So here I am, sitting at my desk some four days after having seen WATCHMEN. It has literally taken me this long to calm myself down, to clear my head and get into the right mindset to write about my feelings on the movie. This probably won't be a review as such as I'm not even sure if a review is particularly necessary at this point given that every movie blog and half-assed film outlet has given their two cents already, including perfectly fine reviews by Obsessed With Film's own
Mike Edwards and
Ray DeRousse. And all you guys have
let us know what you thought of the film already. But I almost feel like I need to give WATCHMEN a sense of closure by writing up my two cents. It's been an awfully long journey watching this project develop over the past two decades, as new creative teams became attached, were convinced they were able to make a WATCHMEN movie the way they wanted it, only for studio interference and a sudden lack of balls, to foil them. One of the saddest days I remember as a comic book fan following the Hollywood industry is the week the Paul Greengrass production of WATCHMEN shut down. I remember so well, just before then,
AICN's own Moriarty's set report which made me believe what Greengrass could have made was going to be mind blowing. I contend that Greengrass would have made a superb movie with WATCHMEN but he would never have made WATCHMEN, the way Zack Snyder has made it. Your points of view on the movie currently playing in our multiplexes will dictate how good or bad that statement is.
I have spoken many times at length about the potential pitfalls such a movie needed to avoid and the huge triumphs the film
could have if made the right way, as skeptical as I was that we would ever see it. Even though I'm probably the last person in the world to write a review, the least I can do is let you all know how I feel about it now I've actually seen a movie called WATCHMEN with my own eyes. If I had tried reviewing this movie on Friday night immediately after seeing the film, all I would have been able to say was "I'M FINALLY SEEN WATCHMEN, I'M FINALLY SEEN WATCHMEN, FUCK YEAH WATCHMEN BITCHES". Because that's exatly how I felt when I was watching it. I knew every beat that was coming next and it was hard to be at all subjective about the film when it was matching my memory of what was in the graphic novel so closely. So what did I think of it then?
For the most part I'm delighted with the movie. I really am. Honestly, I never thought that we would ever get a WATCHMEN movie this good. So many Alan Moore adaptations were mis-handled by those who should never have been anywhere near the material, I thought it was always doomed to fail once Rorschach and co. actually made it fully formed onto the big screen. What Zack Snyder created here, surprisingly isn't a failure. I am ecstatic to have paid my money to see a movie titled WATCHMEN, for it to look unbelievably faithful to Dave Gibbons' genius, for it to carry the major themes of Alan Moore perfectly, for it to be a movie with performances that truly inhabit and for the most part, improve on the visions of these characters that have been lodged into my head for so long. For it not to be comical, for it not to have many glaring omissions from the graphic novel and for it to be a completely different superhero experience to the rest of what is out there.
For it not to be compromised. WATCHMEN shouldn't feel like the average comic book movie and thankfully it didn't. Quite honestly, I can't believe that in an industry of mediocrity and studio's aiming for the lowest common denominator with their superhero flicks, for movies like WATCHMEN and THE DARK KNIGHT to even exist among the crowd, is a not-so minor a miracle. Both Zack Snyder and Christopher Nolan have given the movie industry something to think about and it's exciting to think where the second decade of superhero movies might take us. X-MEN was the new beginning of comic book films ten years ago, the next step to look forward to is awesomely stimulating wouldn't you say?
Honestly, I don't think you can truly under-estimate the supreme task that faced screenwriters David Hayter and Alex Tse in adapting the 12 chapter magnum opus of Alan Moore, especially living in a world where their peers failed to make good movies out of the more commercial minded properties of V FOR VENDETTA, THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN and FROM HELL. But they cracked it here. WATCHMEN works cohesively in a satisfying 2 hour and 40 minute film, where you honestly feel like you are watching more than just a movie. All those reviewers who mentioned the "Watchmen experience", I didn't quite understand what they were talking about until I saw this film. There's a density to WATCHMEN that is unparalleled in the comic book film genre and it's to it's credit that it almost requires multiple viewings. Not because you will be left out or confused because they have done a great job making this story accessible but because of the sheer depth of history that we are shown of these characters, their complex moral choices at every given moment and their relationships towards each other.
