In February, we reported that 90 theaters across the United States and Canada were planning to hold screenings of the John Hurt-starring 1984 film on April 4, the day the plot of George Orwell’s original novel and the movie adaptation begin. The screenings were designed to be casual protests of Donald Trump and the attempts of his administration to present “alternative facts” and squash freedom of speech, and with today being April 4, more theaters around the world are joining in on this haunting reminder of what can happen when the truth is ignored and abandoned by those in power.
As reported by The Independent, almost 200 theaters in the U.S., the United Kingdom, Canada, Croatia, and Sweden are holding 1984 screenings in protest of Trump. The screenings were arranged by Dylan Skolnick of the Cinema Arts Centre in New York and Adam Birnbaum of the Avon Theatre Film Centre in Connecticut, and Skolnick said in a statement that Trump’s “undermining of the concept of facts and the demonization of foreign enemies” really line up with the world presented in 1984, even if we’re not literally at that point yet.
You can find information about the screenings at this link.