Note: Somehow, when I hinted during Metal Month II in my main journal that I had "something special" coming up here in terms of movie reviews, Pet_Sounds correctly guessed that it was this. How'd he do that? Is he psychic? Your guess is as good as mine. But he was right...
Title: Nineteen Eighty-Four
Year: 1984
Genre: Science-Fiction
Starring: John Hurt as Winston Smith
Richard Burton as O'Brien
Suzanna Hamilton as Julia
Cyril Cusack as Mr. Charrington
Director: Michael Radford
Writer: Michael Radford, based on George Orwell's novel
In the original dystopian future, set in the year 1984, Winston Smith is a low-level operative working in the Ministry of Truth, whose job it is to revise history, to make sure that what the all-powerful Party sees as being correct is shown as such. Any newspaper articles, editorials or anything else written prior which does not conform to, or contradicts what the Party want, is adjusted, changed, amended. Literally, rewriting history. But Smith is rebelling in his own small way. He is keeping a diary, an activity forbidden by the Party, a personal act which is not in accordance with the wishes of the ruling elite, and he dreams of the world outside the grey confines of his cell-like quarters, of trees and blue sky and clean water and, most damning of all, of freedom. Freedom from the Thought Police, freedom from the endless announcements about an endless war, freedom from the morning hate-ins everyone has to attend, freedom from revising history and freedom, most of all, from the Party and its ubiquitous figurehead, Big Brother.
In his actual real world, even the language is being rewritten. Newspeak uses only the words authorised and approved by the Party, and people who have been found guilty of offences against the State are excised from history, labelled as “unpersons”: every reference to them, every photograph of them or with them in it, every document pertaining to them is changed, altered, deleted, so that no trace of the person will be left. They are lifted from the face of time itself; it is as if they had never been born. Smith's world is in a constant state of war, with military vehicles prowling the streets, helicopters buzzing in the sky like angry wasps, and continual reports from “the front” coming in all the time. Most of the resources of the country (said to be England, referred to as Oceania and Airstrip One) are bent towards the production of munitions, vehicles and supplies for the eternal war, the opponent only known as Eurasia.
Reacting against the unrelenting greyness and his dreary, pointless existence, Smith begins an illicit love affair with a woman called Julia, meeting her outside of London where he risks his position, his freedom (such as it is) and even his life by indulging in one of the most heinous crimes imaginable, sexcrime. He then takes it a step further, renting a room above an old curio shop where he and Julia can meet and make love in private, away from the prying eyes of Big Brother and the Party, away from the incessant tannoy announcements and the litany of production figures and targets reached or set, away from the dark, grey, drab, hopeless despair of his life and into, if only for a short moment, a small shaft of personal sunlight that will get him through the rest of his boring, unfulfilling, monotonous week.
He is contacted by O'Brien, a senior Party member who loans him his copy of the latest edition of the Newspeak dictionary. However he discovers the book to be merely a front for one of the most hated and banned books in Oceania, “The theory of collective oligarchy” by the arch-traitor, Emmanuel Goldstein. Why would O'Brien, a trusted Party man, have such a book in his possession and why, more to the point, would he pass it on to Smith? Surely he must be a member of the legendary and often thought fictional Resistance? While he ponders this revelation, the news reports advise that the hated enemy is not after all Eurasia --- Eurasia has always been their ally --- it is now Eastasia. And so the lie propogates and takes on its own life, and nobody questions it.
As he reads the book with growing interest and understanding to Julia, it turns out he has been sold out by Charrington, the owner of the curio shop. There is a camera behind the picture hanging on the wall and the Party have been watching Smith and Julia commit their sexcrime, and add to it by reading the banned book written by the traitor Goldstein. They are arrested and separated. While awaiting interrogation, Smith meets his colleague Parsons, who has also been found guilty of being a traitor and is sentenced to the infamous Room 101. Nobody knows what happens there, but everyone fears the very mention of that dread chamber.
Then it's Smith's turn. He finds to his dismay that O'Brien is not part of the Resistance at all, and the book was planted as a device to trap him. He is in fact going to be interrogated by O'Brien, though torture would be a more accurate description. O'Brien does his best to break Smith, trying to make him see things that aren't there and acknowledge that the will of the Party is all that matters, but unable to satisfy his torturer Smith remains resolute: he tries to lie when O'Brien asks him how many fingers he is holding up, four or five, and though Smith sees four he tries to say it's five, as O'Brien wants him to believe this. But O'Brien knows he is lying, trying to save himself from further torment, and this is not what he wants. He wants, needs Smith to absolutely believe that he can see five fingers, because the Party says that is what he should see.
