Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) on Netflix
In the superstate of Oceania, Winston Smith rewrites the past for the Ministry of Truth. He keeps a secret diary and begins an affair with a fellow Party worker, Julia.
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Trailer
Plot summary
Oceania is a totalitarian superstate under the Party and its leader Big Brother, who appears only on posters and screens. Rocket bombs fall on London, the capital of Airstrip One, and a war against Eastasia goes on far away. Winston Smith revises old news reports at the Ministry of Truth so they match whatever the Party now says, while telescreens record what citizens say and do and the Thought Police hunt thoughtcrime. He sits through the rallies at Victory Square and writes his private thoughts in a diary. A young Outer Party worker, Julia, keeps watching him, and he fears she is an informant. In the countryside she speaks to him instead, and they begin an affair they must hide.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Paul Scofield was originally cast as O'Brien but had to drop out after breaking his leg while filming The Shooting Party; Anthony Hopkins, Sean Connery and Rod Steiger were then considered before Richard Burton joined six weeks into shooting and had his boiler-suit costume hand-made on Savile Row.
- Financier Virgin Films first approached David Bowie to score the film but balked at his asking fee, hiring the duo Eurythmics instead; director Michael Radford objected because he had already commissioned a full orchestral score from composer Dominic Muldowney.
- Director Michael Radford was so angry that Virgin overrode him and used the Eurythmics score that he denounced the studio during his Evening Standard British Film Awards speech and withdrew the film from BAFTA consideration in protest.
- Nineteen Eighty-Four turned out to be Richard Burton's final screen appearance; it reached theaters two months after his death and the film is dedicated to him.
- Director Michael Radford and cinematographer Roger Deakins wanted to shoot in black and white, but financial backers Virgin Films refused, so Deakins used bleach bypass, a technique invented by Kazuo Miyagawa, to give the film its washed-out color.
- To qualify for the 1985 Academy Awards, the film ran for one week in December 1984 at the Egyptian Theatre in Los Angeles, where it set a house box-office record of $62,121 despite stormy weather.
