V For Viceroy
Posted on | April 2, 2006 at 4:35 pm | 10 Comments
Sorry for all the cell phone photo postings yesterday. As I mentioned, I was experimenting with new ways to post and I got carried away. I will try to be more judicious about such things in the future.
I think yesterday may have been the first April Fool’s Day ever where I didn’t play a single trick on anyone. In a way, that was the trick. Sorry if you were expecting something diabolical from me.
I forgot to mention last week the statewide indoor public smoking ban that was just signed into law by Colorado’s governor, which takes effect on July 1st. Part of me feels that this is an intrusion into the lives and rights of people and that it’s a “slippery slope/where do you draw the line?” issue, but the selfish part of me says “Hooray!”. I’m not sure I totally buy that it’s a health issue. I am just so looking forward to going to nearly any establishment and not to having to worry about coming out of it smelling putrid. Let’s face it, even non-smoking areas in smoking restaurants don’t totally do the trick. I know that I will be much more likely to spend my money going out than I used to be, and will patronize places I might not have otherwise. I know there is at least one restaurant that the gang and I used to patronize that we had to stop going to because the smoking was getting out of hand and ruining our dinner.
I sympathize with the small tavern owners who say it will decrease their business, and I hope that it will actually have the opposite effect and bring in some new blood. This has apparently been shown to happen in other states and cities that passed a similar ban. I may try out some of my neighborhood dives after the ban takes effect. At any rate, it will be interesting to see what the fallout will be.
I finally saw V For Vendetta today. I was kinda upset that even though the Imax version is playing in Denver, the earliest show is at 4:45pm, even on the weekends. I don’t like to go to shows that late on the weekend. So I saw it at a “normal” theater with my friend Bryce. Definitely my favorite film of the year so far, especially in the Big Hollywood Action Movie category (though there really wasn’t all that much action). But with all the previews for upcoming blockbusters that they showed, I’m sure that it will be eclipsed soon. I read the comics that the movie was based on many years ago, but remember very little of them. I’m not sure what all changed, but it looks like some of the important parts of the story did wind up in the movie. There ends up being a lot of thoughts, ideas, and emotional content in it than is evident from the trailers. Not to mention a plot twist or two. It’s pretty much Natalie Portman’s show (since Hugo Weaving has to act inside that mask) and she did a decent job of conveying the changes that her character undergoes throughout the movie, though there were a few times that I felt her turnarounds were a little too abrupt and not fully explained.
[Spoiler Warning; this paragraph only]
The only plot issue I had a big problem with was: Where the heck did V get all those masks to distribute to the people, and how could he afford to buy them and ship them? Didn’t they say there was like 800,000 (or was it 8,000?) of them? Seems like it would’ve been pretty easy for the authorities to catch V by following the trail of who placed an order for all those Guy Fawkes masks.
[End Spoiler]
Anyway, the acting, direction, cinematography were all good. I hope no one went to see it expecting another Matrix just because the Wachowski Brothers wrote and produced it, since it was very different. The story is more personal and even a bit… understated. Recommended.
One odd thing about the movie – I didn’t even notice that Dascomb was played by Ben Miles until the end credits. Miles played Patrick in the British version of Coupling, one of my all time favorite sitcoms. I should’ve recognized him. I did keep thinking the actor looked familiar though. (Speaking of Coupling, I noticed that Sarah Alexander, who played Susan on that show, is the female lead in the new American sitcom Teachers. Does this mean there will be no more seasons of Coupling? Not that I expect Teachers to be around for long.)
Latre.
Comments
10 Responses to “V For Viceroy”
April 3rd, 2006 @ 2:10 pm
…the Wachowski Brothers wrote and produced it…
Brothers? I thought they were brother and sister.
April 3rd, 2006 @ 2:14 pm
It’s like Warner Bros, a trademark that suggests gender but doesn’t guarantee it.
April 4th, 2006 @ 12:45 pm
I recognized Ben Miles in the sense that I thought it was “that guy who played Patrick on Coupling,” but I’d never seen him being serious, and he looked kind of different. I was wondering if the American show Teachers was related to the BBC show at all. I really liked that one and see no indication that they are going to do another series. It’s more dramedy than sitcom. I haven’t seen the American show, but I do like Sarah Alexander.
