Fahrenheit 451 [50th Anniversary Edition] [Blu-ray] (1966)

Excellent interpretation of Ray Bradbury's Book. It depended on content to tell the story rather than dazzling special effects. Julie Christie and Oskar Werner gave excellent performances.

Firemen Put Out A Burning Desire

TITLE: Farenheit 451
GENRE: SciFi/ Distopian political satire, near term Earth
CAST: Julie Christie, Oskar Werner, Cyril Cusack and Anton Diffring
PLOT: In it's attempt to make everyone equal, a society, gone mad through drug use, acts to stiffle independent thought by outlawing what they believe to be the source of new and different ideas: books. All the buildings by then are fireproof so they change the job of firemen into that of being the ones in charge of burning the books. A rebellious underground exists. They strive to keep the very idea of ideas alive. Our hero goes from one side to the other trying to simply determine his relevancy to life.
RETURN ON INVESTMENT: 9.5 of 10; The Director, Francois Truffaut, created one of the most masterful presentations of a concept. Long a student of Hitchcock, he understood the significance of every little detail of a film's bits help make a whole. To show two sides of a woman's personality, he had J C play two parts to juxtapose one side of character against the other. Few realize he did this also with another character in the film. The asst fire chief, A D also plays the female headmistress at a school (I won't get into what he may have been trying to say with that one). In a story about no books, we are denied the written word even in the opening credits. He scores on the selection of music score (he he he) to set mood. There is master use of lighting and cinematic techniques, some highly innovative for the time. And in the DVD see below.
DVD BONUS: This is one of the best Special Features I've seen! There is an overdub of commentary by J C, by the editor, by a truffaut historian and by the producer; there is a theatrical trailer; there is a Making of...; best of all, there is an interview of Ray Bradbury who wrote the book that didn't get burned.
ADDED NOTES: Will it happen? In a way, NO because we are all exposed to so many different ideas by the web. In another way, it has already happened! Our literature is being preserved digitally and books are fading, you will never again see a million book printing run. There will be some books printed, yes, but the majority of the spreading of the idea will take place electronically as it disfunctionally did in Farenheit 451.Truffaut points out that the need to express ourselves and latch on to the ideas we have is basic to the human psyche when the wife packs her bags to leave, she puts her diary into the suitcase,