FAHRENHEIT 451 Explained: Terrifyingly Relevant Sci-Fi

Just a few years ago, films like 1984, Logan’s Run, Children of Men, or even V for Vendetta, which was recently mentioned by a colleague, were films that one could watch from a safe distance. For years, they didn’t go beyond the boundaries of the fantasy they truly represented. The visions born in the minds of their creators were primarily meant to serve as a warning against the ideological radicalism accelerating around the world. Since no actions followed the words, and the dust after the horrors of World War II had settled, dystopian films could only warn about the possible tomorrow, rather than secretly commenting on what was happening. However, no one really believed in this finger-wagging warning. Fahrenheit 451.

The tone has changed. Just look outside the window. We’ve watched so many science fiction films, and we learned nothing from them. They were meant to teach us, they were meant to warn us, yet it seems that a mechanism of repression worked in each of us, pushing the possibility of connecting the filmic vision with reality further away. As it turns out, François Truffaut, like all of us, also mocked science fiction. He considered the genre to be uninteresting, derivative, and arbitrary. That’s why his friend told him the story contained in Ray Bradbury’s novel titled Fahrenheit 451. Do you think he was impressed? You guessed it. The plot completely absorbed him, and from that moment on, Truffaut set out to adapt it for cinema. The work on the script began, followed by fundraising, and then the casting. Fahrenheit 451 became Truffaut’s first and only English-language film. It happened in 1966, almost 60 years ago.

It’s worth commenting briefly on the acting in the film. Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, and Terence Stamp were all considered for the role of Guy Montag. However, the choice fell on the lesser-known Oskar Werner, with whom Truffaut had previously worked on Jules and Jim. The director later regretted working with Werner. A little more, and due to misunderstandings between the actor and the director, the Fahrenheit 451 adaptation would have been ruined. The actor didn’t like the director’s decisions, so he began to boycott the project whenever possible. He insisted on not participating in scenes with the flame-thrower (in a film about burning books, I remind you), so the director had to use a stunt double. In the last scene, we see Werner with noticeably shorter hair. It turns out that the actor cut it off deliberately and shamelessly just to create a continuity error. However, it’s hard to hold a grudge against Werner – he simply fits into this world. His impassive facial expression seems as devoid of hope as the landscape that surrounds him.

The mesmerizingly beautiful Julie Christie played a dual role in the film, for which she was, deservedly, nominated for a BAFTA. She played both the wife of the main character and (in a completely different hairstyle) the mysterious stranger encountered on the train. This was a particularly difficult role for Christie because it required playing opposite emotions at the same time. Linda, the main character’s wife, seems to be a typical representative of the masses, who blindly accepts whatever the authorities provide through the media. Meanwhile, the curious Clarisse contributes to Montag finally starting to question the meaning of the reality he’s been living in for years without thought. In this way, the one who burns books becomes the one who, at night, reads them with fascination.

At one time, Stanisław Lem himself, commenting on the 1953 book in his Fantastyka i Futurologia, pointed out that there was something childish about it. The concept on which the plot is based seems so naive, as if it were taken from a dream. Montag is a firefighter of the future. But he does not deal with extinguishing fires. He deals with starting them. Together with his colleagues, he goes from house to house, intercepting contraband, which is then used to create a bonfire. What is it? Books. Various kinds – nonfiction, novels, plays, encyclopedias. Lem was right when he wrote that more than burning books, we would fear the burning of people, which is why he didn’t believe in Bradbury’s vision. The threat posed by books, however, should be treated symbolically. Officially, in accordance with propaganda, the government decided to eliminate what caused discomfort in people through the growing anti-intellectual sentiments over the years. In practice, this boils down to a desire to maintain collective ignorance. The dumber the society, the easier it is to control – simple.

It’s amusing that a book meant to be a tribute to literature was adapted into a medium that openly opposes it in its assumptions. When we take a deeper look, especially at the scenes with the main character’s wife, the criticism in Fahrenheit 451 is not so much directed against totalitarianism as against television as a tool for mass indoctrination. The author of the book himself admitted it. Let’s say it directly, using Ray Bradbury’s words – television simply turns people into morons. Already in the 1950s, according to the author of the novel, television served only to bury people with useless information, without taking the broader context into account. The slow disappearance of critical thinking due to an unquestioning trust in what the glass box provides was becoming noticeable. I’m afraid to think about how Bradbury would comment on the era of fake news today. However, the thing is, he was right, as evidenced by the growing media misinformation we see today. In the 1950s, it was just beginning to sprout; today, we call it informational chaos.

François Truffaut followed this path and made his adaptation, clearly marking it with a stamp of unease. It is one of those films that you watch while shifting uncomfortably in your seat, feeling an underlying tension. It’s uncomfortable, something doesn’t add up, the presented images sound and look terrifying, even though they are all too serious. You can sense inspiration from Hitchcock, particularly in the work with the camera (e.g., the vertigo effect). The composer who created the music for Fahrenheit 451 was even the same musician who composed the soundtrack for Psycho – Bernard Herrmann. Apparently, he even asked the director why he chose him when he had previously worked with other acclaimed composers. Truffaut allegedly replied that the others would give him music for the 20th century, and he wanted music for the 21st century. It seems that this motivated Herrmann, as he created compositions that perfectly fit the atmosphere of paranoia.

I cannot write this text without contemporary analogies. I admit I’m a weak reviewer because I don’t always manage to keep a work from clashing with my internal beliefs. I still don’t want to believe what I see, but it turns out that George Orwell, Ray Bradbury, and others were simply right. They weren’t playing satire. They were simply selling us a vision of the future, to which they somehow had access in a transcendent, superconscious way. The filmic guard at the head of the regime of ideas, or lack thereof, who deals with burning books every day, is simply our beloved police, which, in a little while, will transition from issuing fines for not wearing masks to knocking on the doors of those who, for some reason, have decided not to mark themselves with a QR code.

This is how we fight that damned discrimination, this is how we try to bring tolerance to the world, yet we are one step away from creating new ghettos or, as some prefer, leprosariums in the 21st century. We will lock all the inconvenient, the inferior, the lepers, the ones who threaten the rest. Those who want to read books while keeping their freedom of spirit and thought. If, watching Fahrenheit 451, you preferred to belong to the group running from the fire, who will you be after you turn off the receiver?