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Specifically, in today's polarizing political climate? (Yes I'm aware of this disaster.) With the NSA gradually becoming more identical to Telescreens & Big Brother with every passing year it only begs the question. In Nineteen Eighty-Four every aspect of everybody's life was recorded which could be doctored or deleted (memory holed) at any given moment by the Ministry of Love (becoming "Unpersons") if they were perceived to be a threat to the state. With the addition of the internet in modern times—where the NSA gets its power— the reality of this happening seems much more plausible. It seems Hollywood wouldn't entirely be opposed to the concept, as they're releasing a film about Snowden helmed by Oliver Stone in December about the NSA surveillance shenanigans (unfortunately everyone will be talking about Star Wars instead). With the polarizing clusterfuck known as American politics in the 21st century dominated by micro-aggressions & trigger warnings where everyone is alleging that every political/ideological opponent is the equivalent of Adolf Hitler in the 24/7 information age, do you think film adaptations of either of these two novels which embody every aspect of political & social control as it's subject matter as objectively viable to the public? Is the American population mature enough to handle it? Will Fox News & Media Matters begin to accuse the left & right of thoughtcrime or newspeak? Will colleges embrace these Ministry of Truth type criticisms? Will Morgan Freeman voice Big Brother? Will filmmakers avoid them more on social stigma positions rather than the pressure of adapting revered classics? Would Ingsoc & Fordism replace the Democrats and Republicans on the ballot in 2020 as a result? Thoughts(crimes)?
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Aug 15, 2015 10:24
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Voted 'yes'. I don't think making another 1984 movie would be that much of a problem because most people wont think much of it/associate it with their own lives that much. There really isn't much left for 1984 to expose, most people are aware that they are being monitored and manipulated, they just don't care. They will however go and watch 1984 if it has Morgan Freeman as O'Brien, as well they should.
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Aug 15, 2015 11:58
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I feel like too much is made out of the surveillance aspects of 1984, in that that's all that people ever talk about when they mention the novel. I think the more interesting part is actually the geopolitical climate of the novel, which is a pretty specific nod to the dissolution of the WW2 alliance of UK/US/USSR against Germany and the beginning of East-West tensions where Germany was suddenly allied with the US/UK against the USSR. The problem with making any movie based on 1984 is that Orwell's political philosophy doesn't really fit into the neat and tidy definitions we like to throw around in the US these days. From the very get go the politics of the movie are either going to be way over the audiences head. Or the film may ignore or simplify the political aspects and just be a prime example of the suppression of thoughtcrime that Orwell opposed.
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Aug 15, 2015 12:44
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the version of 1984 from 1984 is pretty darn good
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Aug 15, 2015 13:07
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Immortan posted:Specifically, in today's polarizing political climate? (Yes I'm aware of this disaster.) That movie is actually fantastic though? What problems with it could you possible have? 
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Aug 15, 2015 16:48
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The 1956 version of 1984 is extremely good as well. Anyway, every loving idiot online compares everything to 1984. What I suspect would happen is people picking up on the oh so subtle themes in 1984 and others accusing them of reading too much into it.
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Aug 15, 2015 17:15
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They should make a 1984 movie but it should include my pet theory that Britain is really a North Korea analogue and the rest of the world is just fine.
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Aug 15, 2015 17:19
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computer parts posted:They should make a 1984 movie but it should include my pet theory that Britain is really a North Korea analogue and the rest of the world is just fine. Isn't that a popular theory about the novel? It certainly strikes one as eminently possible right in the plain text. Literally nobody that we know of ever actually interacts with the two other countries.
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Aug 15, 2015 17:37
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The movie adaptation of 1984 was real bad IMO
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Aug 15, 2015 17:41
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Brazil is an excellent versoon of both.
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Aug 15, 2015 17:43
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The Double based on the Doestoevsky story is also in the same 1984/Brazil mashup area and is really good. The guy from The Social Network is great in it. The classic Orson Welles adaptation of The Trial is good too. So is this now the "dystopian movie" thread because cool, cool.
