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Wasn't there actually a recent attempt to make a 1984 movie as a romance starring Kristen Stewart?raditts posted:Also, I don't know how anyone can call Equilibrium "a good movie" unless the last time you saw it was in 2002 and/or when you were 15. I remember Equilibrium being super popular for a few years and I actually think that once Batman Begins came out, that was what almost immediately erased it from popular memory by offering an alternate Christian Bale stylish fantasy action movie.
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Aug 24, 2015 21:24
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Equilibrium O'Brien: If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human fa... *falls screaming to the ground, legs cut at the shin* With a sigh Winston Smith sheaths his katana and walks away. It's a fun action movie.
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Aug 24, 2015 23:27
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No, these hallowed works of literature are too sacred to film.
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Aug 24, 2015 23:58
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Well, Alfred Hitchcock did say that he could make a great film out of a good or even mediocre book, but never out of a great one because the film would always suffer by comparison. I guess that's why we're getting all these YA adaptations.
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Aug 25, 2015 03:00
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raditts posted:Nobody seems to ever take anything from it but the book burning though. Maybe that has to do with it being the title of the book.
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Aug 25, 2015 10:57
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it's a wierd thing to complain about given Bradbury himself doesn't seem to have a really clear idea of what Farenheit 451 is about, and if there's one consistent strain in literally every work of dystopian fiction it's that it assumes the people do just kind of accept whatever indifferently. the whole point is they're writing about things that are already happening, and which people are accepting indifferently F451 is also also just... not really that memorable but otoh I've already given too much consideration to the opinions of a guy who thinks Equilibrium was bad A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 12:05 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 11:57
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Samuel Clemens posted:Well, Alfred Hitchcock did say that he could make a great film out of a good or even mediocre book, but never out of a great one because the film would always suffer by comparison. I guess that's why we're getting all these YA adaptations. Hitchcock made those?
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Aug 25, 2015 12:55
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I would have loved to see Hitchcock's take on The Maze Runner.
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Aug 25, 2015 13:57
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RovzANTVo8o
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Aug 25, 2015 14:10
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Grendels Dad posted:Maybe that has to do with it being the title of the book. That makes about as much sense as reading 1984 and interpreting it as a literal history book about the year 1984. A Wizard of Goatse posted:it's a wierd thing to complain about given Bradbury himself doesn't seem to have a really clear idea of what Farenheit 451 is about, and if there's one consistent strain in literally every work of dystopian fiction it's that it assumes the people do just kind of accept whatever indifferently. the whole point is they're writing about things that are already happening, and which people are accepting indifferently I dunno, the theme seemed pretty clear to me when I read it when I was 15, but maybe someone who thinks Equilibrium was good may have a bit more trouble. raditts fucked around with this message at 14:35 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 14:27
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raditts posted:That makes about as much sense as reading 1984 and interpreting it as a literal history book about the year 1984. I vaguely remember that the appendix basically treats the whole book as exactly that, so yeah.
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Aug 25, 2015 14:34
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Grendels Dad posted:I vaguely remember that the appendix basically treats the whole book as exactly that, so yeah. Yes, but you understand the book is make-believe, right My point being that it's a little silly if you missed like 3/4 of the book because it wasn't alluded to in the title of the book. raditts fucked around with this message at 14:41 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 14:37
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Timeless Appeal posted:
You're absolutely right. Both novels hit nails that occur today, but if the themes of both books were combined, I think they'd genuinely have greater effect. But both are ultimately bleak as the protagonists ultimately fail in provoking a revolution. There's a certain level of apathy that we typically have, reflected even in our fiction and science fiction, but I think, even today, we have people willing to lay everything down to help inspire change (Edward Snowden or 50 years ago, Daniel Ellsberg). And for that, the protagonist of Children of Men is far more realistic, imo.
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Aug 26, 2015 20:11
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A Wizard of Goatse posted:it's a wierd thing to complain about given Bradbury himself doesn't seem to have a really clear idea of what Farenheit 451 is about, and if there's one consistent strain in literally every work of dystopian fiction it's that it assumes the people do just kind of accept whatever indifferently. the whole point is they're writing about things that are already happening, and which people are accepting indifferently Fahrenheit 451 kind of straddles a middle ground between 1984 and Brave New World. There is the background of an oppressive government censoring art with a vague war going on. But then it also shares aspects of Brave New World where people are complacent and aren't involved because they are so caught up in pursuing their own entertainment and drugs. It's mostly about censorship, but there is a lot going on in that novel.
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Sep 1, 2015 04:45
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F451 is also clearly about how you grow up and live your life to society's expectations without thinking about what the hell is going on, then all of a sudden your worldview can be thrown on its head by a chance encounter. But yes, not just that, lots of things.
