Marketing and Movies: V for Vendetta

"Remember, remember, the fifth of November"

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Today is the second entry in the Marketing and Movies series, and it will feature V for Vendetta. This issue will review the movie and also include some key business and marketing lessons you can learn from it. This issue WILL contain spoilers for the film, so I would ask you to please watch V for Vendetta first before reading this issue. It’s a wonderful film that you will thoroughly enjoy.

V for Vendetta is an incredibly timely movie, and hits on some quite important themes for the world we currently live in. In fact, let’s touch on one of those themes right out of the gate.

And for that…I will need your help. Please Google “What year is the movie V for Vendetta set in?”

You will likely see an article claiming the movie is set in the late 2020s, or maybe the late 2030s. The top result for you may be a Reddit post that claims the same.

Regardless, the top results will have two things in common:

1 - They will likely all agree that it’s unclear what year V for Vendetta is set in

2 - Yet they will also agree the movie is NOT set in the year 2020.

But of course it is. The movie's director freely admits V for Vendetta is set in the year 2020. The movie’s script is available online, and you can see the script explains that the opening scene is set on November 4th, 2019. The majority of the movie is set over the course of the following year, which would be…2020.

Why this disconnect? Let’s delve into the substance of the movie, and the answers may reveal themselves in the process.

V for Vendetta is a 2005 film set in 2019 and 2020 London. The protagonist is an anonymous figure who calls himself ‘V’. V has a singular mission; To take down what he feels is a corrupt UK government. As the movie unfolds, we learn that V's belief that the government is corrupt isn't due to suspicion, but rather due to firsthand knowledge. Or rather, firsthand exposure, in the truest sense of the word.

Although the world of V for Vendetta is set in the future, we can sadly see the events of the current day beginning to dovetail into accordance with the bleak setting of the film. V for Vendetta is set in a future London where the government is a completely fascist police state. Any criticism of the government is completely silenced. Forcibly. No one is allowed to voice opinions that aren't approved by the government, and the government totally rules the people by using fear and propaganda.

Early on in the movie, we are introduced to Evey Hammond. Evey is the daughter of activists who were arrested when she was a child and who later died in prison. London has a strict nightly curfew, and Evey, losing track of time, has to leave her apartment past curfew.

She is soon stopped on the street by secret police known as Fingermen. The Fingermen are about to assault Evey, when V arrives and saves her. V then encourages Evey to join him on the rooftop of a nearby building, as he has a surprise for her. She reluctantly agrees.

On the rooftop, Evey witnesses the explosion of the Old Bailey, via bombs that had been set up by V.

The following morning (November 5th, 2019), V hijacks the local news station feed and delivers a pirate video message to all of London. On the message, V takes credit for the bombing of the Old Bailey, and details all the myriad of problems currently facing the UK. And in the process, V also identifies the guilty parties: The people themselves for allowing it to happen.

V closes his message with a call to action: He asks the citizens of London who agree with him that change is needed to meet him in one year outside of Parliament, where he promises to give the government a 5th of November they will never forget.

Over the course of the remainder of the movie, V begins killing high-ranking members of government, while Chief Inspector Eric Finch investigates him and tries to piece together what is driving V’s killing spree.

It turns out, all of V’s victims are connected.

In the years prior to the movie, the Norsefire political party had leveraged world events to gain a stranglehold on UK politics. As the party became dominant, it attempted to consolidate and strengthen its position by jailing anyone who criticized the party, as a true fascist state does. These dissenter and other ‘undesireables’ were sent to ‘detention’ centers where they were tortured and horrific experiments were conducted on them.

In the process of these experiments, a deadly virus was created. Yet, instead of using this virus as a weapon against its enemies, the Norsefire party decided to use it against the populace of UK as a tool to further solidify its power in the country. Over the years, citizens of UK were becoming increasingly upset at Norsefire's strongarm tactics, the push for more jailings and surveillance of ‘undesirables’.

