From: henry999@eircom.net   
      
   It's that ol' synchronicity again--Bierman's film was shown on our local   
   television _last night_ and I had a chance to watch it for the first   
   time.   
      
   I remembered that there had been an extensive discussion here a while   
   back (it was _1998_!), so I googled to review the commentary. It's been   
   even more years since I read the novel. I must say that on the whole I   
   found the movie quite disappointing. Orwell's book has wit and humour   
   but it is not a comic novel. In fact, I recall the story of Gordon   
   Comstock as being quite tragic, in the end. He is crushed and trapped   
   (by fate as well as his own folly) and his return to petit-bourgeois   
   respectability is really very sad. I found it offensive that Bierman   
   would so blithely, even wilfully, convert pathos into farce. In that   
   regard the film reminded me of another enormous   
   misinterpretation-on-celluloid, _The Bonfire of the Vanities_.   
      
   cheers,   
      
   Henry   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)