"People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people".

Didn't know really what to expect from this film, all I knew before watching it was that it had something to do with the Wachowski brothers. It's roughly a political-thriller/science-fiction/action-adventure borrowing a fair few ideas from George Orwell's 1994 and in turn Terry Gilliam's Brazil. This is quite an un-Hollywood film with the main character, V, essentially being a "terrorist".. but a terrorist on the right side fighting against a fascist totalitarian state; one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter.

The Wachowski's production becomes very apparent in the action scenes, all bullet-time and the like. Other scenes though are far more "Prime Suspect", aided by a strong British cast, Stephen Rea, John Hurt and Tim Pigott-Smith in particular.

I was surprised to find Stephen Fry in the film (good) just as much as I was to hear Natalie Portman's English accent (not very good). It also took me a long time to work out the voice of the masked V.

As modern dystopian movies go, this was less convoluted than the Matrix and more action packed than Brazil. Arguably without the Matrix-style action scene the political ideas of the story would never have reached such an audience. So then, more thought provoking than most films of this ilk; definitely worth a watch when you want your food for thought with a little eye candy.