So Norsefire released the virus into a water treatment plant, a hospital and a school. This caused intense panic and chaos across the country. It also gave the Norsefire party a path to victory in the upcoming election. Prior to the release of the virus, the Norsefire party's candidate was trailing in the upcoming election. But as the virus was released, Norsefire adjusted its platform to address how it would save the UK from the virus, and that ultimately turned their election hopes and the Norsefire candidate easily won the election. A result that would have never been predicted before the virus arrived on the scene.

Shortly after the election, the Norsefire party announces that a cure for the virus (that they created) had been found. The cure was immediately distributed to the public, and an overjoyed populace gave the Norsefire candidate who had just been elected Prime Minister almost unlimited political power, elevating him to the newly created role of High Chancellor, effectively making him a dictator.

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With that backstory of Norsefire's rise to power satisfied, let's circle back to V. V was a prisoner at one of the detention centers, Larkhill. Unspeakable experiments were carried out on the inmates there, in an attempt to create biological weapons that the Norsefire party would use to stay in and gain political power. Most of these experiments resulted in the death of the subjects.

But V not only survived, he was given superhuman strength and an enhanced intellect as a result of the experiments. He helps to destroy Larkhill, but in the process is horribly burned and disfigured, which is part of the reason why he always wears a costume and gloves.

V begins to target all the people who were responsible for his torture and the torture of his friends at Larkhill. Many of these people have now risen to prominent roles within the Norsefire party and government. Evey continues to remain in contact with V and once she learns of his plans, she attempts to betray him to her boss, not realizing that her boss truly is the villain that V says he is. V finds out that Evey intends to betray him, and he captures her, but not as V. Evey believes she has been captured by the Norsefire party. For months, Evey is kept in a cell and tortured as her captors demand that she reveal who V is and his plans. Evey refuses until one day her cell is left open. She leaves the cell and discovers she is in V's lair and has been the entire time.

Initially furious with V, she reluctantly agrees to see V again one last time on November 5th, then she leaves. As the fateful day approaches, V continues his plan as the nation continues to grow more restless. Additionally, the High Chancellor puts intense pressure on his underlings to stop V, most of which falls on Peter Creedy, the head of the secret police. Capitalizing on this, V strikes a deal with Creedy; He will give himself up to Creedy, in exchange for Creedy betraying the High Chancellor to V. This would happen on November 5th.

In the days prior to November 5th, V distributes tens of thousands of Guy Fawkes masks similar to his own to citizens of London. V's plan to create anarchy and push the citizens to retake control of its government begin to become clearer.

November 5th arrives, and V meets Evey for the last time. He tells her he has set up a train with explosives to go to Parliament. He tells Evey that since he will be gone, the decision will lie with her over whether or not to put the train in motion and destroy Parliament.

V then meets with Creedy and several of his henchmen underground. Creedy gives the High Chancellor to V, who executes him. Creedy then tells his henchmen to open fire on V. They do, but V is not killed. While the henchmen attempt to reload their guns, V quickly strikes all of them with his knives. He ends up with Creedy being the sole survivor, and he kills him.

On the street, thousands of citizens have donned their V masks, and have marched toward Parliament. Military is lined up in the street and awaiting orders from Creedy on whether or not they should open fire on the citizens. As Creedy is dead, the order cannot be given, and the military stands down and allows the citizens to pass unharmed.

Meanwhile, V is still alive, but badly wounded. He stumbles out into the train tunnel where Evey is. V dies in her arms, and she places his body on the train and goes to press the button and start the train. Before she can, Chief Inspector Finch arrives and tells her to stop. She refuses and says the people need hope and she starts the train. Finch doesn't attempt to stop her. On the street, citizens remove their masks and cheer as Parliament explodes. The scene seems to invoke a transformation from the populace all being of one mind (that can be controlled via propaganda), to being individuals, united in creating a new Nation for themselves.

Finch then asks Evey who V was. She replies ‘He was all of us'.

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What we can learn from V from Vendetta

One of the things I try VERY hard to avoid in writing Backstage Pass, and really on Substack and social media in general, is getting on my soapbox. But I will do so gently, here. One of the main themes of V for Vendetta is how the media can be leveraged to control people by carefully crafted messages, IE propaganda.

