Watching Watchmen
I first read Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ graphic novel Watchmen when I was working at Cooperstown Baseball Cards and Comics between my Junior and Senior years of high school. That was 1989, which means I’ve been a fan of Watchmen for almost 20 years. During that time, I’ve periodically reread the graphic novel and always found some new nuance or insight to the story. Watchmen is an amazing, complex, highly detailed, novelistic and densely multi-layered work and I will admit I had serious doubts that it could be successfully adapted to the screen. After all, isn’t Watchmen first and foremost a comic book about comic books?
Maybe so, but it’s also a dark, witty mystery, a suspenseful political thriller, and a grim drama about a group of fascinating and frustrating characters and these elements came through strongly in the movie which turned out to be pretty awesome. The narrative was compelling, the performances convincing, the music perfect and the graphics absolutely amazing. Further, as a fan of the comic book I appreciated how film managed to be faithful to the original- exactly reproducing whole scenes from the graphic novel- while successfully streamlining the complex (and sometimes convoluted) storyline.
The film does well a striking a balance between being faithful to its source material and independent from it. Many of the comic books iconic images and memorable lines remain intact and there are many little details that can be appreciated by old school Watchman fans like me but you don’t have to have read Watchmen to follow the film. It’s not an homage- it’s rich and comprehensive in its own right and uses the cinematic medium to add a new dimension to the Watchmen mythos.
For example over the opening credits a montage set to Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A Changing” sketched the rise and fall of the original Minutemen in 40’s and the emergence of the new generation of crime fighters. I thought that this was an extremely effective sequence, laying out the back story while at the same time illustrating the differences and similarities between our world and the Watchmen world by showing skewed versions of familiar images. For instance we recognize the Kennedy assassination then the camera pulls back to show that the Comedian is gunman. A hippy maiden places a flower in a soldier’s gun but in the brutal alternate reality of Watchmen the gun is fired. The most effective of these set pieces was a recreation of the famous photo taken in Times Square on V-J Day where a sailor kisses a nurse. Only here, instead of a sailor it is the Silhouette kissing the woman. I actually got goose bumps when I saw that, the same way I get goose bumps when I see people dressed as Wonder Woman or Captain America at gay pride. Even though she’s in the movie for about two minutes (both she and the nurse are killed off a few images later in accordance with the graphic novel) I came away from Watchmen with a major crush on the Silhouette.
Music is used effectively throughout the film and the cast also brings a great deal to it. I get the impression that somewhere along the line a conscious decision was made to make the movie using actors rather than stars. Most of those involved are known for independent film or supporting roles. This works to the films advantage as it allows the performers to become the characters rather than the characters being altered to accommodate the existing persona of a miscast celebrity. Jackie Earle Haley, who is little know despite a career that stretches back to the early 70’s,really stands out as Rorschach. Uncompromising and antisocial as I am, I’ve always identified very strongly with Rorschach (when I was a teenager I planned to get a tattoo of his inkblot calling card) and I felt like Haley was spot-on in his portrayal capturing both the loneliness and the hardcore psychosis of the character.
Patrick Wilson as Dan Dreiberg (Nite Owl II) was a casting choice that caused me some concern. While I know Wilson (Hard Candy, Little Children) is a fine actor he did strike me as too young and buff to play Dan who is something of a middle-aged sad sack. He was however completely convincing and looked the part, probably making him the only actor ever to gain weight, get out of shape and feign impotence to play a superhero. Based on this and his performance in Hard Candy (where a teenage girl nearly castrates him) I’m actually very impressed by Wilson’s willingness to be emasculated on screen. I respect that in a man.
The entire cast-- Haley as Walter Kovacs/Rorschach, Wilson as Dan/Nite Owl II, the always extraordinary Billy Crudup as the increasingly out of touch superman Dr. Manhattan, Jeffery Dean Morgan as Edward Blake/The Comedian and Malin Akerman as Laurie/Silk Spectre II-embody the characters of the Watchmen comic book with various levels of finesse. However it is Matthew Goode as Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias who really brings his character to another level.
In the comic book Veidt is quite frankly a megalomaniac Ken doll. Goode brings a kind of edgy nervousness and vulnerability to him not to mention a foppish sexual ambiguity (or maybe that’s just comes with the purple suit). The scenes with Veidt at the movies end really got under my skin. Whereas in the comic book, there’s that famous image of Ozymandias triumphant before the wall of screens in the film there’s a sequence where after Rorschach’s death Nite Owl attacks Veidt who does not fight back. It lends credence to what he’s said about having forced himself to feel every death he has caused. Then at the very end of the scene he is left alone, holding his wounded hand where Laurie has shot him. Despite the fact that he had just vaporized 15 million people, it was sad. I found myself wishing Dr. Manhattan had stuck around so they could be superior and abstract together.
