Orwell: 2+2=5 (2025) (Blu-ray Review)
DIRECTED BY: Raoul Peck
STARRING: Damian Lewis, George Orwell, Eric Ruf
RATED: UR/Region: O/1:78/1080P/NUMBER OF DISCS 1 (BD-r)
AVAILABLE FROM Decal Releasing
If you ever watched the news, sighed deeply, and thought, “Wow, this feels extremely Orwellian,” then Orwell: 2+2=5 (2025) is here to look directly into the camera and say, “Yes. Yes it is.”
Directed by Raoul Peck, this documentary doesn’t so much explore George Orwell’s legacy as it grabs you by the collar and insists you confront it. Subtle? Not especially. Necessary? Unfortunately, yes.
Peck, who has made a career out of politically charged, intellectually rigorous documentaries, approaches Orwell less as a dusty literary icon and more as a prophet we collectively ignored while doomscrolling. The film weaves together Orwell’s life, his work — particularly 1984 — and the increasingly uncomfortable parallels to modern politics, media manipulation, and the weaponization of language. If you came for cozy book-club nostalgia, you took a very wrong turn.
The title alone, Orwell: 2+2=5, isn’t exactly whispering its intentions. It’s shouting them through a megaphone while fact-checking you in real time.
The documentary’s greatest strength is how it frames Orwell not as a one-note “Big Brother” meme machine but as a complicated, often conflicted writer who was deeply engaged with power structures, class, colonialism, and truth itself. Peck refuses to reduce him to a bumper sticker. Instead, he methodically builds the case that Orwell’s warnings weren’t just about totalitarian regimes in black boots — they were about the slow erosion of truth through language, propaganda, and institutional gaslighting.
You know. Fun stuff.
Visually, the film leans into archival footage, stark narration, and sharply edited montages that connect Orwell’s words to modern headlines with almost surgical precision. At times it feels a little too neat — like the documentary equivalent of underlining passages in red ink and circling them three times — but the urgency is hard to deny. When the connections land, they land hard.
Is it subtle? Again, no.
Does it occasionally feel like it’s lecturing you? A bit.
Is it wrong? Not really.
What makes the film compelling is its refusal to treat Orwell as merely a historical artifact. Peck presents him as disturbingly current. The documentary argues — persuasively — that “2+2=5” isn’t just a dystopian slogan; it’s a mindset that creeps in when truth becomes negotiable and language becomes elastic.
If anything, the film’s only real flaw is that it can feel relentlessly grim. There’s no sugarcoating here. No hopeful pivot to “but we learned our lesson!” Instead, it leaves you with the uncomfortable realization that Orwell’s work isn’t fading into irrelevance — it’s being quoted in real time.
Orwell: 2+2=5 is sharp, intelligent, and bracingly direct. It’s the kind of documentary that makes you want to reread 1984… and then maybe unplug your router for a few hours.
Not exactly a feel-good movie night.
But definitely a necessary one.
Extras
- None