When I first began to delve into the world of content creation some 20 years ago, one of the first lessons I learned was how to craft my messages so that they could achieve maximum exposure. There's a whole cottage industry that has sprung up around the concept of creating content in such a way to 'drive more eyeballs'.

When used correctly, this is simply smart marketing and focusing on the core ideas that are relevant to your audience.

Yet messages can also be carefully crafted to prey on the intended audience. To invoke feelings of anger, fear, panic. In the 'right' hands, content can be presented in such a way to create the desired emotional response and cause people to react in a way that they otherwise would not. V even eludes to this early on in the film when he points out that the citizens of London can only blame themselves for allowing the Norsefire party to gain total control of the country. He states “I know why you did it, I know you were afraid! Who wouldn't be? War, terror, disease, there were a myriad of problems that conspired to corrupt your reason, and rob you of your common sense.”

We can see that happening today, can't we? As someone who has worked in media for decades and who has studied how messages can be crafted to elicit a response, I sadly see this every day. From all sides and every isle of the political spectrum.

Outrage sells. Fear sells. Anger sells.

Content creators and media sources, particularly those of a political stripe, know this better than most. When a populace is exposed to enough sensational content, many people simply stop questioning it. They make up their minds and shift to consuming content that validates their worldview, rather than content that educates them.

As Mark Twain famously said “A lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can get its pants on”.

A few weeks ago I saw a clip from a podcast where a guest made a point about the upcoming US election. As soon as the guest made their point, the host immediately interrupted “Whoa! Ok if you're going to say that, I am bound to point out that I don't necessarily agree with or endorse your statement, otherwise YouTube will demonetize this podcast.” The obviously confused guest replied with “Why? All I did was quote the Constitution.”

This brings up a very interesting point about both censorship and content creation. First, censorship on social media platforms is a very real problem and it has been for years. Often, content creators are banned or removed from platforms for simply expressing opinions that the ‘content moderation team' aka ‘trust and safety' team for that platform disagrees with.

But the podcast host's focus on avoiding being banned by YouTube also speaks to a larger point: Content creators are creating content that they can monetize. And they know content that drives fear, anger and outrage drives dollars in the form of clicks on social media. So that's the content they create. But they also know if they discuss certain topics, platforms can ban them. It can become a situation where a content creator is intentionally creating sensational content to drive engagement, while at the same time avoiding discussing relevant aspects of the topics in order to avoid being 'deplatformed'. It almost creates a perfect storm where the content is devoid of substance, and is full of outrage instead. Think of it as ‘junk food' content. And we are getting a far too steady diet of it these days.

I asked ChatGPT to give me some stats on fear-based marketing and an explanation. GPT says roughly 70% of all advertising messages are fear-based(!). It added that fear-based marketing can work in the short-term, and is more effective when used alongside products and services in the health, security and safety industries. Ironically, it added that extended exposure to fear-based messages leads to increased levels of anxiety, stress and burnout. So these fear-based messages are offering you the solution and the problem, all rolled up in one!

So how should we handle being bombarded with fear-based content daily? I won’t make suggestions, as everyone needs to decide for themselves how they process information that they encounter. I will say that as a content creator myself, I know that earning and protecting the trust of my readers is of the utmost importance. Because once you lose the trust of an audience, you very likely aren’t getting it back.

This world has become hyper politicized, and the reality is it will likely get worse before it gets better. Hopefully on the other side, we can all make a better effort to be more thoughtful about the information we consume, and the people we interact with. As a nation, even as a world, we have more in common than differences.

Let's hope in the coming years we make a greater effort to focus not only on what draws us together, but that we also turn our backs on the sources that would wish to drive us apart.

That's it for this issue of Backstage Pass, and the second edition of Marketing and Movies. Next month, Marketing and Movies will feature The Time Traveler's Wife.

On Thursday, Paid subscribers will be treated to the first edition of Marketing and Music, featuring Evanescence, and a very detailed examination of how rock stars flip traditional marketing on its head. It's the most important content I've created so far for Substack, and I've dropped the Paywall down so 75% of the post will be free for all.

See you then, have a great Tuesday!

Mack