Plustown
A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.
Yash Wade
Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.
Paynbob
It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.
sarastro7
Having just seen the 1980 adaptation, I decided to watch this much-maligned 1998 remake as well. It was significantly better than I'd expected. The points of the original book come across quite well, the actors are quite good (esp. Rya Kihlstedt), and much of the thought-provoking content is retained. Considering how bad I had been led to believe that this was, it was a positive and worthwhile, at times even memorable, surprise.Still, I find have more criticism than praise for this version. It is very low-budget, and so resorts to showing a world far too similar to our own, with a general (and generally nonsensical) setting of skyscrapers, shopping malls and (?) traffic jams. People flying ordinary current-day helicopters and driving ditto cars. The cast of characters, too, has been whittled down to just a few mains, and Bernard Marx, in order to contrast him more with John the Savage (who is for some reason called John Cooper here), is handsome and orthodox, unlike in the book.What we have, then, is a deeply, deeply dumbed down version of the original story, super-simplified for a less intellectual audience, and probably also for the purpose of keeping the budget down.A 7 rating is very generous (and most of the reason is because of the greatness of the original book), but this TV movie actually did hold my attention, and I liked the performances of both Gallagher, Kihlstedt, Ferrer and Nimoy. A few of the changes made to the story (in an attempt to make it more current) were okay, although I'd have to say they were also unnecessary. Still and all, this is something I would buy if it were available on DVD rather than just VHS.7 out of 10.
stazza
Yes, it was not TRUE to the novel, but this version hits on so many levels closer to home, I found it to be much more interesting and connectable than the 1980 version. The writers deserve much kudos for fitting most of the elements of the novel into this modernized version - and it fits well with current trends from the night club sex world, to the Prozac, zoloft, "e" popping world, to the CITY people being civilized and the country folk shunned for their family ways. ALL very relevant, or sort of how the novel played out in my mind anyway... but this movie fit even better. If you can ever find it, I'd recommend a watch, NOT as the best version of BNW novel, but as a modern and currently existing lifestyle in the world that BNW predicted. I mean, I read the novel and the whole time I was thinking, "This is exactly how the world is today mostly", so I found this updated version to be brilliant.Production wise, the sets were fine, the lighting great, not sure about the audio, and the actors fit pretty well, and acted okay... it's not Oscar material as it was made for TV, but the STORY carries everything along exactly as it should. I'd buy the DVD in a second if it is ever released.
magicsinglez
It's been said there are 3 types of SF stories. The 'What if' story, based on a new invention or idea. The 'If then' story, taking a current idea, say, Islamic fundamentalism, and projecting it into the future. And the 'out of place' story, taking ordinary people and subjecting them to extraordinary circumstances -as was sometimes observed on the 'Twilight Zone' TV show. Aldous Huxleys' 'Brave New World' is known for being a political 'If then' story, sometimes being called a 'dystopia' however 'Brave New World' seems to have elements of all 3 types of stories. Who could have imagined in 1930, babies being raised not by mothers, but as test tube babies reared by the state? Or that the entire populous would be pacified by state mandated drugs? In 'Brave New World' Tim Guinee plays 'John Cooper' or 'the Savage' as he is known. John was born of a real mother and raised by her outside the city. Tho it's far in the future, growing up outside the controlled city, John comes across as a product of the 20th Century. He quotes Shakespeare and talks about the power of religion and love. John visits the city where his very oddity makes him something of a celebrity. Compared to the sophisticated residents of the city John seems naive. Frankly looking like a complete fool. He has a hard time accepting their ways. Why spend two hours visiting the city if he's unwilling to accept anything different from his own ideas?There's a stereotypical villain in this story, the Director of Hatcheries (Miguel Ferren), who seems to exist simply as a prop to make this movie look like every other. However, his villainy worked for me. It was as if to say, even in this completely controlled sterile world there still exists the danger of wrongdoing. In this case the Director of Hatcheries (also on the governing council) seems to be motivated to do evil by both fear and ambition. He's afraid it will come to light that he's actually the biological father of the savage John (making babies this way is illegal) and he has ambitions of being named the Director of the Governing council. He re-engineers (brainwashes) a citizen into trying to kill his rival on the board Bernard Marx (Peter Gallagher). Peter Gallagher as Bernard Marx turns in a great performance in this movie. Leonard Nimoy, who plays the Director of the Governing Council, Mustapha Mond, is great here too. Nimoy really earns his spot in this movie. My favorite scene is when Mustapha Mond quickly reacts to something by saying, "History is always unpleasant, - hmm". As he speaks, he realizes his own society, of which he is the leader, will be judged poorly by future generations. One thing I like about this movie is that it provides a behind the scenes look at the leaders of society as they make their decisions, even if this is only a fictional society.John W Campbell, SF magazine editor, was famous for asking his writers to, "write about aliens who are truly alien, who think differently than men". They're not aliens, but citizens of this Brave New World think differently than we do and this movie takes their viewpoint. For one thing, they don't believe in love. I had a sociology teacher who used to always say 'love is a new phenomena invented in the 19th century'. In Brave New World they don't believe in love or marriage or religion. They don't believe in quite a few things we believe in. John, the savage, does influence this Brave New World he visits. Council member Bernard Marx and his 'friend' Lenina Crowne (Rya Kihlstedt) decide to have a baby of their own and escape the city. 'Escape' has become a popular SF movie theme. In 'Logans Run' and George Lucases' 'THX 1138' the protagonists goal also becomes escaping the city. Why do these movies show a city-sized society? Do they present a future society inhabiting only city sized areas to make the story seem more believable? Is it more comforting to the audience to see future-change only in one city and not everywhere? Is it a plot device used to give them somewhere to escape to? Do the artists see a city sized unit being the most natural size/normal size form of government? Are these other stories simply influenced by Huxley? Is it coincidence? Perhaps there's another reason altogether.I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. As an afterthought, I do realize this movie put a 'neutral' spin on what was intended to be a 'dystopia' but I enjoyed it even more for the 'open' look into such a different society.
basrolf
The Brave New World is a dystopia.The film didn't get into the whole story. The characters has depth.There are not as flat as in the novel.It's shown to bright and shiny.It's hard to adapt such a story, everyone sees a different of telling the story. In my mind, there are to many quiet important scenes, from book, left out. The whole film was boring. They didn't get the beginning and the end as well. It was awful to see how simple they tried to connect two chapters in the book in the film.The crappiest thing in the movie was that soma can kill some one. But the book told us that it is a drug with side effects, but I think that death is a quiet big side effect. In the end I would say, the film was badly done. It was to easy to see what would happen next.