The ending of the Watchmen movie is different than the one in the comic book. It’s been reworked in such a way that the entire Black Freighter story-within-a-story (which was responsible for instilling me with a terror of pirate stories in pop culture that abides to this day) is no longer necessary. I didn’t really miss it though; there was enough else going on and really, I think the new ending works better. In the original ending, Ozymandias united the world by teleporting an evil psychic squid thing into Madison Square Garden. In the new ending, he destroys several major cities using a replication of Dr. Manhattan’s powers. This leads the world to believe that Dr. Manhattan has punished them for bringing the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation and creates an environment where in the future the possibility of further punishment will keep mankind in check.
In a way, this ending Dr. Manhattan is forced into the role of a kind of an angry God. Atrocities are committed in his name and believing he is watching people will behave morally not knowing that he does not care, that he does not watch and that he has gone away. It’s really rather profound.
I enjoyed Watchmen greatly, but I’m not 100% in love with it. I didn’t care for the action sequences, which some would argue were the whole point of the film. I felt like they were too highly stylized. Characters like Laurie, Dan and Rorschach are not superhuman yet when they fought it was as if the laws of physics did not apply. They were leaping around and tossing bad guys like gravity didn’t exist. And yet for all the unrealistic cartoonishness of the violence things were often unnecessarily brutal, lots of gore and crunching bones. It just seemed ugly and unnecessary. Probably the worst instance of this was the Kennedy assassination scene which showed his wife reaching for the contents of his head that had been splattered over the back of the car. That actually really freaked me out because for a moment I could imagine Michelle Obama doing something like that. It was just really too much and I don’t say that often.
And of course because the film was faithful to the graphic novel it left unanswered a question I’ve been asking for nearly 20 years that I’ve never found a satisfactory explanation for in all my readings and re-readings of Watchmen- why, after what he did to her did Sally Jupiter get involved with the Comedian? Sally is a tough broad and I honestly can’t imagine her letting him within 100 yards of her after that, much less sleeping with him. People dressing up in costumes and fighting crime, naked blue men, giant evil psychic squids, I can accept all of that but Silk Spectre and the Comedian getting together just doesn’t seem plausible.
These problems aside I was really pleased with the movie. I never expected to like it was much as I did.
The Silhouette on VJ-Day. Screencap made by goldblend.
Maybe so, but it’s also a dark, witty mystery, a suspenseful political thriller, and a grim drama about a group of fascinating and frustrating characters and these elements came through strongly in the movie which turned out to be pretty awesome. The narrative was compelling, the performances convincing, the music perfect and the graphics absolutely amazing. Further, as a fan of the comic book I appreciated how film managed to be faithful to the original- exactly reproducing whole scenes from the graphic novel- while successfully streamlining the complex (and sometimes convoluted) storyline.
The film does well a striking a balance between being faithful to its source material and independent from it. Many of the comic books iconic images and memorable lines remain intact and there are many little details that can be appreciated by old school Watchman fans like me but you don’t have to have read Watchmen to follow the film. It’s not an homage- it’s rich and comprehensive in its own right and uses the cinematic medium to add a new dimension to the Watchmen mythos.
For example over the opening credits a montage set to Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A Changing” sketched the rise and fall of the original Minutemen in 40’s and the emergence of the new generation of crime fighters. I thought that this was an extremely effective sequence, laying out the back story while at the same time illustrating the differences and similarities between our world and the Watchmen world by showing skewed versions of familiar images. For instance we recognize the Kennedy assassination then the camera pulls back to show that the Comedian is gunman. A hippy maiden places a flower in a soldier’s gun but in the brutal alternate reality of Watchmen the gun is fired. The most effective of these set pieces was a recreation of the famous photo taken in Times Square on V-J Day where a sailor kisses a nurse. Only here, instead of a sailor it is the Silhouette kissing the woman. I actually got goose bumps when I saw that, the same way I get goose bumps when I see people dressed as Wonder Woman or Captain America at gay pride. Even though she’s in the movie for about two minutes (both she and the nurse are killed off a few images later in accordance with the graphic novel) I came away from Watchmen with a major crush on the Silhouette.
