I saw NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR at the last showing of the last day in the theatre, nearly empty. Why? Perhaps by the time this definitive version was made, cinema-goers had been subjected to far more spectacular and exciting stories of the future -- more puissant heroes, more alluring heroines -- with more uplifting endings. Perhaps too by the pregnant year, this film was alternate history made dreary, nastily laid on, and Americans like things sweet.
The 1956 version with, of all actors, Edmund O'Brien as Winston Smith, a movie that fired me up as a teen-ager, really suffers by comparison. It "told the story," and that was all.
NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR was filmed on location and with a touching eye to authenticity, art imitating the reality we missed, the very springtime when Orwell set his novel, real hommage. I am certain the master would have liked it, and had he as a very old man seen the Hurt and Burton interpretations of his classic characters, the fallen socialist would have said, "Spot on!"
No one does anything alone . . . anymore . . ..
The 1956 version with, of all actors, Edmund O'Brien as Winston Smith, a movie that fired me up as a teen-ager, really suffers by comparison. It "told the story," and that was all.
NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR was filmed on location and with a touching eye to authenticity, art imitating the reality we missed, the very springtime when Orwell set his novel, real hommage. I am certain the master would have liked it, and had he as a very old man seen the Hurt and Burton interpretations of his classic characters, the fallen socialist would have said, "Spot on!"
No one does anything alone . . . anymore . . ..