Review of Fahrenheit 451 (1966) by Robin W — 30 Dec 2013

"These are all novels, all about people that never existed, the people that read them it makes them unhappy with their own lives. Makes them want to live in other ways they can never really be.".

Since I haven't read the book, my first experience of Fahrenheit 451 was this classic dystopian film directed by François Truffaut. The film depicts a futuristic society run by a totalitarian government in which books have been outlawed and the function of firemen have been changed from preventing fires to locating and burning books by any means necessary. Citizens are controlled by a vast range of medications and the only form of legal entertainment are mind-numbing interactive TV-shows that are hauntingly similar to pedagogical programs for small children. After five years of burning books in his work as a fireman, Montag played by Oskar Werner starts to grow tired of his emotionless wife, Linda played by Julie Christie whose only interest seems to be an interactive Tv-show called, The Family in which all the actors refer to their viewers as cousins. After meeting a young schoolteacher who asks him if he ever reads the books he burn, Montag decides to secretely read one, an experience which opens him up to a new way of thinking.

This film looks a little dated with its use of technicolor, but the message is both relevant and timeless. With a small group of interesting characters, the film presents a broad selection of personalities and opinions that might exist in this kind of society, some of the characters are shown to be beyond rescue, but some like the main-character, Montag really drove me into caring, as he slowly embarks on his quest for knowledge. Dystopian films seldom feel this down to earth and few scenarios feels as realistic as this one, seeing how we already have been through periods where knowledge and history were suppressed. I don't know if the film is a good adaption of the book, but it's definitely worth watching.