why i watched watchmen
Because it was free.
The good news is, it's not cut as badly as I heard/expected. They kept in the blue penis and Malin's breasts. There are three scenes with cuts, only one of which is really jarring because the song playing underneath keeps skipping. Supposedly we are the Asian country with the least cuts. Does this mean the MTRCB is no longer afraid of penis? Or do they make an exception when it's glowing bright blue and circumcised?
The bad news is, it's not worth the price of the ticket. If I was a paying customer, that is. It's much too long and boring in several places. The direction is the biggest problem, followed by the script. It's too faithful. You need to adapt when going to a different medium, not transliterate. That means knowing what to cut out of the story. Delivering information more economically, but in clever ways. The director's treatment was akin to that of a blunt instrument: brutal, no subtlety, no nuance, no grace. Every "theme" hammered to beyond obviousness. The music cues are so standard, though one or two songs are welcome. It's a shame because I actually lowered my expectations for this one; I wanted to enjoy myself, but still came out disappointed. He needs to get over the slow-motion kick fast. It's helpful and nice sometimes but too much is too much. Not everything needs to be seen in such detail and you lose the immediacy and urgency, the breathlessness of a possibly-fatal fistfight when you use such a glaring tool. I wasn't happy with the stylization; every location looked like a set, or CG, so it's bad effects. Plus, why be faithful with so much but not with certain details? Like, none of them has powers except Manhattan. But everyone's punching through walls, going through floors without a scratch or broken bone or even a sprain. And these are "heroes" who've been out of the game at least a decade. So there's a bit of cartoon quality to the violence, especially with fake CG blood splatter everywhere. But then he'll go way overboard with the gore: entrails, cleaved heads, exposed bone. Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are made into stone killers. Why change the ending? The alien squid isn't arbitrary; it was a nod to sentiments then-president Reagan shared with others. I can understand, I suppose, why: because the public can't be trusted to understand. They're too stupid to get what was originally published in a comic book, a medium once derided, but now must be reduced and dumbed down to bite-sized morsels for a general audience, who Hollywood assume to be morons.
Snyder was good at saying all the right things: he wants to be faithful, keep it R-rated, etc. At the end of the day, if it's a movie-length commercial for the book, he said, he'll be happy. He took the job because he knew if he didn't, someone else would, and they might screw it up. Sounds like someone who loves the material.
But they were also the sentiments of Frank Miller about agreeing to direct The Spirit, another glorious misstep.
At least Miller tried to do something new and different. Snyder's Watchmen feels like the cover version of a classic song by a not-so-good band. Where's the imagination? Is it limited to amping up the violence and sex, the slow-motion and the rampant effects? Hard cuts and aggressive sound design? There are some glimpses, like the opening credits, especially Silhouette. The scenes in prison were effective. Jackie Earle Haley turned in the best performance of the lot as Rorschach. Malin was ugh, Wilson wasn't pathetic enough, Goode was just miscast. Morgan was alright. Crudup got better but oftentimes it felt like he was performing and not being the character if that makes sense.
I'm left overall with the feeling that the film is the cinematic equivalent of the grim and gritty comics that followed in the wake of Watchmen the comic: the ones that took the wrong lessons, and saw it as a license to have more brutal, gruesome depictions of violence and actually show the nudity they've always wanted. Compare the tasteful depictions in the book and see how the treatment is different.
The V For Vendetta film actually got me angry. Not only was it poorly executed, it missed the spirit of the book by a wide margin. With Watchmen, I thought it had the spirit of the book in mind, but couldn't bring it to life properly, not in a way that was classy or with any finesse. Instead of angry, I was left bored, and a little sad.
Mostly, relief that I didn't pay to see this thing.
--
I'm casually watching the critical response. It's at 60-something on the Tomatometer but if you check amongst the Top Critics it's closer to 20-something. Ebert loved it, though. But Ebert's Ebert. He loathed Fight Club (which I worship) and loved The Fall (which I liked a lot). You never can tell. I'm sure it'll do a good opening weekend but it's the second weekend I'm interested in. I'm sure someone liked it at the screening earlier but out of the 10 people I was with not one did.
--
Wow this went longer than I thought. I'm biased, of course, but no one wishes for a bad film. I do hope it means millions more people end up reading the book. It's just a shame that Holy Fuck! shock of an ending won't be as strong if they saw the movie first.