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Aug 15, 2015 17:47
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precision posted:So is this now the "dystopian movie" thread because cool, cool. Ooooh, if it is that I want to ask whether Watership Down could be considered a dystopian story. I thought about that for a bit when I was watching the bunnies in my garden, but couldn't decide for or against it.
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Aug 15, 2015 18:17
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precision posted:Isn't that a popular theory about the novel? It certainly strikes one as eminently possible right in the plain text. Literally nobody that we know of ever actually interacts with the two other countries. That and all of the ministries are located on the point farthest away from the majority of the country and right next to (regularly) hostile neighbors.
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Aug 15, 2015 18:33
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anyway, to answer the thread's question if they made a 1984 movie now it would almost certainly go hard for the Hunger Games crowd and suck balls
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Aug 15, 2015 18:34
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Or it would go for the think about it maaaan liberals and equally suck.
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Aug 16, 2015 02:28
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Actually if someone tried to make a 1984 movie now it would probably be someone like David Fincher, it would be so true to the source material that it stops halfway through and becomes an audiobook, and would win multiple Academy Awards. Christian Bale stars as Winston Smith, having starved himself back down to The Machinist levels.
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Aug 16, 2015 02:49
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On the subject of Brave New World, has anyone seen the 1998 version with Peter Gallagher and Leonard Nimoy? Is it worth watching?
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Aug 16, 2015 03:25
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1984 is going on right outside your window, at least, if you live here in America.
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Aug 16, 2015 03:43
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rear end Catchcum posted:1984 is going on right outside your window, at least, if you live here in America. I'd say we're more in Scanner Darkly territory at the moment to be honest.
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Aug 16, 2015 03:48
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precision posted:I'd say we're more in Scanner Darkly territory at the moment to be honest. Or Brave New World without the sex
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Aug 16, 2015 05:01
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rear end Catchcum posted:1984 is going on right outside your window, at least, if you live here in America. Nah the modern world is more generic cyber-punk what with everyone being constantly connected to cyberspace and carrying around super-computers in their pockets, huge multinational corporations basically controlling the world, holograms of popstars holding huge concerts and rapid advances in bionic limbs. Except of course you live in North-Korea. In that case you live in 1984 except they can't afford to actually monitor you constantly so they rely on you monitoring yourself through a sort of societal panopticon where anything you do might get reported to the government and get you sent to a camp so you don't do anything in case someone might say something. FreudianSlippers fucked around with this message at 13:52 on Aug 16, 2015 |
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Aug 16, 2015 13:50
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FreudianSlippers posted:
That's basically how it works in 1984 too. Winston's neighbor for example didn't get caught by monitors but by his own children.
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Aug 16, 2015 14:29
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rear end Catchcum posted:1984 is going on right outside your window, at least, if you live here in America.  I feel like both could do with adaptations, but I think both come toothless when they're just strict adaptations to their original source material. For example, I think Huxley's views on sexuality and body politics don't really ring true to the modern world in a lot of ways. I think it's important to get the spirit, but think of how it connects to a current audience. Timeless Appeal fucked around with this message at 16:04 on Aug 16, 2015 |
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Aug 16, 2015 15:19
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Of course, the studio would rename it "2084" otherwise people would mistake it for a period piece and wonder where all the zipper jackets and parachute pants were at.
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Aug 16, 2015 16:00
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One reason not to make another adaptation of 194, Brave New World or Fahrenheit 451 is that it might turn out like Equilibrium.
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Aug 16, 2015 16:39
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this would probably be pretty cool
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Aug 16, 2015 17:01
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Grendels Dad posted:One reason not to make another adaptation of 194, Brave New World or Fahrenheit 451 is that it might turn out like Equilibrium. That sounds like a reason for it?
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Aug 16, 2015 17:13
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Equilibrium is a good movie.
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Aug 16, 2015 18:18
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Grendels Dad posted:One reason not to make another adaptation of 194, Brave New World or Fahrenheit 451 is that it might turn out like Equilibrium. Tread softly, O'Brien, because you tread on my dreams.
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Aug 16, 2015 18:27
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If it helps the conversation, I voted for the OP to gently caress off.
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Aug 16, 2015 19:20
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Tailored Sauce posted:If it helps the conversation, I voted for the OP to gently caress off. It seems like the only reasonable vote.
