Hrrm...
I am mixed on Watchmen the movie. It was good, and I wonder if I would have liked it if it wasn't based on the comic book. I don't think it would have been confusing, because I think Zach Snyder spent too much time filling in blanks. There wasn't much for the viewer to think about, because most things were explained in fairly short order. Too much exposition. And too much stop action - just let the thing roll....we're trained to watch fight scenes - just let 'em go.
Too much time spent on seemingly mundane details. Like how the blood got on the pin. We didn't need a stop action there. It would have been fine to show us that bit when Rorschach picked up the button on the street. Preferable, in fact, as I felt like he was hitting us in the face with it. He didn't need to stress that this was an interesting element. It was interesting, but not really THAT important.
There were a lot of good things about the movie, but there were also a lot of things I'd rather have seen done differently. I think that being so driven to follow the comic book became a detraction after a while. There wasn't much room left for originality. I also think that, while the Rorschach prison scenes were cool - they should have been cut...or cut down. And I thought it was a good contrast in the comic how Rorschach lied at first, and then was asked again later....and then told what was really going on.
Oh - and the scene where he killed the guy with the cleaver....way over the top. I thought all of the violent scenes were a bit much. Very little left to the imagination there. We could have filled in those blanks. And was it me, or were there many times with Dr. Manhattan when you couldn't get away from the fact that you were looking at a green screen?
I think it would have been better (or rather, I'd have preferred) to have had a scene where unknown persons (or even Ozymandius to... Bubastis , who knows?) were talking at the beginning of the movie about each of the characters. A kind of "In order to know how I saved the world, you must first understand how I developed the plan..." This would have saved us from the 'background' scenes of each character.
Speaking of Ozymandius, I thought he was painful. His speech patterns and pronounciations were maddening. I found it hard to believe that this guy had the plan to save the world.
I know there was a desire to give everybody what they wanted, but after about 2 hours, I was kinda like..."ok, let's wrap this up..." The fight scenes were well done, but too long. The one in the alley was overlong, but not as bad as the prison one.
Hmmm...still mixed. I guess I'm going to have to mull it over some more...I may update with more thoughts in the near future.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Monday, March 9, 2009
Sluggo's Watchmen Review
Well the most anticipated comic book movie of all time came out this weekend and I decided that I should post my opinion.
I’m really conflicted about it. To start with, it is a very good movie. They are faithful to all of the important aspects of the plot and the imagery is total spot on. From a Sluggo point of view, the fight scenes in this movie are the best comic fights ever filmed. There is nothing about the movie that a casual viewer (one who is predisposed to like comic movies) will find off-putting. The performances of the bulk of the cast were near perfect, especially in the case of Nite Owl and Silk Spectre. Those are two of the more nuanced characterizations in the comic, in my opinion, when compared with more one note characters like Rorschach or Dr. M. Their chemistry is like the comic book story come to life. I especially found Nite Owl's transformation from dud to stud, to be handled believably, and I liked him a lot more than I did when I read the issues originally.
But this is comic books, so there must be some fanboy nitpicking. There is one characterization where the director (or actor, thoughI think it was probably the director) totally missed the mark, so much so as to make it hard to watch the character on the screen at times. This is where I should say something about SPOILERS.
Ozymandias in the comic book is the shining star of the Watchmen world; a GOLDEN mishmash of Batman and Captain America. He is so universally loved that he has his own line of action figures, which the movie makes sure to point out. But in the end, the movie totally fails to make this a believable persona. To begin with the character is lit in shadows in almost every key sequence in the movie; he is dressed not in a golden costume but some kind of washed out tan. Part of his costume was pink in the comic for god's sake.
And I realize that most of the audience knows the outcome, but is that any reason to telegraph his role as the villian, in HIS FIRST APPEARANCE on screen. He is visited by Dan and delivers a despondent discussion of the problems with the world. And the delivery of the actor is borderline comatose. In the final sequence, he does kick some serious ass, but still seems like he is on qualudes as he is doing it. And I personally couldn't wait for his signature line about not being a 1940s supervillan, but when it came he totally whiffed.
