Hi everybody. Happy New Year!! I know what you think. You think, “If only I could have one or two more days off…” Fortunately we have a snow day today and what a better way to enjoy a snow day than by having a little challenge. The one who would be able to pronounce the following sentence in less than a minute would gain my eternal admiration.
“Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant and vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a bygone vexation stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsaving the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition! The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me "V".”
Most of you would have recognized it, this quote come from the motion picture “V for Vendetta”. Here is the scene from the movie:
I watched this movie during the break and I have to admit that it is probably one of the best movies I have ever seen. I regret I waited so long before watching it.
After having been transported in fascist England for two hours, I wanted to know how such an incredible story had been invented and I did a couple researches. I discovered that the authors of the original comic books had taken their inspiration in historical events that happen in the 16th century. The every first scene of the movie show a man carrying a lot of powder in what looks like an underground gallery (which in fact is underneath Parliament). Short after, he is arrested and hanged in a public place. This man’s name was Guy Fawkes. He belonged to a Catholic radical group and participated in the Gunpowder Plot. Fawkes wanted to blow up the House of Parliament and saw this act more as a symbol and a necessary action to end the discrimination against Catholics.
Also, the first sentence pronounced in the movie is a famous quote by Guy Fawkes: “Remember, remember the fifth of November,/The gunpowder treason and plot,/I see no reason/Why the gunpowder treason/Should ever be forgot.”
What really fascinated me in this movie is the new look it gives on the importance of an idea. Beginning with Guy Fawkes and in the rest of the movie, it is suggested that ideas can change the world and are immortal, that when a dramatic event happen, we remember the idea, not the man who made it live for a second. Take Harper’s Ferry for example, you remember the idea that motivated the slaves to rebel against whites, you remember that they wanted emancipation but you do not remember the men who risked their lives for that idea.
