V for Vendetta

[Cidien]

Go see this movie. Go see it now. May be my favorite movie ever. Going again tomorrow with a different group of friends. Wasn't going to, but goddamn this is a good movie.

[Cyrus]

cool

its at the imax maybe i should check it out then

[Homeless Joe]

good, i was thinking about seeing it and now that i you say it's so good i'll check it out for sure

[-spike-]

Saw it on friday, pretty sweet. Much better than I expected.

[Cidien]

Saw it again tonight. Was just as cool a second time. You notice a lot more the second time that you don't notice the first time, mainly because you don't really know to look for it.

[gubi-gubi]

Just saw this. LOVED IT. Best movie this year I think. Such a good commentary on stuff like the Bush administration... Really good plot and action aswell. Can't wait for a DVD of this...

[Cidien]

Well, while interesting it won't ever happen. However, I told ya it was awesome. =P

[gubi-gubi]

Well, while interesting it won't ever happen. However, I told ya it was awesome. =P

Really? Look at what happened after Sept 11th, what Bush has done to take peoples rights away for their own 'safety'.

[Cidien]

Dude, my life and everyone elses life is exactly the same when it comes to our rights. If it's not and you were being spied on - you probably should have been spied on.

[gubi-gubi]

Dude, my life and everyone elses life is exactly the same when it comes to our rights. If it's not and you were being spied on - you probably should have been spied on.

I'm not even American and I worry. Look at Patriot act 2 and tell me you don't see the link to V for Vendetta:

* Americans could have their citizenship revoked, if found to have contributed "material support" to organizations deemed by the government, even retroactively, to be "terrorist." As Hentoff wrote in the Feb. 28 Village Voice: "Until now, in our law, an American could only lose his or her citizenship by declaring a clear intent to abandon it. But -- and read this carefully from the new bill -- 'the intent to relinquish nationality need not be manifested in words, but can be inferred from conduct.'" (Italics Hentoff's.)

* Legal permanent residents (like, say, my French wife), could be deported instantaneously, without a criminal charge or even evidence, if the Attorney General considers them a threat to national security. If they commit minor, non-terrorist offenses, they can still be booted out, without so much as a day in court, because the law would exempt habeas corpus review in some cases. As the American Civil Liberties Union stated in its long brief against the DSEA, "Congress has not exempted any person from habeas corpus -- a protection guaranteed by the Constitution -- since the Civil War."

* The government would be instructed to build a mammoth database of citizen DNA information, aimed at "detecting, investigating, prosecuting, preventing or responding to terrorist activities." Samples could be collected without a court order; one need only be suspected of wrongdoing by a law enforcement officer. Those refusing the cheek-swab could be fined $200,000 and jailed for a year. "Because no federal genetic privacy law regulates DNA databases, privacy advocates fear that the data they contain could be misused," Wired News reported March 31. "People with 'flawed' DNA have already suffered genetic discrimination at the hands of employers, insurance companies and the government."

* Authorities could wiretap anybody for 15 days, and snoop on anyone's Internet usage (including chat and email), all without obtaining a warrant.

* The government would be specifically instructed not to release any information about detainees held on suspicion of terrorist activities, until they are actually charged with a crime. Or, as Hentoff put it, "for the first time in U.S. history, secret arrests will be specifically permitted."

* Businesses that rat on their customers to the Feds -- even if the information violates privacy agreements, or is, in fact, dead wrong -- would be granted immunity. "Such immunity," the ACLU contended, "could provide an incentive for neighbor to spy on neighbor and pose problems similar to those inherent in Attorney General Ashcroft's Operation TIPS."

* Police officers carrying out illegal searches would also be granted legal immunity if they were just carrying out orders.

* Federal "consent decrees" limiting local law enforcement agencies' abilities to spy on citizens in their jurisdiction would be rolled back. As Howard Simon, executive director of Florida's ACLU, noted in a March 19 column in the Sarasota Herald Tribune: "The restrictions on political surveillance were hard-fought victories for civil liberties during the 1970s."

* American citizens could be subject to secret surveillance by their own government on behalf of foreign countries, including dictatorships.

* The death penalty would be expanded to cover 15 new offenses.

* And many of PATRIOT I's "sunset provisions" -- stipulating that the expanded new enforcement powers would be rescinded in 2005 -- would be erased from the books, cementing Ashcroft's rushed legislation in the law books. As UPI noted March 10, "These sunset provisions were a concession to critics of the bill in Congress."

[Cidien]

I don't have a problem with most of that.

* Police officers carrying out illegal searches would also be granted legal immunity if they were just carrying out orders.

Damn right they should be granted immunity. If I were ordered to do something then got in trouble myself for following my superiors orders i'd be pissed.

Some of it may sound or actually be a bit extreme such as the deportations, but how many people have been deported? If someone was deported and there really was no evidence to support the decision chances are the public would find out about it and be in an uproar. Personally I think the laws are for those "We know they do this but we can't do anything about it" situations. That's one of the police's biggest problems and one of the things i'm looking forward to the least when I become a cop. Knowing for 99.9% certain someone did or is doing something but you have no physical proof so you can't actually do anything about it. =/

[evilomar]

Go and read the comic strips which are collected in a trade paperback. Alan Moore hates that he has anything to do with this movie, but I thought it was damn close to the book.

[Cidien]

Just because I like the movie I probably won't read the comics. Don't wanna chance ruining anything.

[evilomar]

You do realize that 99% of the time the books and comics are better than the movie right?

[Blight]

IGN did a compare and contrast of the Movie vs. the Comics. I think it should do a good job of pointing out the similarities and differences between them. The most pertinent one is that the Comic was for something that happened in the 80's and I believe in the UK (sorry, I'm on campus and they censor the word "Game?, which kills IGN, from all their computers or I would be specific and give a link as well). The movie is a blatant shot at the Patriot act.