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Aug 16, 2015 20:31
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precision posted:Equilibrium is a good movie. Eh, it has its moments and is fun in a way, but I wouldn't call it good. It's like the dream of a teenager after he started watching 1984 on one screen and some sick action movie on another, but fell asleep halfway through.
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Aug 16, 2015 21:07
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I recently read Nothing to Envy: Real Lives in North Korea which I highly recommend if you want a peak into what life's like in a real totalitarian regime. The book's based on interviews with six North Korean defectors and recounts their lives and what led to them defecting, followed by their final mistake. The story of Jun-Sang and Mi-ran particularly touched me, and I thought it would make an excellent film. Only then I remembered that the last time someone made a film about North Korea they started a cyberwar against Sony.
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Aug 16, 2015 23:38
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Tailored Sauce posted:If it helps the conversation, I voted for the OP to gently caress off. You'll never unperson me, motherfucker.  And yeah, Equilibrium owns.
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Aug 16, 2015 23:51
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I think the only problem with a film of 1984 is that we have been watching for 1984 to happen so long we've been blinded to other things. Isaac Asimov posted:To summarise, then: George Orwell in 1984 was, in my opinion, engaging in a private feud with Stalinism, rather that attempting to forecast the future. He did not have the science fictional knack of foreseeing a plausible future and, in actual fact, in almost all cases, the world of 1984 bears no relation to the real world of the 1980s. http://www.newworker.org/ncptrory/1984.htm
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Aug 17, 2015 06:43
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Erich Fromm wrote a good forward in one paperback edition (Penguin, I think?) and said that comparing 1984 to Stalinism was oversimplifying the forecasts Orwell was making. Besides, his critique of Stalin was much more up-front. He conjured up a pig named Napoleon and even gave him a Trotsky named Snowball to pick on. Isaac Asimov may think Orwell had no skill at predictive science fiction, but I heartily disagree. 1984 could be made. There are some directors and companies out there with the right amount of vision and money and guts to do it. It could probably be easily made by an indie company if they were creative in shooting scenery. Also, I didn't especially care for the movie that came out in the eponymous year. It was just, blah, compared to the book. As for Brave New World, there've been a lot of movies that come close to the concepts of the book, but usually they chicken out and make it some kind of fake utopia or have some big uprising thing. Yippee, another loving battle of five armies. But although it would be interesting, I think Huxley's book might be too ambiguous for a big audience. His world is amoral to our sensibilities (well, to what I see out my window at least) and it's focused around the idea that nobody at all is special and life is and should be one giant orgy. To say nothing of the implied racism and sexism that world contains. By the way, Equilibrium was a childish rebuke of 1984. "Oh yeah, Oligarchy?" *Christian Bale sighs and draws his katana* It wasn't even scary because the drugs everyone took were voluntary and somehow all the young children IN THE WHOLE WORLD did that secretly-good-conspiracy thing. Orwell depicts children who will grow up to mug you. Also, even though I love that guy who played Robert the Bruce, O'Brien would never gamble on a sword fight. He would just abduct you in the night and put you in an electric char. I did enjoy seeing Taye Diggs get his face sliced off.
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Aug 17, 2015 07:38
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Nessus posted:I think the only problem with a film of 1984 is that we have been watching for 1984 to happen so long we've been blinded to other things. Science fiction as predictive is a stupid ideal anyway. Futurology is impossible, what we got correct is mostly by dumb luck
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Aug 17, 2015 15:56
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Yeah, the guy who spends his time writing about robots critiquing 1984 for not being a realistic enough imagining of the future is a bit rich.
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Aug 17, 2015 16:08
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Simplex posted:Yeah, the guy who spends his time writing about robots critiquing 1984 for not being a realistic enough imagining of the future is a bit rich. To his credit, he spent like the last twenty years of his writing career critiquing his own fictional setting. It seems perfectly Asimov to be hung up like that.
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Aug 17, 2015 17:33
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Asimov imagines the future of I, Robot to be one where capitalism has become self-reflexively corrective in addition to being massively productive. He's pretty ambivalent about whether that's a good thing or not, but he's one to talk.
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Aug 17, 2015 17:43
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