Watch 3 hours of back to back Ren & Stimpy instead
I pretty much considder it to be one of the best films made in recent years. Love it.
I read the original graphic novel years ago and loved it. If I recall correctly, the film is faithful in all the important respects and has nice cameos from some well known British luvvies.
The only problem I felt is that the story is very British (with strong shades of Orwell's 1984) and that is a style that has never sat comfortably with the Hollywood big budget approach as one of the essences of 'British' is low key and understated, often with a touch of quiet class - the complete antithesis of everything that is Hollywood. That said, the I thought the film works reasonably well. I enjoyed it and have it in my collection. I don't think the film is quite 'grubby' enough in its look but I'm glad the filmmakers understood the importance of not revealing V's face (unlike the makers of Judge Dredd mutter mumble mumble mutter) and kept faith with the source material.
Yes, its a bit overblown in places but that is in keeping with character of V, who is himself grandiose and pretentious while remaining mysterious.
The story would have better suited a TV series, but then so would many graphic novels or books (Dune, Akira, to name but two).
reviews aside, you're gonna HAVE to watch it now anyway, to make sense of all the comments[you started this... now finish it... with your review of the film - hehe
]
I hope they make a film of Michael Crichton - prey