Music is used effectively throughout the film and the cast also brings a great deal to it. I get the impression that somewhere along the line a conscious decision was made to make the movie using actors rather than stars. Most of those involved are known for independent film or supporting roles. This works to the films advantage as it allows the performers to become the characters rather than the characters being altered to accommodate the existing persona of a miscast celebrity. Jackie Earle Haley, who is little know despite a career that stretches back to the early 70’s,really stands out as Rorschach. Uncompromising and antisocial as I am, I’ve always identified very strongly with Rorschach (when I was a teenager I planned to get a tattoo of his inkblot calling card) and I felt like Haley was spot-on in his portrayal capturing both the loneliness and the hardcore psychosis of the character.
Patrick Wilson as Dan Dreiberg (Nite Owl II) was a casting choice that caused me some concern. While I know Wilson (Hard Candy, Little Children) is a fine actor he did strike me as too young and buff to play Dan who is something of a middle-aged sad sack. He was however completely convincing and looked the part, probably making him the only actor ever to gain weight, get out of shape and feign impotence to play a superhero. Based on this and his performance in Hard Candy (where a teenage girl nearly castrates him) I’m actually very impressed by Wilson’s willingness to be emasculated on screen. I respect that in a man.
The entire cast-- Haley as Walter Kovacs/Rorschach, Wilson as Dan/Nite Owl II, the always extraordinary Billy Crudup as the increasingly out of touch superman Dr. Manhattan, Jeffery Dean Morgan as Edward Blake/The Comedian and Malin Akerman as Laurie/Silk Spectre II-embody the characters of the Watchmen comic book with various levels of finesse. However it is Matthew Goode as Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias who really brings his character to another level.
In the comic book Veidt is quite frankly a megalomaniac Ken doll. Goode brings a kind of edgy nervousness and vulnerability to him not to mention a foppish sexual ambiguity (or maybe that’s just comes with the purple suit). The scenes with Veidt at the movies end really got under my skin. Whereas in the comic book, there’s that famous image of Ozymandias triumphant before the wall of screens in the film there’s a sequence where after Rorschach’s death Nite Owl attacks Veidt who does not fight back. It lends credence to what he’s said about having forced himself to feel every death he has caused. Then at the very end of the scene he is left alone, holding his wounded hand where Laurie has shot him. Despite the fact that he had just vaporized 15 million people, it was sad. I found myself wishing Dr. Manhattan had stuck around so they could be superior and abstract together.
The ending of the Watchmen movie is different than the one in the comic book. It’s been reworked in such a way that the entire Black Freighter story-within-a-story (which was responsible for instilling me with a terror of pirate stories in pop culture that abides to this day) is no longer necessary. I didn’t really miss it though; there was enough else going on and really, I think the new ending works better. In the original ending, Ozymandias united the world by teleporting an evil psychic squid thing into Madison Square Garden. In the new ending, he destroys several major cities using a replication of Dr. Manhattan’s powers. This leads the world to believe that Dr. Manhattan has punished them for bringing the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation and creates an environment where in the future the possibility of further punishment will keep mankind in check.
In a way, this ending Dr. Manhattan is forced into the role of a kind of an angry God. Atrocities are committed in his name and believing he is watching people will behave morally not knowing that he does not care, that he does not watch and that he has gone away. It’s really rather profound.
I enjoyed Watchmen greatly, but I’m not 100% in love with it. I didn’t care for the action sequences, which some would argue were the whole point of the film. I felt like they were too highly stylized. Characters like Laurie, Dan and Rorschach are not superhuman yet when they fought it was as if the laws of physics did not apply. They were leaping around and tossing bad guys like gravity didn’t exist. And yet for all the unrealistic cartoonishness of the violence things were often unnecessarily brutal, lots of gore and crunching bones. It just seemed ugly and unnecessary. Probably the worst instance of this was the Kennedy assassination scene which showed his wife reaching for the contents of his head that had been splattered over the back of the car. That actually really freaked me out because for a moment I could imagine Michelle Obama doing something like that. It was just really too much and I don’t say that often.
And of course because the film was faithful to the graphic novel it left unanswered a question I’ve been asking for nearly 20 years that I’ve never found a satisfactory explanation for in all my readings and re-readings of Watchmen- why, after what he did to her did Sally Jupiter get involved with the Comedian? Sally is a tough broad and I honestly can’t imagine her letting him within 100 yards of her after that, much less sleeping with him. People dressing up in costumes and fighting crime, naked blue men, giant evil psychic squids, I can accept all of that but Silk Spectre and the Comedian getting together just doesn’t seem plausible.
These problems aside I was really pleased with the movie. I never expected to like it was much as I did.
The Silhouette on VJ-Day. Screencap made by goldblend.