WATCHMEN Movie Discussion (SPOILERS allowed)!

[Buttmunch]

Got my tickets for Imax!

 

[Scar]

And what would they do, exactly? How do you fight a god?

Crucifixion worked the last time.

But honestly if hypothetically such a situation did occur, one can't just expect humanity to just sit back and say, "Ooooh that Dr. Manhattan!" and just let go the mass slaughter. Particularly if it were the US that initiated the call to arms against him, I can still see misgivings against the US but with a larger looming threat it would present itself regardless. One could have made the argument originally that in the gn with Dr.M being omnipotent and virtually omnipresent, he should have been able to anticipate Veidt and been cognizant of the creation of a massive squid monster, and that thought creeping into the minds of people around the world would have created increasing enmity towards him and suspicions of the US regardless through Dr. M's omission. Could have been, but we've never really been made privy to Dr. M's limitations, if they exist, but eventually I think it would have come down to scapegoating him in one form or another in the long run. It's the prioritization of concern, what lives are and are not worth saving, and when Manhattan should and should not take action that becomes a focal point. Again, I haven't seen how this all plays out on film, I'm just playing devil's advocate and speculating based on the unknown. I've always understood the replacement of the squid so as to circumvent a global "wtf" in every theater. Hence why Alan said some things they did in the graphic novel just weren't capable of being translated into another medium. Just some thoughts.

 

[Ktjn]

Got my tickets for Imax!

Too bad they didn't do any virals for this.

 

[Entropy]

...with Dr.M being omnipotent and virtually omnipresent, he should have been able to anticipate Veidt and been cognizant of the creation of a massive squid monster, and that thought creeping into the minds of people around the world would have created increasing enmity towards him and suspicions of the US regardless through Dr. M's omission. Could have been, but we've never really been made privy to Dr. M's limitations, if they exist, but eventually I think it would have come down to scapegoating him in one form or another in the long run.

As powerful and intelligent as Dr. M is, it's amazing how powerless and ignorant he is throughout the story. He is far from all-knowing. He's very much a pawn of events, in the end, confused and wondering how things got so ^^^^ed, but ultimately not caring and wandering off into the the universe, distracted by something shiny.

I've always understood the replacement of the squid so as to circumvent a global "wtf" in every theater. Hence why Alan said some things they did in the graphic novel just weren't capable of being translated into another medium.

I'm pretty sure that's was the motivation for changing the ending and calling the group "Watchmen". But that's the problem with adapting a strange story like Watchmen and repackaging it for mass market, main stream appeal. In the attempt to make it clearer, more accessible to the average schlub and less "wtf", they gut it of some, or all, in the case of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, of what makes it such a good story in the first place. Understandably, this is a big reason Moore wants nothing to do with Hollywood adaptations.

I think the squid could've worked just as well in a film narrative as in does the comic, but the average movie goer would probably not get it or like it and would have an odd wtf, distancing reaction. I think most will probably have that anyway - naked blue guy, rape, dog killing, etc. - so they might as well have kept the whole shebang. I don't think the squid itself is one of the untranslatable bits. I don't believe that the average person accepts the notion of alien invasion or finds the squid any less goofy in the comic than they would in a film. What is completely untranslatable is the basic construction of the comic, the unique aspects of sequential art storytelling. The lay out of the pages, the construction of the 12 issue thing, the beats between panels, the design of it to drawn your eye over the images in a certain order and pace, the juxtaposing of images and interweaving of stories like TotBF or Under the Hood, can't be replicated the same way in another medium. Just look at the beautiful mirroring and framing at work in issue #5, Fearful Symmetry. How the hell do you translate the craft of that into another medium?

 

[DinoLast]

I can't understand why they did not just replace the squid with something that looked more like aliens. Say mutated humans inside a flying saucer or something

 

[CelticPredator]

Because the GA are idiots....

I dunno....i'm just saying, they could've come up with something waaaaaay worse.

 

[Entropy]

yup. Just go read the Sam Hamm script. Yikes!

 

[CelticPredator]

I'd rather not.....

 

[BadMoon]

Where is Irish with his review?

 

[Kabukiman]

Where is Irish with his review?

Perhaps he couldn't go on after discovering the film fell so low below expectations.

or...

Perhaps he was so overjoyed at witnessing such a triumph in filmmaking that he fell into a stupor so wonderful that he ran off into the sunset laughing hysterically never to be heard from again.

Either way, I want my damn review!

