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 ?
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 ?