Whew, glad I got all of that off my chest.
Doctor Manhattan is a little off as well, in my opinion, by being too human of all things. When I read the book, I always felt he was more remote than is represented here. It worked OK in the movie, just didn't match up to my impression.
It's a lot more gory than it needs to be, but I guess this is the director's hangup (see 300). Still the action is really incredible.
In the end, I came away thinking it was very good, but I can’t help but compare it to the feelings I had walking out of Iron Man. I personally feel that Iron Man is the best comic book movie to date and I remember walking out of the movie knowing that. Of course, the material of Watchmen itself doesn’t lend itself to that kind of jumping up and down cheering; it’s similar to walking out of the Dark Knight. I told a friend after I left DK that it was so much I needed time to think about it. I eventually decided that DK was a great movie, but I personally prefer Iron Man. I think I’ll ultimately come to appreciate Watchmen like DK, but I can’t say that walking out of it, I unequivocally loved it.
Sluggo
I’m really conflicted about it. To start with, it is a very good movie. They are faithful to all of the important aspects of the plot and the imagery is total spot on. From a Sluggo point of view, the fight scenes in this movie are the best comic fights ever filmed. There is nothing about the movie that a casual viewer (one who is predisposed to like comic movies) will find off-putting. The performances of the bulk of the cast were near perfect, especially in the case of Nite Owl and Silk Spectre. Those are two of the more nuanced characterizations in the comic, in my opinion, when compared with more one note characters like Rorschach or Dr. M. Their chemistry is like the comic book story come to life. I especially found Nite Owl's transformation from dud to stud, to be handled believably, and I liked him a lot more than I did when I read the issues originally.
But this is comic books, so there must be some fanboy nitpicking. There is one characterization where the director (or actor, thoughI think it was probably the director) totally missed the mark, so much so as to make it hard to watch the character on the screen at times. This is where I should say something about SPOILERS.
Ozymandias in the comic book is the shining star of the Watchmen world; a GOLDEN mishmash of Batman and Captain America. He is so universally loved that he has his own line of action figures, which the movie makes sure to point out. But in the end, the movie totally fails to make this a believable persona. To begin with the character is lit in shadows in almost every key sequence in the movie; he is dressed not in a golden costume but some kind of washed out tan. Part of his costume was pink in the comic for god's sake.
And I realize that most of the audience knows the outcome, but is that any reason to telegraph his role as the villian, in HIS FIRST APPEARANCE on screen. He is visited by Dan and delivers a despondent discussion of the problems with the world. And the delivery of the actor is borderline comatose. In the final sequence, he does kick some serious ass, but still seems like he is on qualudes as he is doing it. And I personally couldn't wait for his signature line about not being a 1940s supervillan, but when it came he totally whiffed.
Whew, glad I got all of that off my chest.
Doctor Manhattan is a little off as well, in my opinion, by being too human of all things. When I read the book, I always felt he was more remote than is represented here. It worked OK in the movie, just didn't match up to my impression.
It's a lot more gory than it needs to be, but I guess this is the director's hangup (see 300). Still the action is really incredible.
In the end, I came away thinking it was very good, but I can’t help but compare it to the feelings I had walking out of Iron Man. I personally feel that Iron Man is the best comic book movie to date and I remember walking out of the movie knowing that. Of course, the material of Watchmen itself doesn’t lend itself to that kind of jumping up and down cheering; it’s similar to walking out of the Dark Knight. I told a friend after I left DK that it was so much I needed time to think about it. I eventually decided that DK was a great movie, but I personally prefer Iron Man. I think I’ll ultimately come to appreciate Watchmen like DK, but I can’t say that walking out of it, I unequivocally loved it.
Sluggo
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