1984 (1956) 90m
It's a little puzzling that this film begins with a statement saying that it has been 'freely adapted' from George Orwell's classic novel, because everything in the screenplay follows the story's outline from beginning to end. It may have been the simplicity of the plot that failed to ignite much interest from me when I was assigned the book in high school, and it didn't help much that I was reading it as low-tech science fiction rather than a sober satire on totalitarian government. Neither did I get too excited about the higher-profile movie remake of 1984 (in the year 1984), which even now can only conjure up three impressions: (a) too much brown, (b) Richard Burton looking fed up with being Richard Burton, (c) jarringly inappropriate Eurythmics songs.
However, I find the 1956 version oddly involving, primarily because of the circumstances of its viewing. This first film version of Orwell's story (made 8 years after the book's publication) has never been commercially available and exists only as a bootleg, passed from collector to collector, sold on the grey market, or exchanged via PC on the Internet. I'm a diehard advocate for films being seen in cinemas in the best prints possible, but I find in the case of 1984 that less is more (a phrase that sits nicely among the novel's other oxymoronic slogans 'War is Peace' and 'Freedom is Slavery'). Watching this movie as a bootleg - with poorer picture quality and in gritty black and white - is the perfect way to see it. There's a sense of illicitness in the act of viewing which serves the subterfuge and paranoia of the story very well, as if we were watching an artefact from the past that had been smuggled out of the vault and was now doing the rounds underground. Because the film was made close to the era when the book was written it gives me the same feeling as viewing Marcel Carne's CHILDREN OF PARADISE, which was made with some sleight of hand in difficult circumstances during the Occupation of France.
I may be in the minority by preferring Edmond O'Brien's turn as Winston Smith to John Hurt's portrayal in the later film, but I'm pretty sure everyone agrees that Jan Sterling is terribly miscast as Julia. This isn't her fault - any actress would have fared just as badly, as it is the part itself that is misconceived, bearing little resemblance to the uninhibited Julia of the novel, who uses sex with dozens of men as her own personal expression of rebellion. It's when Winston and Julia start getting lovey-dovey that the film slows down, but they are brought back to reality in a wonderfully chilling moment, and the final act picks up the pace again. Julia's promiscuity and some scenes of brutality have obviously been left out of the film version for censorship reasons (and Winston's cell is far too clean and spiffy), but there is a kind of glum, low-rent fatality to the production that suggests oppression through attrition. Donald Pleasance is an ideal choice in a small, yet sympathetic role, as Parsons (the poor guy would have to go through all this again in George Lucas' own Orwellian dystopia, THX-1138), but Michael Redgrave is less convincing as O'Brien (renamed to O'Connor in this version for some reason - Edmond objected). We see him only as a Bad Guy, which makes Winston and Julia look pretty stupid for trusting him, but then again, their willingness to confide in O'Connor so utterly may simply highlight their desperation.
There are a couple of dumb moments - Winston's anxious remark that rats are the thing he fears most is too obvious a plant, and the single-minded reaction of people in the crowd scenes is stagey - but decades after the year 1984, the relevance of Orwell's ideas make his book much less science-fictional and satiric. How suspicious our times seem now, when we look back at the citizens of Oceania held in constant fear by a war which has been exploited, and possibly manufactured, by government-controlled media, and we no longer think concepts like telescreens, revision of history, doublethink, and thought crimes seem unusual. It all helps the 1956 film version seem even more like a warning assembled by revolutionaries in the past.
sburridge@hotmail.com
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