If you ask me — and, by reading this, you kinda are — director Zack Synder (300) put himself in a no-win situation when he took the can’t-miss approach to making WATCHMEN. In adapting the Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons graphic novel as closely as possible, he’d please its rabid fanbase, but doing so requires a running time beyond what it should be, alienating critics.
It’s hard not to sympathize with mass audiences who don’t “get it,” not having read the novel. The story is huge — epic in scope, with roughly five main characters all vying for time — and there’s more on the screen that can be taken in with one viewing by those heretofore unfamiliar with the material. That crowd might even like it better on a second viewing, but they’re unlikely to give it another chance.
Too bad, because I enjoyed WATCHMEN, even in the parts when it lagged, of which there are several. Its core storyline of the mystery surrounding retired superhero The Comedian remains as compelling as it was in the book, but the soul searching and deep characterization that made that comic so different doesn’t always make for great cinema. Panel-by-panel purists will cry blasphemy, but several scenes could be excised and/or trimmed without harming the overall film.
There’s a lot to admire in Snyder’s version, including:
• the aforementioned Comedian homicide;
• the stylish opening credits that encompass decades’ worth of events into the span of a Bob Dylan song;
• the awfully realistic sex scene between Nite Owl (Patrick Wilson) and Silk Spectre (Malin Akerman), fucking to Leonard Cohen;
• practically anytime the enigmatic masked man Rorschach (Jackie Earl Haley, giving the film’s best performance) appears onscreen, but especially the prison sequences; and
• Dr. Manhattan’s (Billy Crudup) purposefully narrated origin, calmly but fervently scored to Philip Glass cuts from KOYAANISQATSI; and
• the nuclear destruction of New York City.
Chances are, your favorite scene from the book has made the leap — shame on you if that’s the attempted rape of the original Silk Spectre, although it allows Carla Gugino’s goods to swell the full proportions of the screen — as Snyder has bent over backwards to include just about everything. The TALES OF THE BLACK FREIGHTER comic sequence didn’t make the cut (but instead merits its own DVD release), and the ending is simplified, but generally, WATCHMEN in print equals WATCHMEN in screen.
Snyder is to be applauded, even if the end result is flawed — not deeply, mind you — for filming a work that has long been tagged unfilmable, and almost getting it dead right. There’s one thing his movie does even better than the terrific yet overpraised source material: It looks absolutely fantastic, popping with a look that makes the book’s muted colors seem flat. —Rod Lott
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I enjoyed the movie as well. I understand the switch for the ending, the end result is the same and the book’s ending would have taken another twenty minutes to explain.
For a movie that was called un filmable I think they pulled it off
The more I think about the movie’s ending, the less it works for me. That said, I praise Snyder for doing the impossible almost as well as anyone could. It’s essentially a well-made, greatest hits distillation of WATCHMEN starring real people.
I find it a success, based in large part on boiling 400+pp of dense source material to less than 3 hrs, while still retaining the bulk of story, both thematically and narratively.
I actually think the film’s ending makes more sense then the graphic novel’s, both logically and thematically. I personally was enthralled from beginning to end and couldn’t identify a single point where the film lagged. If anything my complaint is that the film wasn’t longer, but then the special edition Blu-Ray shall take care of that for me in no time.