Review of Fahrenheit 451 (1966) by Edward W — 25 Apr 2009

French New Wave director François Truffaut went commercial here, his first film in colour and his only English language film, he took on a popular science fiction book by Ray Bradbury. It's future vision is 60's space age, but it's well made and it's the closest Truffaut came to going to Hollywood.

This is set in an oppressive future, where firemen don't put out fires, they go around hunting books down and then burning them. This is a society which forbids books, as they seemingly cause anger, outrage and controversy.

One such 'fireman' Guy Montag (Oskar Werner) is committed to his job as fireman, and is on the verge of a promotion, however, he becomes involved with Clarisse (Julie Christie), who bears a striking resemblence to his wife Linda (also Christie).

Montag starts to question his job, and asks whether it is really worth it, and even starts to collect books privately. It does differ from the book, but it does make the most of it's locations, (close in look to A Clockwork Orange.

) with brilliant cinematography by Nicolas Roeg and a haunting score by Bernard Herrmann. But, it feels very cold where Truffaut and Co. could have had fun with this dark dystopia.