V for Vendetta - About the story

Director James McTeigue describes V for Vendetta as a political thriller first and foremost with a very dark and multifaceted character at its center. "On one hand, V is altruistic, believing he can bring about great social change, but on the other hand he has a murderous vendetta towards anyone who’s done him wrong."

While preparing for V for Vendetta, McTeigue was influenced by a host of films, principal among them 1965’s The Battle of Algiers, a highly realistic account of the Algerian revolution against the French, fought from 1954 to 1962. Like Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, George Orwell’s 1984, Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 or Lindsay Anderson’s If...., V For Vendetta cautions against the dangers of corruption, control, manipulation and repression, while exploring the perils of extremism – whether it be a government abusing its power or an individual taking the law into his own hands.

"V For Vendetta is a multi-layered film," says producer Joel Silver, whose long and impressive film career includes the groundbreaking Matrix trilogy and seminal action films such as the Lethal Weapon series, Die Hard and Predator. "It can be enjoyed as a dynamic action picture, or audiences can go deeper into the complex issues and ideas it explores, about the individual’s responsibility for the power they entrust to their government, and what means are necessary or acceptable to bringing an end to tyranny. It raises a lot of fascinating questions, but doesn’t provide any easy answers."

The film is based on the graphic novel of the same name – V for Vendetta first appeared in Warrior, an independent monthly comic magazine published in 1981, quickly capturing a cult following. Co-created by Alan Moore and David Lloyd, it ran in 26 issues before the magazine folded, leaving fans hanging mid-plot. After a five-year hiatus, Moore and Lloyd completed V for Vendetta in 1989 under the DC banner when it was released in its entirety as a graphic novel.

V For Vendetta is set slightly in the future, where modern day London is still very recognizable. Creators Moore and Lloyd were influenced by the times in which they lived. "Our attitude towards Margaret Thatcher’s ultra-conservative government was one of the driving forces behind the fascist British police state we created in Vendetta," Lloyd explains. "The destruction of this system was V’s primary reason for existence."

Thematically, Moore and Lloyd’s series explores many political and ethical notions of continuing relevance in today’s world. "The principal message of the original is that every individual has the right to be an individual, and the right – and duty – to resist being forced into conformism," comments Lloyd. "V resists by directly attacking government installations and murdering the regime’s supporters. So it’s not just a story about a battle against an evil tyranny, but a story about terrorism and whether terrorism can ever be justified – and that’s something we have to try to understand if we’re ever to solve the problem of it in the real world."

Acclaimed writer/directors Andy and Larry Wachowski, the inspired minds behind the revolutionary Matrix trilogy, were fans of Moore and Lloyd’s original work, and first wrote a screen adaptation of the graphic novel in the mid-1990s, before embarking on the Herculean task of filming the Matrix trilogy. During post-production on the second and third installments of The Matrix, the Wachowskis revisited the Vendetta script and brought it to the attention of their first assistant director, James McTeigue, with whom they had worked on all three Matrix films. McTeigue had been directing commercials at the time and was looking to transition to feature films.

"We were in post-production on Revolutions when Andy and Larry first gave me a copy of V for Vendetta," remembers McTeigue. Intrigued and excited about the themes of the graphic novel, he shared the Wachowskis’ view of its relevance in the current political landscape. "We felt the novel was very prescient to how the political climate is at the moment. It really showed what can happen when society is ruled by government, rather than the government being run as a voice of the people. I don’t think it’s such a big leap to say that things like that can happen when leaders stop listening to the people."

At the time, the Wachowskis had just reached the end of a 10-year odyssey with the Matrix films and were not prepared to immediately jump back into directing. As McTeigue explains, "Ten years is a long time to spend on anything, and making films takes a lot out of you. I think Andy and Larry wanted the film to be made now, but wanted to take a back seat for awhile."

So the Wachowskis and producer Joel Silver offered their longtime colleague the opportunity to direct V For Vendetta, surrounded by many of the Wachowskis’ other key collaborators, such as producer Grant Hill, production designer Owen Paterson, visual effects supervisor Dan Glass and stunt coordinator Chad Stahelski, with the brothers collaborating as producers and writers.

In returning to the script, the Wachowskis went back to their original draft and set about making revisions. As McTeigue recalls, "Their original version was a really good adaptation, but it was almost a blow-for-blow retelling of the graphic novel. We thought it would be good to move the story forward in time, setting the flashback portion in the 1990s and projecting the present-day timeline into the future around 2020."