April 4th, 2006 @ 1:06 pm
The weird thing about a smoking ban is that, if it does in fact lead to more business for pubs over the long run, why haven’t more pubs gone nonsmoking voluntarily? Smokers have always been a minority in this country, even at the peak of its popularity. A democracy will eventually rule against the minority doing anything that the majority doesn’t like, and that’s fine, but I don’t get why it has to become a blanket total ban without possibility of exceptions.
In LA I’m starting to notice more and more “cigar stores” springing up next door to some clubs – the ban here has been around a lot longer and folks are starting to work out ways around it, like the “private clubs” you join in Salt Lake when you want to have a drink…
Actually, the biggest news is that Scotland – of all places – has also banned smoking in pubs. I mean, it’s like it’s no longer Scotland! This is a place where you can actually buy deep-fried candy bars, and children are restricted to beer only until they’re old enough for whiskey – suggesting to someone to adopt healthier habits is the most unhealthy thing you could normally do in a pub…
April 4th, 2006 @ 5:22 pm
If one location prohibits smoking all the smokers go to another location. A few people that hear that the place is non smoking may start going. If smoking is prohibited in all locations smokers only have the option of not going out at all. Others know that all locations are smoke free.
This is why you have to have the ban to have to boost in business. I’m not endorsing the overall ban. I believe then ban here even covers private clubs, which seems very not Constitutional, but there it is.
April 4th, 2006 @ 6:08 pm
InfK: Why haven’t more pubs gone non-smoking voluntarily? One answer might be that they *think* they’ll lose business (or would, in the absence of a widespread smoking ban). Sort of a variation of the “tragedy of the commons”: if every bar thinks it’ll lose some customers by banning smoking but is unlikely to gain customers by being non-smoking, no club will risk being the one club to lose customers. It will only work if it’s universal.
Bill: “Smokers only have the option of not going out at all” if smoking is banned only if it’s also banned outdoors (which would be unusual – at least more than some specified distance from buildings – and which I wouldn’t support). What, you can’t go outside and have a smoke? Lots of people do at non-smoking places, or when guests at houses of non-smokers.
What people tend to overlook is that smoking affects not only the smokers but others – including the people who (have to) work there. I just don’t buy the “choice” argument here: it’s a public health issue, and individual businesses shouldn’t be allowed to have smoking just as they’re not allowed to have their pet rats in the kitchen with them.
I mean, consider that if it weren’t for the fact that smoking is customary, the idea that someone has the “right” to spew stinky and toxic fumes into the air others must breathe would be considered absurd. Remember those spray cans of “fart gas” you could buy? Would you agree if I argued my “right” to spritz it around in public – especially if it were not only stinky but toxic too? (Note that there’s no law against it…)
April 4th, 2006 @ 6:18 pm
2fs: I spoke overly succinctly. Smokers will still be able to smoke outside, but the option to change to another bar to smoke inside won’t exist so most will stay at the places they already frequent. Meanwhile there would be an upswing of people going out that wouldn’t before. A small portion of smokers who insist on smoking w/o going outside will give up bars.
April 4th, 2006 @ 8:23 pm
My dad pretty much chain-smoked around me while I was growing up, so I’m waiting to see if I develop lung cancer or emphysema before I decide if secondhand smoke is a public health issue or not. (Luckily, he quit some years ago, after his heart attack, but he is on oxygen 24/7 these days. I think that has more than a little to do with the smoking.)
April 4th, 2006 @ 9:34 pm
I still say that the ban in Scotland is un-natural and flies counter to all that’s right and proper. And whichever side of the debate you’re on, I would argue that these sorts of bans in the U.S. – however constitutional they may be – are clearly anti-capitalist. The free market is supposed to be able to find its own way, says good old-fashioned conservative economic theory…
I’m not even personally against such laws in principle, I just think they’re solving the wrong problem – which is what government seems to do best.
April 4th, 2006 @ 10:03 pm
Anti-capitalist? Naw, it’s clearly Mob Rule (see recent postings in The Dilbert Blog). I truly believe a majority of people in the US are for these bans, and the government is just following the will of the people.