Comments: Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, 1966, directed by Francois
Truffaut.
In a futuristic totalitarian society all books are banned and their
possession is illegal because it is believed that they bring unhappiness
to humans by opening up a reality other than their squeaky clean middle
class fantasy world.
The firemen of their society do not put out fires, but have rather
become Gestapo-like troops that search and destroy books by fire, which
start burning at 451 degrees fahrenheit.
Montag (Oskar Werner), the main character, starts as a loyal book
burning fireman and becomes aware of the mistake of his beliefs as he
discovers reading. As he is betrayed by his superficial wife Linda (Julie
Christie) and his world falls apart he enters the world of reading that
Clarisse (also played by Julie Christie), a book reading insurgent,
offers him. He then joins the "book people" who live in the outskirts of the
city. They memorize entire books and burn them, recite them throughout
their lives and pass them on to the next young generation in order to
preserve them for when they are called to write them down again.
There are very enjoyable parallels to the characters, situations and
the principles of Objectivism in Ayn Rand's body of work. Montag reminds
me of Commandant Kareyev in Red Pawn (The Early Ayn Rand). He
experiences a transformation and realizes how things should be from his own
experience. He is transformed from a man of faith to the state, a mystic of
muscle, to a man of reason. His discovery of the old knowledge in the
books is almost identical to Equality 7-2521's discovery of the
forbidden word and the lost technology of the past in Anthem.
Linda is a superficial parasite of Montag who gets all her knoledge
from an equally fickle female TV host. She reminds me of Lillian Rearden.
It wouldn't be too hard to imagine them having tea and waiting for Hank
to return from the steel mill to verbally tear him to pieces.
Clarisse, the heroine, is a little bit of a Kira. She lives in a
totalitarian state but her ideals remain untouched by the pervading fear of
the state. She has also a little bit of Liberty 5-3000/"The Golden One"
in reverse. She inspires Montag and he follows her to the secluded camp
where the book people live. The camp itself reminds me of Galt's Gulch,
where the last free minds of Earth have escaped to preserve knoledge. I
see the overall message of the movie as that knowledge of good and evil
is necessary to make choices. Where there is no choice values can not
be achieved. It is kind of hilarious to know that Truffaut was a Marxist
and yet directed a film such as this one.
Nowadays the ban on books is not imposed by the state as in Fahrenheit
451, but self imposed by those who accept false premises, cliches and
contradictions from uninformed bystanders, celebrities and
self-appointed "experts". After watching this film I can't help recalling Ayn Rand's
speech to the West Point graduates (Philosophy: Who Needs It) where she
says she doesn't want to sell them her philosophy, but philosophy as
such and if they examine it critically it is Objectivism that they will
come to accept. Seems like today a lot of people must rediscover reading
altogether, before they can get a glimpse of philosophy.
I highly recommend this film to all fellow students of Objectivism as a
rare intellectual masterpiece.