When, after what could be days or weeks, or perhaps only hours of unremitting physical and mental torture, Smith clings to the hope espoused in Goldstein's book, O'Brien drops his final bombshell, telling him that he authored, or co-authored it. It is a fantasy, a made up thing, a prop with which to fuel the hatred of the people and falsely build up the hopes of aspiring rebels. But though almost broken, Smith clings to his love of Julia and confesses he still hates Big Brother, so he is taken to Room 101, where, O'Brien tells him, the worst thing in the world awaits him. This is based on individual horrors, and in Smith's case it is the terror of rats.
He is strapped into a chair and a cage with two large starving rats is secured to his head. At the realisation that when the door to the cage is open the rats will burrow through his face and eat him alive, he finally snaps and screams for O'Brien to torture and kill Julia instead of him. Having broken the last vestiges of his spirit, torn the hope and love from his heart, O'Brien is satisfied and Smith is released. He is later seen on the screen confessing to all the crimes he has been accused of --- most of which are fanciful but that doesn't matter --- and when he meets Julia some time later she too has been reprogrammed, and their meeting is sterile and polite. As she leaves, and Smith awaits his final execution at the whim of the Party, he turns to the image of Big Brother and says “I love you”. Meanwhile the screen announcer broadcasts a “glorious victory” against Eurasia, who are once again the enemy, and proclaims that the war is once more “within measurable distance of its end.”
QUOTES
Smith: “Thoughtcrime is death. Thoughtcrime does not entail death, thoughtcrime
is death.”
Smith (from his diary): “To the past, or to the future, to an age when thought is free, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of the Thought Police, from a dead man: greetings.”
Announcer: “I am authorised to say that the war against Eurasia is within measureable distance of its end.”
(This is said ad infinitum; the war will of course never be over, but you have to throw the citizens a bone from time to time, in case they get restless or begin to ask awkward questions).
Doctor: “When the orgasm has eventually been finally eradicated, the last remaining obstacle to the psychological acceptance of the principles of INGSOC as applied to ARTSEM will be removed. In other words, the unorthodox tendencies towards Ownlife, which constantly threaten the natural erosion of the family unit will no longer have the biological support of the organism. As we all know the biological and social stimulation of the family leads to private reflection outside Party needs, and the establishment of unorthodox loyalites which can only lead to Thoughtcrime. The intoduction of ARTSEM combined with the elimination of the orgasm, will render the family obsolete, until it becomes impossible to conceptualise.”
(One thing the Party fears more than anything else is the hardwired loyalty to one's family, coupled with the sex drive of humans. If they can eliminate both, then people will have no need to struggle with divided loyalties. Why decide between loyalty to the Party and loyalty to one's family, or wife, or girl or boyfriend, if these things no longer exist? Rivals for the unquestioning fealty and obedience of its subjects, the Party will destroy them and leave room for nothing in the lives of its citizens but unswerving, total submission to the Party. I never found out what INGSOC was --- though the "soc" part is surely "society", but I assume ARTSEM is "artificial insemination".)
Smith (delighted and surprised): “Tea!”
Julia: “Hmm. There's been a lot of tea around recently. We've captured India or something.”
Smith (from his diary): “Freedom is the freedom to say two plus two equals four. If that is granted, all else follows.”
(Smith will find though that even this simple arithmetic may not be authorised by the Party, as he will later be asked “And what if the Party says two plus two equals five? What then?” Making it clear that no matter what the reality, it's what the Party agrees is truth that is the accepted norm. If the Party says the sky is pink, then the sky is pink. There is no room whatever for a dissenting or contradictory opinion.)
Smith: “Julia, do you think resistance is real?”
Julia: “No. None of it is real.”
Smith: Oceania is at war with Eastasia. Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia. Eurasia is our ally. Eurasia has always been our ally. Everything fades into mist, the past is erased, the erasures forgotten. Lie becomes the truth, and then a lie again.”
Smith: “It's not so much staying alive as staying human that's important. It counts that we don't betray each other. If they can make me change my feelings, can make me stop loving you, that would be a real betrayal.”
Smith: “You can ...?” (O'Brien turns off the screen)
O'Brien: “Yes. You're allowed that privilege.”
