V for Vendetta: Methods of Story Telling
The present-day story is told conventionally: we follow the action with Evey, with V, and with Finch. This part of the story also makes much use of television screens, with events being told – or retold – via news reports. The brief reference to an avian flu outbreak helps to suggest topicality. [See below]
Montage is used to show the responses of people in the city. We see them watching TV and watch with them. Several of the main characters are shown reacting to V 's broadcast address. Gordon 's show is screened on TV and watched by Evey and Gordon (their POV); the public, and the Chancellor himself are shown watching and reacting.
Events and dialogue are overheard and repeated to others, as in Cabinet meetings, when they are reported to Sutler, and particularly in Finch 's and Dominic 's reports to each other. Chancellor Sutler communicates with his cabinet via closed circuit television.
The extensive back-story is told in several ways.
Computer screens show newspaper archives, tax returns and police records. These are generally POV shots.
Delia 's story is told via flashback montage and her V.O. as Finch thinks about what he has read in her journal; Valerie 's is told in the same way, as Evey retrieves and reads each letter. However, we see the letters; we don 't see the pages of the journal.
V 's own story (and that of St Mary 's) is told via V.O. and flashback montage as 'Rookwood ' tells it to Finch. Evey tells her story similarly to V.
What all this adds up to is story within story, reporting and repeating, eavesdropping and surveillance. Much is second-hand story-telling, sometimes deliberately altered to 'spin ' the facts, e.g.
We see the Bailey blown up – we hear the Cabinet discuss it – we see the news item that 'reports ' it, i.e. rewrites it – we get the disbelieving reaction of the public via an eye witness
We see Prothero get killed – we see Dascomb decide how to spin it – we see the news 'report ' of it – we see
Montage is used to show the responses of people in the city. We see them watching TV and watch with them. Several of the main characters are shown reacting to V 's broadcast address. Gordon 's show is screened on TV and watched by Evey and Gordon (their POV); the public, and the Chancellor himself are shown watching and reacting.
Events and dialogue are overheard and repeated to others, as in Cabinet meetings, when they are reported to Sutler, and particularly in Finch 's and Dominic 's reports to each other. Chancellor Sutler communicates with his cabinet via closed circuit television.
The extensive back-story is told in several ways.
Computer screens show newspaper archives, tax returns and police records. These are generally POV shots.
Delia 's story is told via flashback montage and her V.O. as Finch thinks about what he has read in her journal; Valerie 's is told in the same way, as Evey retrieves and reads each letter. However, we see the letters; we don 't see the pages of the journal.
V 's own story (and that of St Mary 's) is told via V.O. and flashback montage as 'Rookwood ' tells it to Finch. Evey tells her story similarly to V.
What all this adds up to is story within story, reporting and repeating, eavesdropping and surveillance. Much is second-hand story-telling, sometimes deliberately altered to 'spin ' the facts, e.g.
We see the Bailey blown up – we hear the Cabinet discuss it – we see the news item that 'reports ' it, i.e. rewrites it – we get the disbelieving reaction of the public via an eye witness
We see Prothero get killed – we see Dascomb decide how to spin it – we see the news 'report ' of it – we see
References: in Alan Moore 's Graphic Novel, V For Vendetta ', by Madelyn Boudreaux]