I loved the interweaving of historical fact and the fiction for this alternative 1985 universe. Snyder without a doubt made the right choice in setting the movie in this era. This is a tale born out of 80's paranoia, a particularly scary time for the Western world and although the film looks back at the Cold War more with nostalgia than a kind of relevant or striking fear, it just wouldn't feel right been set in today's world. It's more timeless this way, it's more symbolic and a meta textual film that will still be rewarding on the 5th viewing. That Dr. Manhatten was the one who photographed man's landing on the moon was a stroke of genius. It utterly made mockery of the human face and showing just how superior he is to the mere mortals that surround him. I also loved the remake of the JFK tragedy and how powerful that was set to Bob Dylan's music and I didn't mind the inclusion of The Comedian for that sequence. It fit the story and again, Zack Snyder made choices that moved away from the graphic novel, often expanding or going in a completely different direction to what was written on the page. Sure, it's a faithful adaptation but what is so rich and exciting about this work, is that it was often difficult to work out what was from the page and what he made up. That is a huge compliment to Snyder and I'm positive I won't be the only person who has read the graphic novel multiple times to pick up on that.
I enjoyed the opening scene, even if it was a little jarring to have such a brutal fight and eventual murder of Eddie Blake/The Comedian to open the film, though it was a good choice to score it with Nat King Cole's
Unforgettable, which kind of made that scene, the thrust of the story, unforgettable in it's own way. Jeffrey Dean Morgan, an actor I was scratching my head as to whether I had ever seen in a act before, has more charisma than anyone else in the movie and steals just about every scene he is in. He is gonna be a big movie star. I found his character so despicable, so beyond anything remotely likeable, a hideous creation but altogether fascinating and I missed him when he wasn't on screen. What a performance... memorable, iconic and chilling. A smile that sends shivers down your spine. To know he is enjoying what he is doing because society is such a joke and no-one will stop him... well it wasn't so far removed from a certain clown prince of crime last year. If Brad Pitt was deserving of a Best Actor nomination for THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON then what about the work of the great Billy Crudrup here. His voice wasn't quite what I was expecting for Dr. Manhatten, it was warmer than I thought it would be but still very much in the realm of something not of this world. The voice was other worldly and then the flashback solitary few moments of him in human form, gave a great tragedy to that character that worked much like Andy Serkis' live action scenes in THE LORD OF THE RINGS. His Dr. Manhatten, a character made completely by CGI was a revelation.
Patrick Wilson is almost unrecognisable as Dan Drieberg/Nite Owl II, a difficult character to play. I forever thought Jeff Goldblum was the perfect Dan Drieberg and maybe in another life he would have been but Wilson undergoes a wonderful transformation of himself here. If you have seen LITTLE CHILDREN, you have already witnessed how much of a manly man man he can be, but here he makes himself necessarily geeky, needy and just a pathetic loser. But we have empathy with him because we know
he knows he is a loser. He is uncharismatic Bruce Wayne but with his loss being the fact he can't be a superhero anymore and he doesn't really know how to function in society without the costume, his only vices being the odd trip to see his old friend Hollis Mason (the all too brief Stephen McHattie) or to stay a recluse in his basement. He is very much like the first act of Mr. Incredible from Pixar's movie THE INCREDIBLES and it works to great effect. Though more of a gut would have been good... but it's obvious Wilson put on a few pounds for the role. His impotence was suggested well, though I can't help but feel it would have been better if he had sex with Laurie in their uniforms. The suggestion being they have no characters outside of their missions and that Nite Owl can't get it up unless he is disguised and sees leather latex.
Now Matthew Goode (Ozymandias/Adrien Veidt) I had seen a bit of in previous movies, his stand-out being his small turn in MATCH POINT but I would have sworn he wasn't the shame person and quite unbelievably myself and the person I saw the movie with both thought he was imitating the same famous villian actor. I shit you not, but I think Matthew Goode was imitating a early to mid 90's Jeremy Irons. Watch DEAD RINGERS... watch DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE, it's uncanny. Not just the voice, the manerisms, the way he walks. It's everything. A good performance and I would have appreciated a little more screentime to get to know his character. And towards the end, they never really gave him the pay-off he needs. He plays Veidt about as best he could given the amount of screentime he had. I just always wanted more... not just from him as actor but from the writers and what they did with the character. Where was the Alexander The Great obsession, where was the convincing dialogue that the last ten minutes was craving for to end this film on an amazing high?
