All's Orwell That Ends Orwell

April 4 rapidly approaches, the day that Winston Smith begins his illicit diary in Nineteen Eighty-Four. It is thus the day that indie theaters across the country have chosen for a protest-screening of the 1984 movie version of George Orwell’s dystopian tale. The movie houses are calling out, of course, the Trump administration: “Orwell’s portrait of a government that manufactures their own facts, demands total obedience, and demonizes foreign enemies, has never been timelier,” declared organizers of the showing. (In doing so, they bravely put themselves at risk—of rotator-cuff injuries, what with all the back-patting.)