Fahrenheit 451 Film Review

Then you don’t care anymore?” “I care so much I’m sick. – Quote, Ray Bradbury – Fahrenheit 451
Well, where to start with such a film. It takes a completely different approach in comparison to the book. Both visually and contextually it is much darker than the original words of Ray Bradbury. I love this book with all my heart and when I saw the DVD in the library, I couldn't help but see for myself how good the film adaptation would be. In this fictious future, it is governed almost entirely by the fire services. Which set fires, rather than put them out. I especially like the uniform, because it was so much darker than expected. The sense of comradery with the firemen is really felt, and it was interesting to hear their chant song and where the director took those words; that was the main thing that really saw them as a team as they sung their propaganda on their way to each report of there being books hoarded.
  When it comes to visual effects, the film is incredibly impressive and did a lot with the book's descriptions of what the world and houses would be like. I especially like the technology and the fire graphics. I like the concept of social media merging with mainstream media (such as the news articles), you can see the reactions of society coming in when the news articles were broadcasting each fire in real time. This isn’t really far off when comparing this fictious future to the present reality in which we live. Live broadcasting on social media is a thing, and you can see the comments and reactions of the other people when you watch these livestreams.
   When analysing the script to the film, it lacks what the original source material had in abundance. I feel like it relied predominantly on the words of authors, rather than having its own narrative. The dialogue seemed extremely forced and not genuine to how people speak. The script heavily relies upon the words of authors and the words that they were burning, illegal words of importance. When it came to the dialogue, the most profound and poignant points that were made, were by using the words of authors, unfortunately.
  This film drifts quite far from the source material, it contains the key components of the original film that made it so wonderfully compelling as a story and concept overall. The idea of the written word being illegal and books being burned as they are a sinful item to own is fascinating to me, especially considering my love for books.
  While the dialogue wasn’t impressive, the acting of Michael B. Jordan was extremely impressive and expressive. He really managed to capture the conflicts that the protagonist, fireman Guy Montag, had. It shows how his beliefs changed and how he formed his own opinions, while watching the world around him all becoming brainwashed by the fire services and the media. Being one of the members of the fire service, he was subject to some particularly violent and emotional moments, that helped him make his decision and form his extremely different belief system about the importance of the written word, when he begins to hoard books.
   I was disappointed that the film drifted heavily from the narrative of the book, with many of the events forming at a completely different time in comparison to the book. For me, while the new ending of the story was extremely meaningful, with the bird that has the knowledge of books flying away to join his species that all share the information – it is known that those birds will not have the same level of intelligence as the people that died for the books, which is what makes this new ending somewhat depressing and most definitely disappointing. As a film, I would give this a rating of 2.5/5 stars.