(Smith is as amazed at this tiny but at the same time massive concession as he would be if O'Brien had suddenly sprouted wings and flown away. Imagine a world where music blares at you constantly, at full volume, and nobody can turn it off. Nobody would even THINK of turning it off. This has gone on for all of your life, and all of your parents' life, and probably all of their parents' too. Then one day, someone pulls the plug. Imagine the incredulous looks, the sudden lack of understanding as to how you cope with a world not filled with endless announcements of traitors uncovered and munitions created, of war reports and progress dispatches, of orders to keep the faith and the constant song of Oceania. In the absence of the screen, the silence must be deafening. And impossible to comprehend.)
Soldier (on screen): “This is no longer war. This is cold-blooded murder!”
(There's a difference?) 
Quoted from Goldstein's book: “In accordance with the principles of doublethink, it does not matter if the war is not real, or when it is, victory is not possible. The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous. The essential act of modern warfare is the destruction of the produce of human labour. A hierarchical society is only possible on the basis of poverty and ignorance. In principle the war effort is always planned to keep society on the brink of starvation. The war is waged by the ruling group against its own subjects, and its object is not victory over Eurasia or Eastasia, but to keep the very structure of society intact.”
Smith (Looking out the window at an old washerwoman singing in her yard): “The future is hers. We are the dead.”
Parsons: “Keep away from me Smith! I'm an agent of Goldstein! I didn't even know it myself! Thoughtcrime is so insidious; it just creeps up on you! My daughter found it out: very proud of her. Lucky it was discovered before it was too late.”
(Another example of how absolute the control, how final the word of the Party is. If they say you're a traitor you are one. Maybe you didn't realise it, but ignorance is no excuse. The possibility of the Party being in error is not even contemplated, to the point where a citizen will readily accept he or she is guilty, because the Party says they are. Also note: family loyalty is breaking down. Parsons' own daughter reported him, knowing he would be executed. And he's proud of her for doing what he sees as her duty!)
O'Brien: “Do you remember writing in your diary, freedom is the freedom to say two plus two equals four? How many fingers am I holding up, Winston?”
Smith: “Four.”
O'Brien: “And if the Party says it is five, how many then?”
(Although Smith does not answer, O'Brien knows he is thinking “four”. It is, you see, not enough for Smith to simply repeat what he thinks his interrogator wishes him to hear. He cannot merely parrot an answer that will satisfy the Party member. He must believe it, truly, totally, completely. He must believe that four equals five, and that this is only so because the Party says it is so. Lying to a Party member is an act of resistance, an act of will, an act of defiance, none of which will be tolerated, none of which will shorten his interrogation or lessen his pain. But he cannot make himself believe it, not until O'Brien has completely and irrevocably broken him.)
O'Brien: “Neither the past nor the future, nor the present exist in their own right. Reality is in the human mind. Not the individual mind. Each makes mistakes, and soon perishes. But in the mind of the Party, which is collective, and immortal.”
O'Brien: “There is no escape here Winston. No martyrs. All the confessions made here are true. We do not destroy the heretic because he resists us. As long as he resists us, we never destroy him. We make him one of ourselves before we kill him. We make his brain perfect before we blow it out. And then, when there is nothing left but sorrow and love for Big Brother we shall lift you clean out of history. We shall turn you into gas and pour you into the stratosphere. Nothing will remain of you: not a name in a register, not a memory in a living brain. You will be annihilated in the past as well as in the future.”
O'Brien: “You know what is in Room 101. Everyone knows.”
O'Brien: “Power is inflicting pain and humiliation on another because you can. Power is tearing a man's mind apart and putting it back together in shapes of your own choosing. Power is not a means, it is an end. The past is forbidden. Why? Because when you cut a man from his past, his family, his children, there is no loyalty except loyalty to the Party. There is no love, except love for Big Brother. All competing pleasures we will destroy. If you want a vision of the future, Winston, imagine a boot stamping on an upturned human face forever.”
Smith: “Something in thes world, some spirit you will never overcome.”
O'Brien: “What? What is it, this spirit, Winston?”
Smith: “The spirit of Man.”
O'Brien: “And do you consider yourself a man, Winston?”
Smith: “Yes.”
O'Brien: “If you are a man, you're the last man. Your kind is extinct. We are the inheritors.”
O'Brien: “You asked me once what was in Room 101, Winston. I told you that you know already. Everyone knows. What is in Room 101 is the very worst thing in the world. It goes beyond fear of pain, or death. It is unendurable, and it varies from individual to individual. It may be burial alive, or castration, or any other thing. In your case, it is rats.”