Fahrenheit 451 (1966)
Directed by a legendary director (Francois Truffaut) and featuring one of the scorching female stars of the time (Julie Christie) and based on a imaginative book by a great American fantabulist (Ray Bradbury) there really has to be something amazing here. And there is, at times, between the cracks.
But in fact, Truffaut and his wry, human touch might just be wrong for a futurist film dripping with old school nostalgia (both). Christie is a good, plastic presence, actually, so that's a good choice. And Bradbury may have liked the adaptation but I've read the book and it has some kind of flow and subtlety that the movie misses.
There are interesting stylistic comparisons with The Prisoner television series (a semi-nostalgic, futurist cult favorite of its own), which came the next year. Both the movie the t.v. show make great use of small budgets, which is partly where the slightly creaky, slightly endearing, slightly cheesy qualities come in. So what you really end up with, overall, is the story, or even better, the germ of the story--that books are so dangerous to the big brother authorities, they are outlawed.
It's a brilliant premise, and the movie is fun, for sure, and interesting. I remember being moved by it (really disturbed) as a teenager, and maybe that's where it resides best. I've tried reading Bradbury as an adult and have some trouble with the emphasis on idea over elegance or depth of character. In fact, as you can see in this movie, there is no depth of character at all. Or, to go an obvious step further, everyone's character is subsumed by something greater, either by choice or by force.
This might be the bigger point, implicit throughout, that we are always something lesser than the requirements of life and death around us.
Directed by a legendary director (Francois Truffaut) and featuring one of the scorching female stars of the time (Julie Christie) and based on a imaginative book by a great American fantabulist (Ray Bradbury) there really has to be something amazing here. And there is, at times, between the cracks.
But in fact, Truffaut and his wry, human touch might just be wrong for a futurist film dripping with old school nostalgia (both). Christie is a good, plastic presence, actually, so that's a good choice. And Bradbury may have liked the adaptation but I've read the book and it has some kind of flow and subtlety that the movie misses.
There are interesting stylistic comparisons with The Prisoner television series (a semi-nostalgic, futurist cult favorite of its own), which came the next year. Both the movie the t.v. show make great use of small budgets, which is partly where the slightly creaky, slightly endearing, slightly cheesy qualities come in. So what you really end up with, overall, is the story, or even better, the germ of the story--that books are so dangerous to the big brother authorities, they are outlawed.
It's a brilliant premise, and the movie is fun, for sure, and interesting. I remember being moved by it (really disturbed) as a teenager, and maybe that's where it resides best. I've tried reading Bradbury as an adult and have some trouble with the emphasis on idea over elegance or depth of character. In fact, as you can see in this movie, there is no depth of character at all. Or, to go an obvious step further, everyone's character is subsumed by something greater, either by choice or by force.
This might be the bigger point, implicit throughout, that we are always something lesser than the requirements of life and death around us.