Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

Hellen I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Sameer Callahan It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Theo Robertson I heard about this film version of Orwell's classic novel many years ago . In the Radio Times to celebrate the year of the setting did a large piece feature on the BBC TV adaptation from 1954 and the film version of 1956 starring Edmund O Brien and looked forward to seeing the BBC showing either version . The problem was that due to copyright issues by the Orwell estate there was no way either adaptation could be broadcast , instead the closest the BBC could do was broadcast a narrated version of the book for the Book For Bedtime slot In truth this version is hardly waiting for . There are some very good aspects to it . Best is the directing from Michael Anderson . I know Anderson is hated in some circles for " Having no love for the Sci-fi genre " but I've never had a problem . LOGAN'S RUN and THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES whilst not being classics of the genre are okay movies . Perhaps the problem might be that his films don't have too much of a futuristic look . Certainly he could thrown a massive spanner in the works by making everything look too futuristic which would have been a disaster . Here we see something recognisable as being both contemporary and futuristic which means nothing is too dated watching in 2012 The good points are however outweighed by the bad . Orwell's novel is unfilmable and only Nigel Kneale's teleplay despite being freely adapted does capture the feel and subtext of the original while this version doesn't . Instead the storytelling concentrates heavily on the romantic doomed love affair between Winston and Julia so much so it becomes more of a love story set in a communist tyranny rather than being about the failures of Marxism when it becomes hijacked by tyranny . It's certainly not a complex or sophisticated film and the ending has nothing in common with the novel The casting certainly doesn't help . You want an everyman type of actor playing the everyman character from the novel ? Well who worse than Edmund O Brien a very effective actor playing rough diamond types in film noir classics but hopelessly miscast here along with Jan Sterling who'd also be equally at home in a crime drama . Michael Redgrave is good enough in his role but gives an inferior performance if you've seen the 1954 BBC version with Andre Morell . It doesn't help that he's called O Connor which is another distraction as is the name change for Goldstein I can't say I was too disappointed by this film version . I went in not expecting much and came out of it having not seen much . Orwell was a writer who didn't make filmable novels and this is yet another film adaptation that once again proves it .

aa-ron-1 *Also contains minor spoilers from the 84 version of 1984.*"THIS IS A STORY OF THE FUTURE- NOT THE FUTURE OF SPACE SHIPS AND MEN FROM OTHER PLANETS- BUT THE IMMEDIATE FUTURE."A sentence that stays on your screen for over 10 seconds as the film opens, just to ensure you get the idea that this is the future that could be near, in case you've missed the film's title 1984.How could someone who's actually read the book think this is in anyway truthful to the it..? Visually, the Ministry of Truth looks like something off Star Trek, the canteen was ridiculous, seriously? Food tray coming out of a hole? "the girl with black hair" apparently was blonde, Winston is 40 pounds too heavy, and their strange overalls are so seldom shot in full length, I was under the impression that Winston was wearing a sports jacket most of the time. The psychological aspect of the book was never shown through this film, Winston's fear of rats were explained so briefly that it was hideous, "Rat! A rat! it's the one thing I really hate" screams Winston after throwing the coral dome at the rat in the film. It's a phobia, you don't get up and throw things at it like anyone else would, in the book he went into shock, simply from the knowledge of one being near, started sweating and shivering. The sense of oppression and the idea that anyone could be watching was portrayed by a annoying short girl playing a member of the Junior Spies buzzing around Winston the whole time, a character that did not exist in the book. It's details like that which shows whoever made the film thought its audiences are too dumb to understand anything unless it's screamed at their faces. I felt patronised throughout the film, and worst of all, the line at the end by the narrator "This is the story of the future, it could be the story of our children if we fail to preserve their heritage of freedom", I assume everyone who's written the reviews of this film wrote it when internet had been invented? Or when IMDb has been established? Maybe this film was relevant in the 50s, but viewing it now? It's a blatant piece of propaganda that grants very little credit as an adaptation to a great book. It's taken everything that's intellectual from the book, filtered it so that the only message left is "this is what's going to happen if the Russians win", they should really have played God Save the Queen through the credits.Like someone else has pointed out, this is your overly patriotic grandpa's version of 1984, not Orwell's.

Greg Treadway (treadwaywrites) Hopefully everyone knows the story of author George Orwell's novel and then the subsequent movie, Nineteen Eighty-Four. Even the cult classic movie Brazil in 1985 has an Orwell type features and themes through the entire fabric of the film. In fact the working title for for the highly futuristic Brazil was 1984 and a half.In the future, the people of Oceania are in a endless, living in a state of poverty, fear, and oppression. Even personal will and thought are monitored for the common good. Meals are rationed and virtually every move is monitored through video cameras and police agents. Winston has memories of when life was better and he expounds about it in a private journal that he keep hidden. Winston begins making eye contact with a younger woman named Julia; it's not long afterward that they are part of the rebellion against the state.George Orwell published his book in 1949. The novel found fame because of its portrayal of everyone watching everyone else and loss of personal rights in the face of a oppressive government. He chose the year 1984 as the target date for Big Brother as he called it.There was a BBC version of the movie followed by the 1956 Edward O'Brien film. Together the movies were able to cause only a minor stir and that was for sending people back to the book to read the full story. This version was directed by Michael Anderson who did such films as Around the World in 80 Days and Logan's Run in 1976. This movie is just not well done, it lacks timing and any degree of suspense. If you can find the BBC version try that one first. Even though there is some combining of characters, Donald Pleasance is in it and does a pretty good job.

Tarasicodissa The first half of the book contains practically no dialogue. Just chats with the Parsons and with Symes. But aside from that Winston Smith's total isolation.Rendering this cinematically required more subtlety and intelligence than was shown in this Cold War propaganda piece. In the '80s version a voice-over rendered Winston's thoughts. In this version he prattles them nonstop.SPOILER...Well, we've all read the book so hardly a spoiler. Do you remember the part in the book where Winston finds himself holding in his hand an old clipping that proves that three recently purged and executed party members were actually in London when they were charged to have been meeting with Eurasian agents in New Jersey ? Now, in a totalitarian state of the murderous Hitler/Stalin/Mao variety, where a careless remark can get you shot or sent to a concentration camp, you learn to very, very carefully watch what you say. Spontaniety must be completely eradicated from your character. Well in this movie Smith enthusiastically goes running up to his superior waving the picture, babbling like an imbecile, "Look ! Look ! See what I've found. Proof that those three traitors were innocent !" No one who lived in a society as terrifying as Oceania would ever be that stupidly naive.This movie was so unimaginative that it insisted on making Winston Smith a conventional movie hero but the constant furtiveness necessary to survive in a society as crushing as 1984 Oceania is not heroic so it made him a fool.And by the way, do all the people rating this comment negatively understand that it is about the 1956 movie that virtually no one has seen in 30 years, not the John Hurt movie in the '80s ?