Linnen Reviews "Watchmen"

I remember reading Watchmen back in the mid-80s as the individual issues hit the stands, so I have some true "comic geek" history with this story. You see, I have followed the adventures of countless heroes over the past thirty years in these four-color magazines, and with along with me, my opinions of these heroes have grown up over time.

Batman is, of course, my favorite character as anyone who knows me will attest; however, I would never single out an issue of Batman as my favorite comic. His story is like a television soap opera, extended for the purpose of making money. His war on crime can never end and as a result, his story will never be completed. It seems to me that for a book to impact a reader enough for it to become his or her "favorite", it must be a full story, one with a beginning, a middle, and an end.

To get this in comic books, you need what is commonly referred to as a "limited series" - a book that isn't intended to live beyond it's natural life. The author begins it knowing exactly how it is going to end - and then the characters ride off into the sunset. The genre of comic books has had many great ones over the years - Preacher, Sandman, V For Vendetta, Starman - yet none of these tremendous stories have been able to supplant Watchmen as my favorite.

So what did I think about the film?

I was blown away with its faithfulness to the source novel and by how fantastic everything looked on screen. No lie – often I felt like a little kid seeing a favorite character come to life! I left the theatre completely happy with what director Zack Snyder presented us.

Is Snyder a “visionary director” like the film’s numerous preview trailers would have us believe? Well, I would say “no” based on this movie.

Here’s why: I have seen sections of the original script that writer Alan Moore gave to artist Dave Gibbons when they were collaborating on the comic. It is detailed enough to give you a migraine. A single panel could take up a full, typed page as Moore explains character’s positions in relation to each other, gives descriptions of benches or rooms, tells us what someone’s unspoken thoughts are or what they are wearing…

Gibbons uses all this to create what is one of the most tasteful and intelligent examples of comic book art I have ever seen. He doesn’t fill panels with unnecessary lines or cross-hatching like many of today’s popular artists. He has a completely realistic understanding of the human form. Although the tone of the story is dark, his art is not, and yet the appropriate mood is still struck in the reader. Not just anyone could pull this off.

Snyder’s brainstorm, and the movie’s biggest strength, was his decision not to deviate from the comics. Because of his desire that his movie look as much like the comic as possible, in my opinion, we are witnessing Moore and Gibbon’s vision, run through the filter of Snyder’s brain.

Maybe this has something to do with Moore’s hatred of the movie, I don’t know. In a way, I see his point: Watchmen was created as a comic first and foremost. It is as a comic that it completely worked as a story and won over millions of readers. What is it with our desire to translate everything to film??

You read a book like The DiVinci Code and you can see that, in his mind, the author was cashing checks from movie studios as it was written. There was never any question that these stories were created specifically to be seen on the big screen. That’s not what you get with Watchmen. Watchmen works masterfully where it was intended to work.

Now having said that, unlike it’s author, I loved seeing it on the big screen! I thought that much of the casting was inspired. Jackie Earle Haley was incredible as Rorschach! He nailed the voice without making it seem clichéd, especially fortunate following on the heels of Christian Bale’s Batman, which some found to be over-the-top. Physically, he looked as if he had been plucked right from the pages of the comic.

Another bit of perfect casting was Patrick Wilson, who played Nite Owl. This role was important because it is through him that the reader immerses himself in the story. Wilson provided a wonderfully understated performance. And even though it has become the favorite past time of reviewers to criticize Malin Akerman’s performance as Silk Spectre, I didn’t really think she was bad. She isn’t ever going to win an Oscar, but so what?

Sets were incredible; just like the comic. The CGI Dr. Manhattan? Beautiful. He looked exactly how I imagined he would if that character was real. Nite Owl and Silk Spectre saving the people in the burning apartment building really struck me as an incredible scene – likewise, the police’s capture of Rorschach.

Some complain about the end of the movie, the section that the film-makers actually changed. You know what? It works beautifully. Given what they had to take out of the movie to get it down to a workable running time, I’m glad they did what they did. To leave it unchanged but to cut out the Black Freighter story and the “missing creative folks” subplot would have made no sense. And even considering how much I love the book – this ending may be just a bit better.

So although I started by saying Snyder isn’t a visionary, I think he did a great job, and I’m so thankful that he is the director that finally made this movie. He respected the source novel and that shows with every frame I witnessed on the screen. His reported 3 ½ hour extended cut should be even better than what I saw in the theatre because it will allow for more character beats in the story. Much like Peter Jackson’s extended cuts of “Lord of the Rings” replaced their shorter versions as the “real versions” in my mind, I look forward to the DVD release with great anticipation. In the meantime, I’m very happy with the “Watchmen” I experienced last night.