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Sep 1, 2015 10:44
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Simplex posted:Fahrenheit 451 kind of straddles a middle ground between 1984 and Brave New World. There is the background of an oppressive government censoring art with a vague war going on. But then it also shares aspects of Brave New World where people are complacent and aren't involved because they are so caught up in pursuing their own entertainment and drugs. It's mostly about censorship, but there is a lot going on in that novel. Was there even a war? And yeah that's a fairly straightforward reading but Bradbury's own accounting for what the book was about was basically 'kids these days and their TV shows'. He's changed his tune in the face of the blindly loving obvious, IIRC, but lol.
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Sep 1, 2015 12:16
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A Wizard of Goatse posted:Was there even a war? I get what he's saying, I always got the feeling that the real problem was the people themselves and the government's suppression of culture was more opportunistic than premeditated like in 1984. The people got so immersed in their comfort and entertainment that they became kind of Tea Party anti-intellectuals and when they get to that point no one is going to care what you do to the sour ivory tower eggheads that keep attempting to rile people up and raise trouble for everyone.
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Sep 1, 2015 13:37
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i'm just gonna quote these bits bc haha oh manquote:Bradbury imagined a democratic society whose diverse population turns against books: Whites reject Uncle Tom’s Cabin and blacks disapprove of Little Black Sambo. He imagined not just political correctness, but a society so diverse that all groups were “minorities.” He wrote that at first they condensed the books, stripping out more and more offending passages until ultimately all that remained were footnotes, which hardly anyone read. Only after people stopped reading did the state employ firemen to burn books. SJWs 
A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 14:57 on Sep 1, 2015 |
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Sep 1, 2015 14:52
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I dunno, the argument that we shouldn't censor historical works based on changing cultural attitudes seems to hold water to me?
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Sep 1, 2015 17:37
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yes, and? it's like doing a biting social commentary on why it's bad for the homosexuals to sacrifice babies to Satan
A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 18:08 on Sep 1, 2015 |
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Sep 1, 2015 17:47
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A Wizard of Goatse posted:Was there even a war? The city gets nuked at the end of the story and there are a couple bits during the story about air raid sirens and what have you. It kind of gets drowned out because know one is paying attention to it.
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Sep 1, 2015 18:14
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A Wizard of Goatse posted:Was there even a war? He puts it in an incredibly  "get off my lawn" way, but I don't think he's wrong as far as the core concept of people being made dumber and less informed with an over-abundance of information that's reduced to worthless bite-sized bits. Social media probably accomplishes the job far more efficiently than anything he feared TV would do and he's pretty far off base with this idea that the impetus would be censorship though, yeah. The "NEW YORK CITY?!" sentiment is pretty baffling too, I think it's possible he has failed to keep up with the times.
raditts fucked around with this message at 18:33 on Sep 1, 2015 |
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Sep 1, 2015 18:31
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I kind of get the impression that "intellectuals" in that context is code for "Jews."
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Sep 1, 2015 18:56
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I like Bradbury's writing a lot, but man has he been an angry old coot for a while. Or was, I guess he died in 2012.
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Sep 1, 2015 18:57
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I actually wish that 1984 wasn't taught in schools because I think it misdirects people's fear toward the government and in that fear people embrace privatization as a better alternative. It was mentioned earlier in this thread but people have a bizarre fear that the government is one law away from becoming a Stalinist dystopia while they voluntarily give all of their information to companies that have far more unchecked control and interest in their personal lives. I think an adaption could work if it took place inside a corporate town/campus. The various ongoing wars could remain but instead of landmasses they're competing companies. It just seems more realistic that North Korea will become like the rest of the world instead of the rest of the world becoming North Korea.
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Sep 1, 2015 19:37
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KidVanguard posted:I actually wish that 1984 wasn't taught in schools It wasn't on my curriculum
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Sep 1, 2015 19:48
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A Wizard of Goatse posted:yes, and? it's like doing a biting social commentary on why it's bad for the homosexuals to sacrifice babies to Satan Except the thing I'm talking about kinda actually came up in recent history and also happened in less recent history, whereas homosexuals do not sacrifice babies to Satan, as far as I know? Like, I'm not going to say it's a widespread thing, exactly, but it's hardly a myth.
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Sep 1, 2015 20:47
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KidVanguard posted:I actually wish that 1984 wasn't taught in schools I was required to read it in loving 8th grade because I was in the "advanced" or whatever English class. Do you know how depressing that poo poo is when you're 12? Christ.
