The 2006 film V for Vendetta presents a dystopian story of a masked vigilante fighting against the totalitarian regime, breaking the laws, but fighting for social justice. The plotlines of this movie and particular episodes from it support the premise made by Roland Barthes concerning the limitations of the concept of justice.
Roland Barthes’ discussion of the traditional wrestling matches can be associated with the social order and depiction of daily realities of the citizens of the dystopian state. Barthes (1984) noted that the primary goal of wrestling is to demonstrate the irrelevance of the purely moral concept of justice. As can be seen from the episodes of the film V for Vendetta, the principles of justice are irrelevant for wrestling. The competitors try to win by all means and do not pay much attention to ethical considerations. Taking into account the fact that the main protagonist fights against the injustice of the totalitarian regime, but uses unlawful methods, it can be stated that the concept of justice has certain limitations when applied to the plot lines of this movie. The audience is expected to pose questions of what should be regarded as justice and what methods are correct. Barthes (1984) noted that rules cannot become a true constraint for wrestlers. The same goes for V who does not hesitate to put plosives into a train even though innocent people can die. The question of whether a fighter should use all available means to achieve certain goals is rather philosophical. However, Bathes’ theories of the limited meaning of the concept of justice for applying it to fighting can be used for understanding and justifying the actions of the main protagonist of the film.
The ending of the movie under consideration proves that the concepts of good and evil are relative and cannot be applied to the principles of social justice. Barthes (1984) noted that wrestling offers an ideal understanding of the order of things because the euphoria of winners enables them to neglect the ambiguity of the everyday situation. Though the main protagonist dies in the final episode of the film and cannot enjoy the euphoria, the fight against the government and the totalitarian regime continues. Fighting for justice, the characters of the film, and particularly V and his followers fail to consider the ethical concerns of their methods of struggle. Applying the concepts developed by Barthes (1984) to the analysis of their actions, it can be stated that they might be blinded by their desire to win.
The concepts of social injustice and wrestling as the best way of understanding things offered by Roland Barthes can be applied to the plot lines of the movie V for Vendetta. The episodes from this film demonstrate that the purely moral concept of social justice cannot be applied to situations in which human life is at stake.
Reference
Barthes, R. (1984) Mythologies, translated by A. Lavers, New York, Hill, and Wang.