However, If we can’t count on an objective and uncensored, free press, then we cannot possibly know what is truly happening, how our freedoms are being affected, and/or who is pulling the puppet’s strings behind the curtain!

When I read George Orwell’s “Animal Farm,” in the 1960s I considered it as witty science fiction portraying an exaggerated threat which could never really happen in America. Now I see that repression and political control, like that in the novel, has become shockingly real and immanently threatening. We are really getting too damn close to saying things like, “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

I’m not normally one to panic, cry wolf, or to frequently react with a sour grapes attitude about things that I will most likely never have anyway. But the sad fact is that we should all become very concerned about what is happening in Science and religion, as well as in political obstruction, voter suppression, weakening of equal rights, and religious oppression. Fiction is unreal until the unreal becomes real (or at least) is portrayed as factual by those who try to gain the world and loose their souls. Unfortunately, the delusions of those in power, are being forced on all of us, and we are so complacent with our relative safety and prosperity, that most of us just don’t give a damn what happens while we’d rather tune into “keeping up With the Kardashians!”

I don’t recall this from the book, but in the 1966 Francois Truffaut based on the book, the job of the firemen was to merely burn the books — not the houses as well.

In cases where the house is a virtual library, or is suspected of harboring additional books squirreled away in the walls or hidden coves, they would burn the structure, but that was not the norm.

We might note that Mildred’s favorite TV shows were –yes, you guessed it– reality TV.

The cinematography, sets/production design, etc., and the 1960’s styles add to the reasons to see this film.

Trivia: This was Truffaut’s only English language film. And he and Oskar Werner (Montag) fought quite a bit during the filming, culminating with Werner cutting his hair in an attempt to sabotage the film (this is reflected in the last act at the Book People’s camp).