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Sep 1, 2015 20:59
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raditts posted:He puts it in an incredibly i think you could make a cogent case for it, but OTOH keep in mind he's writing the book in the early 50s, when there were still plenty of people kicking around who could remember when a quarter of the country was just flat-out illiterate (and what culturally enriching entertainment did they consume, I wonder) and television was still in its infancy so the dumb new medium the mindless masses were pursuing instead of a good book was.... movies. He's basically mad about those dumb proles getting anything made for them when they're too unrefined to deserve it, the swine. It's sorta like reading an ancient Greek manuscript written by a guy bitching about how kids these days are so dumb and lazy that he is surely in the twilight of civilization, or Victorian-era writers denouncing fiction novels as society-imperiling brain poison, IMO that doesn't give identical-sounding arguments about the latest newest thing in the modern day more weight. F451 in particular also isn't a very compelling or accurate analysis unless you handwave it to something pretty much exactly this vague; basically nothing except that TV melodrama that talks to you has any significant bearing on anything real, and the lament of the day isn't that books are unavailable it's that there's tons of them everywhere but nobody wants to read them cause they're overstimulated with information and it's quicker to Google things than know anything (example: I had to look up F451's publication date). we still don't do gruesome public executions, in fact there's a huge scramble to conceal as much about the business of killing as possible because it turns out people mostly don't approve of it. You'd never know this though from the number of bitter old cranks bitching about those goddamned touchy minorities and New York KidVanguard posted:I actually wish that 1984 wasn't taught in schools because I think it misdirects people's fear toward the government and in that fear people embrace privatization as a better alternative. It was mentioned earlier in this thread but people have a bizarre fear that the government is one law away from becoming a Stalinist dystopia while they voluntarily give all of their information to companies that have far more unchecked control and interest in their personal lives. i think eliminating a good, and important, book about bad poo poo that actually happened and is happening from the curriciulum because someone might take the 'wrong' lesson from it is a very bad idea, actually 1984 isn't why people are terrified of Stalinists, half a century of proxy wars with Stalin and friends that came a hair's breadth from killing everybody are why people are terrified of Stalinists LORD OF BUTT posted:Except the thing I'm talking about kinda actually came up in recent history and also happened in less recent history, whereas homosexuals do not sacrifice babies to Satan, as far as I know? Like, I'm not going to say it's a widespread thing, exactly, but it's hardly a myth. i was actually going to bring up the Huck Finn thing as an example of just how ridiculous Bradbury's thesis is; one guy wanted to produce a slightly sanitized copy of one book to run alongside the original and the entire nation basically screamed at him about how he was a book-burning Nazi for a couple months uninterrupted. Clearly this out-of-control PC culture will destroy our heritage any day now. A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Sep 1, 2015 |
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Sep 1, 2015 21:11
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Hat Thoughts posted:It wasn't on my curriculum It wasn't on mine either & I wasn't surprised. Schools & colleges I imagine are scared of 1984's themes of indoctrination, newspeak, & memory holes because it hits a little to close to home.
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Sep 1, 2015 21:12
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyyHXTlTZRs
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Sep 1, 2015 21:15
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I read F451 for the first time recently and really enjoyed it because, for the first half at least, the writing was so beautiful - like poetry. The ideas in the book were just supplementary. I don't really care if someone writes something prescient or not.
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Sep 1, 2015 23:02
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KidVanguard posted:I actually wish that 1984 wasn't taught in schools because I think it misdirects people's fear toward the government and in that fear people embrace privatization as a better alternative. The people who take this reading of 1984 are especially ridiculous given that Orwell was explicitly a socialist.
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Sep 2, 2015 01:45
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Chairman Capone posted:The people who take this reading of 1984 are especially ridiculous given that Orwell was explicitly a socialist. Oh, I'm glad that's taught as context to the novel in English Class.
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Sep 2, 2015 01:49
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precision posted: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. I looked this up and I'm intrigued because I like me some Eisenberg. Also the message board on IMDB gave me some cheap laughs. Apparently you've recommended a cheap Fight Club knockoff or so says sixoneninereymysterio. El Gallinero Gros fucked around with this message at 02:09 on Sep 2, 2015 |
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Sep 2, 2015 02:06
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computer parts posted:Oh, I'm glad that's taught as context to the novel in English Class. You had an incredibly lovely English teacher if he/she taught your class that the oppressive regime in 1984 was analogous only to governments on a specific part of the political spectrum.
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Sep 2, 2015 06:16
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Immortan posted:You had an incredibly lovely English teacher if he/she taught your class that the oppressive regime in 1984 was analogous only to governments on a specific part of the political spectrum. I can assure you they didn't, but I can also assure you that Orwell being a socialist is not common knowledge.
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Sep 2, 2015 06:25
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If your English class didn't teach you how  Orwell was during the Spanish Civil War, your English class has failed you.
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Sep 2, 2015 09:27
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computer parts posted:I can assure you they didn't, but I can also assure you that Orwell being a socialist is not common knowledge. yeah, you had an extremely loving awful english class if they did not provide basic context for the books the great gatsby; a very important and presumably good critique of late-80s malaise
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Sep 2, 2015 14:20
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A Wizard of Goatse posted:yeah, you had an extremely loving awful english class if they did not provide basic context for the books My 8th grade english teacher is the first person I heard say "death of the author".
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Sep 2, 2015 15:07
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