Brave New World (1998)

Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

How sad is this?

Fantastic!

Better Late Then Never

Watching this movie was a really bad experience, through half of the movie I wanted to just press stop, but I kept on watching just to see how much they can ruin a wonderful book. First of all, one of the main characters,Bernard Marx,in this adaptation had been striped of every, and I mean every characteristic and trait that he has in the book. The worst thing is that in the book, through this character, the reader gets the experience of isolation in a society totally committed to social activity, where is basically abnormal to spend time alone. In the book, this character was my favorite, in the movie I found nothing in him. Not to mention that the entire first half of the book somehow got lost while making the movie. And as the final blow comes the ending. The producers just had to rewrite it in to this pathetic happy ending. If you didn't read the book, maybe you will find it amusing, but all in all, it is a shame that this kind of great book didn't get a proper adaptation.

Being as Huxley is an incredible fictional writer, I feel that this movie did him no justice whatsoever. I love Peter Gallagher as an actor and I think he as well as some the other actors did a fine job, but others did not fit at all. The script deleted important scenes as well as backstory and destroyed the ending! If I had an unlimited budget I would create a new film version that would parallel "The Matrix" in special effects and art direction. Especially, what is described in the first chapter of the book. Now that we are in a time where people are anti-government and big corporations the movie would do well. I had previously thought about Gary Sinise to play Bernard (because he is a great shorter actor- how he became short was never revealed in the movie by the way), but I think Sinise may be too old now. To play Linda I picture Jennifer Coolidge, and for John a younger upcoming twenty something. The previous John I felt was too old. They needed to find actors that fit the book description. But the biggest disappointment was the script. Overall, I would not recommend this 1998 version if you love the book.

In the far future the World Controllers decided to build a world without any families and crimes. People are no longer born, they are mass produced. There are five different classes, which differ in intelligence: Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons. The Alphas are the most intelligent people and the Epsilons are the most stupid ones. They are conditioned to believe, that they live a happy life and take the world's perfect drug "soma". Berndard and Lenina are both Alphas and are together since 4 months, although it is not really allowed to have a partner for this long because in the "Brave New World", everyone belongs to everyone else. However one day, they decide to visit an outlying reservation, but crash with their helicopter into it. In this reservation they meet John and his mother, who was previously a part of the Brave New World and take them back into "civilazation"...The plot is not really new. There are already other utopian films like "Brave New World". I like the idea of a character of the "other" world, going into the "new world". You can see where the mistakes are lying in the new system of society. In the film the producers concentrated more on Lenina than on John, like it was in the novel. They really changed Huxley's flat characters into round characters and the ending is quite different in the film, than in the novel. Tim Guinee (John) plays his characters very good, however I imagined a totally other actor for John, maybe a smaller one. As for Bernard (Peter Gallagher) I imagined also a smaller actor for him and not so "good looking", maybe someone like the guy who plays Henry Foster. The best job on the characters did Sally Kirkland (Linda). You really can see that she reflects Linda very well and likes to play her role. BUt in the end I never heard of one single one of the actors for BNW and I think that they should have picked some other actors, but all in all it can be said, that they are not too bad choicesm it could be worse. There were not really special effects from with you can say "Wow, gorgeous!" and the soundtrack is not really unique, too. You can only .hear some techno music and sometimes really soft music, which seems to me, that they can bring your every minitue to sleep and on first sight, I Didn't even realize, that there is this soft music (am I already too good conditioned?). So you can say, that this movie is not really outstanding with elements that make a film unique. I only recommend this film to people who like this genere and want to see what could happen if mandkind wants to create a perfect society without wars and real feelings. But I really hate this movie, I like the novel better

In 1932 Aldous Huxley released a confused and naive social rant that gathered what are now considered the worst gimmicks and cliches of science fiction into a single book. 66 years later, Mazur and Tausik managed to assemble that book's characters and a few of its more credible ideas into a worthwhile story. Huxley's book was obsessed with the social effects of what he perceived to be the advent of factory production (actually, it was 300 years old at the time). The movie's focus is instead on the interplay between pop culture, politics, and social relations. The movie premiered in the year of the Lewinsky scandal, and the scandal of the Hatcheries Director is presented with obvious references to the real media's unrealistic expectations of public figures ("How could someone in his position be allowed to have a baby!"). In the book John was portrayed as an Indian, but here he is from a trailer park, and this allows Mazur & Tausik to explore class prejudice. As in the book, everyone is pigeonholed into a rigid social class from birth. John doesn't fit the mold; he is poor but intelligent and doesn't want any part of your brave new world, thanks. The press are baffled that anyone would question massive social planning as the solution to everything, and they don't know what to do with John except make him a gossip and parody piece. There is a clear analogy to today's national press, based in metropolitan cities where non-urbanites are often viewed with contempt.There is plenty more that speaks to the present day. Bernard Marx has an run-in with a disgruntled Delta who "goes postal." In an encounter between John and Mustapha Mond, the latter reveals that (unlike in the book) classical literature isn't forbidden at all; people simply don't read it because the culture doesn't equip them to understand it.The strength of this adaptation rests on the fact that it is examining a real social trend, the development American baby-boomer culture. Nearly all of Huxley's gimmicks (including the nursery rhymes and the absurd Henry Ford cult) are gone. The result, unlike the book, is a social commentary that matters.