The good news is, it's not cut as badly as I heard/expected. They kept in the blue penis and Malin's breasts. There are three scenes with cuts, only one of which is really jarring because the song playing underneath keeps skipping. Supposedly we are the Asian country with the least cuts. Does this mean the MTRCB is no longer afraid of penis? Or do they make an exception when it's glowing bright blue and circumcised?
The bad news is, it's not worth the price of the ticket. If I was a paying customer, that is. It's much too long and boring in several places. The direction is the biggest problem, followed by the script. It's too faithful. You need to adapt when going to a different medium, not transliterate. That means knowing what to cut out of the story. Delivering information more economically, but in clever ways. The director's treatment was akin to that of a blunt instrument: brutal, no subtlety, no nuance, no grace. Every "theme" hammered to beyond obviousness. The music cues are so standard, though one or two songs are welcome. It's a shame because I actually lowered my expectations for this one; I wanted to enjoy myself, but still came out disappointed. He needs to get over the slow-motion kick fast. It's helpful and nice sometimes but too much is too much. Not everything needs to be seen in such detail and you lose the immediacy and urgency, the breathlessness of a possibly-fatal fistfight when you use such a glaring tool. I wasn't happy with the stylization; every location looked like a set, or CG, so it's bad effects. Plus, why be faithful with so much but not with certain details? Like, none of them has powers except Manhattan. But everyone's punching through walls, going through floors without a scratch or broken bone or even a sprain. And these are "heroes" who've been out of the game at least a decade. So there's a bit of cartoon quality to the violence, especially with fake CG blood splatter everywhere. But then he'll go way overboard with the gore: entrails, cleaved heads, exposed bone. Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are made into stone killers. Why change the ending? The alien squid isn't arbitrary; it was a nod to sentiments then-president Reagan shared with others. I can understand, I suppose, why: because the public can't be trusted to understand. They're too stupid to get what was originally published in a comic book, a medium once derided, but now must be reduced and dumbed down to bite-sized morsels for a general audience, who Hollywood assume to be morons.
Snyder was good at saying all the right things: he wants to be faithful, keep it R-rated, etc. At the end of the day, if it's a movie-length commercial for the book, he said, he'll be happy. He took the job because he knew if he didn't, someone else would, and they might screw it up. Sounds like someone who loves the material.
But they were also the sentiments of Frank Miller about agreeing to direct The Spirit, another glorious misstep.
At least Miller tried to do something new and different. Snyder's Watchmen feels like the cover version of a classic song by a not-so-good band. Where's the imagination? Is it limited to amping up the violence and sex, the slow-motion and the rampant effects? Hard cuts and aggressive sound design? There are some glimpses, like the opening credits, especially Silhouette. The scenes in prison were effective. Jackie Earle Haley turned in the best performance of the lot as Rorschach. Malin was ugh, Wilson wasn't pathetic enough, Goode was just miscast. Morgan was alright. Crudup got better but oftentimes it felt like he was performing and not being the character if that makes sense.
I'm left overall with the feeling that the film is the cinematic equivalent of the grim and gritty comics that followed in the wake of Watchmen the comic: the ones that took the wrong lessons, and saw it as a license to have more brutal, gruesome depictions of violence and actually show the nudity they've always wanted. Compare the tasteful depictions in the book and see how the treatment is different.
The V For Vendetta film actually got me angry. Not only was it poorly executed, it missed the spirit of the book by a wide margin. With Watchmen, I thought it had the spirit of the book in mind, but couldn't bring it to life properly, not in a way that was classy or with any finesse. Instead of angry, I was left bored, and a little sad.
Mostly, relief that I didn't pay to see this thing.
--
I'm casually watching the critical response. It's at 60-something on the Tomatometer but if you check amongst the Top Critics it's closer to 20-something. Ebert loved it, though. But Ebert's Ebert. He loathed Fight Club (which I worship) and loved The Fall (which I liked a lot). You never can tell. I'm sure it'll do a good opening weekend but it's the second weekend I'm interested in. I'm sure someone liked it at the screening earlier but out of the 10 people I was with not one did.
--
Wow this went longer than I thought. I'm biased, of course, but no one wishes for a bad film. I do hope it means millions more people end up reading the book. It's just a shame that Holy Fuck! shock of an ending won't be as strong if they saw the movie first.