McTeigue ratches it back into high gear by the end anyway. You sort of put it behind you.

I also enjoyed the supporting cast, from Stephen Rea, whose name I always remember and whose face I always forget, to Stephen Fry, who I am starting to associate with a certain kind of character, to Sinéad Cusack, who played a remorseful doctor. What? I didn't have anything special for her, okay?

Wonder of wonders, I really liked this movie. My chin was quivering by the film's final breaths, and I must confess that it was a struggle to keep from crying. I kind of love Hugo Weaving now. I'm excited about Portman's post-Lucas career. And, if I could have more of what I got Friday night, I'd take it. A-

P.S. But what in the world was the song in the end credits? Crazy, that's what.