Jackie Earle Haley gives a performance that will forever change the way we read and precieve Rorschach. It's just one of those performances where the blending of an actor's persona and material match in a way that you almost never want to see them play another role again. I'm not sure I will ever be able to read Alan Moore's graphic novel without hearing Haley's voice when I'm reading the journal moments. Negatives? I didn't care much for the awful, chicken rubbery neck awful make-up of characters during their older days, especially Carla Gugino's Sally Jupiter and President Richard Nixon. Looked cheap, looked comical and really hurt their performances, they never had a chance to outlive that make-up. None of the Nixon scenes work for me. Yeah I get it... It's DR. STRANGELOVE and the war room but the scenes add nothing but comical add-ons that didn't add to the story in anyway. In fact, if anything, it took me out of the moments. Malin Akerman is pretty and perfectly looks like how I imagined Silk Spectre to look on screen but she is the weak link in a terribly good picture for acting.
Alot of reviews I've been reading mention the "so what?" factor of the film once it has finished, that nothing feels settled, there's no conclusion for the characters and very little humanity for anyone to feel anything but negative when they are walking out of the theatre. Although I can see where they are coming from, I truly think that Zack Snyder's directorial cut will answer a few of these queries and that blame shouldn't rest firmly on his shoulders. Especially the one glaring admission of the infamous Squid, or at least something that resembled a Squid. It's a shame that we weren't shown more accurately what had happened with Veidt's deadly weapon and the mass destruction caused by the Manhatten esque phenomena. I would be absolutely shocked if Snyder hadn't fought relentlessly to keep footage he had shot of that, my evidence for that being the that prior to that he hadn't pulled back from anything else, including the rape scene and The Comedian shooting a pregnant Vietnamese women baring his own child in cold blood. Was it budgetary reasoning, was it cut by Warner Bros. over time? I don't know... I'm hoping it was over a time and then the massive judgement of error is slightly easier to take. But if it wasn't over time, then Warner Bros. have made a mistake right there in giving this movie that massive final push in the third act that it truly deserved. There were other things too that I didn't like about the last twenty minutes that I know are just gonna bug the hell out of me come the second and third viewing and just how quickly they moved through the final act as if there was no tomorrow but it worked better on screen that it did when I read a draft of the script which was left pretty much in tact for that final chapter.
I'm also hopeful that the director's cut will flesh out hints to other things we are shown in the movie. I'm desperate to see more of the news vendor, of Rorschach's psychiatrist's home life as depicted in the book and all the loose ends that you know footage was shot for but was easily cut come the final round of editing. And of course I can't wait to see the Black Freighter story. And there's something else I wanna touch on here. A few weeks ago I paid exactly the same amount of money to see FRIDAY THE 13th which generally got rave reviews from online fanboys for what was a mindless garbage piece of slasher entertainment. Now I see some of those same same writers, dissing Zack Snyder's film. Can you guys honestly tell me with a straight face that you came out of that screening with less to think about, being less impressed and feeling like you got less than your moneys worth compared to a Jason Voorhees movie? Of course with a property like WATCHMEN comes bigger expectations but it's the last time I ever want to hear anyone mention that the movie was ridiculous, because it's not. You are perfectly entitled not to like it but at the end of the day, WATCHMEN had more ideas than 3/4's of what you will pay to see in the cinema this year, not bad for a movie aimed at a big audience. The moral questions movies like WATCHMEN and THE DARK KNIGHT ask compared to the likes of THE INCREDIBLE HULK and FANTASTIC FOUR, are just mind-blowing, really. Shows ya how far we have come. When you see X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE in a few weeks... then you tell me that Zack Snyder doesn't deserve great credit here for making a movie like this.
I am just delighted this movie exists and that a movie like this
can exist, gives me great hope for the future of comic book movies.