Today’s movie is a drama with a
scene that happens on April 4. I hope you will enjoy this film and watch it tonight.
.
NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR
Winston Smith lives in an
alternate dystopian Britain where the Communists seized power many years ago.
Britain is part of Oceania along with the Americas. It is eternally at war with
either Eurasia or Eastasia. The repressive government, run by “the Party”,
tries to control speech and thought, by monitoring everyone and shaping the
language to where rebellious speech is impossible. Winston’s job is to rewrite
old news stories, “correcting” them to be in line with current policy
statements. At a mass meeting to express loyalty to “Big Brother” the
mysterious leader of Oceania, and hatred of Goldstein, former ousted party
leader, Winston spots Julia a girl who appears to be more orthodox than most.
Although Winston appears orthodox and loyal, in reality he hates the Party, and
on April 4, 1984 he starts a private diary, an illegal act. [00:20 to 11:04]
Winston, as a member of the Outer party, is better off than the prols, the
ordinary mass of people who live in poverty and are worked to death to support
the eternal war. Winston revisits the
junk shop where he bought his diary, and the owner Charrington shows him an
unmonitored bedroom. One day Julia slips him a note that says, “I love
you.” They meet in the country, where
they can’t be observed. They have sex, in part as a protest. Winston rents the
room from Charrington for their sexual trysts. O’Brien, an elite Inner Party
member, who lives in luxury and can turn off the Party monitoring devices,
gives Winston a copy of the new Newspeak dictionary, but concealed within it is
a copy of The Theory and Practices of Oligarchical Collectivism
by Goldstein, a forbidden book, which Winston reads. The book says that the war
is perpetual and is never meant to be won. It is used by the leaders of the
three superstates to keep their populations poor, disheartened and under
control. Winston and Julia discover that their meeting room was being monitored
and they are arrested. They are both
subjected to physical and psychological torture to break their will. Winston
refuses to break and eventually is taken to Room 101 where prisoners are
subjected to what they fear the most. In the case of Winston, this is rats, via
a cage fitted to his head into which starving rats will be placed. Winston
finally breaks and says “do it to Julia!” instead of to him. Later, after being
released he and Julia meet and acknowledge they betrayed each other. As news of
a great victory in the war is announced, Winston realizes he loves Big Brother.
A depressing, but fascinating
film. It may be seen as a warning about many trends in modern society, such as
the decline of the nuclear family, the rise of government monitoring and
propaganda along with the danger of political apathy. .
Orwell, George. Nineteen Eighty-four. New York;
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1977. This book at page 8 and the film at 10:34 give
the date.
Released - October 10, 1984
Runtime - 1 hour 53 minutes
Director - Michael Radford
Starring - John Hurt as Winston Smith
Richard Burton as O'Brien
Suzanna
Hamilton as Julia
Cyril
Cusack as Mr. Charrington
Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.
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