 

[Entropy]

Perhaps he couldn't go on after discovering the film fell so low below expectations.

I think that's what some were saying before his Indy review. And look how that turned out. :emperor

 

[scubasteve]

This is a review from WCM -

This will not be a blow-by-blow recounting.

Let's get this out of the way:

6.5/10

First off, the film felt extremely rushed, both in a good way and a bad way; many scenes were so abbreviated and so castrated that there was barely any point in even including them (except to placate fans). The film sometimes felt like a jerrybuilt collection of unconnected scenes; scenes that, in the GN, were interwoven and interconnected are instead disjointed and irrelevant to each other. On their own, many scenes were absolutely fantastic, but the pacing was garbled and occasionally confusing, even to somebody so familiar with the GN.

The first third of the film was truly great, as was the last twenty minutes of it. The hour and a half in between, however, not so much. Many scenes that needed to be serious and and emotional instead came off as lighthearted and breezy; I'm thinking of Dan and Laurie's curtailed lovemaking, their tryst in the Owlship, and Rorschach's interviews with Dr. Long. Many other scenes that too needed to come off as moving instead rang hollow, as Snyder juxtaposed familiar lines against familiar visuals, but forgot to pay any attention to the emotion or relevance behind them (Watchmaker, the Blaire Roche kidnapping).

The violence was over-the-top and campy-level gruesome, and was, in fact, so polished and stylized that it often undercut the gritty and realistic tone that should be defining the whole movie. Dan and Laurie's fight in the alleyway was a prime example of this. Watchmaker was handled pretty poorly, as Snyder confirms that he has almost nothing to contribute when there isn't a punch being thrown, relying instead on Billy Crudup to salvage the sequence. Billy Crudup, by the way, did an extremely good job. All of the actors did, in fact, even Malin Akerman. I'd say that Akerman's best scene was the dinner at Rafael's; their conversation was very natural and fluid, and did a very good job at conveying everything that it needed to.

Anyway, the movie felt truncated, and Snyder relied on the GN too much. No, that is not an oxymoron. He relied on Moore's writing and Gibbons' art to tell the story for him, hoping that if he could give us punctuated versions of the scenes that we all know and love, we would fill in the blanks for ourselves and just go with it. It was very much "by the numbers," and, as a result, did not flow very well.

Now, onto the ending. It was great. Yes, it was great. The fighting between Rorschach, Dan, and Adrian was a bit ridiculous, but the ending was handled so well that that can be forgiven. As Jon and Laurie return from Mars, Manhattan realizes what has happened, saying, "I did this, but not directly." He feels guilty that he has played into Adrian's hand, and ashamed that he could not do anything to stop this. There is no "I did it!" Oh, and Adrian "triggered" it 35 minutes ago. Oh, and there is no final scene between Jon and Adrian; that dialogue is split up between him and Laurie, and later between Laurie and Dan. Rorschach does what he does ("Keep your own secrets"), and heads out of Karnak. His final moments are very emotional (Jackie Earle Haley hit that scene out of the park), and his mask forms the "two lovers" blot just as it does in the GN. When he is killed, his blood forms that same pattern on the snow as his fedora floats to the ground. Seeing this, Dan loses it, rushes back inside, and tries to fight Adrian again. Adrian just takes it, letting Dan hit him over and over and over again. Dan wants to solve this like a hero, but realizes that it doesn't mean anything anymore. It is very sad. Manhattan gives Laurie one last kiss, teleporting away as their lips touch. Dan and Laurie leave Adrian to his conscious, in what I believe is the best sequence of the movie.

Lastly, the final scene. It too was phenomenal. Robert Redford is now Ronald Regan, but this is excusable. It's almost the final page of the book verbatim, with the film ending on a zooming shot of Rorschach's journal. It does not show Seymour definitively picking it up or skipping over it. MCR's song actually worked quite, well, by the way.

I was underwhelmed by some of it, overjoyed by a lot of it, and now I'm just waiting for the damn Director's Cut. I really wish that I could have fallen in love with this film, but I had to settle for liking it.

OK, question time, but don't bombard the ^^^^ out of me.

 

[darthviper107]

Where is Irish with his review?

He might not be able to say anything since he's a mod for the Watchmen site.


I'm actually surprised with all these reviews hearing how much they kept in the movie, 3 hours isn't enough time to properly show everything if they are trying to go through the whole story.

 

[LTM438]

Interesting review. By the way, it's amazing what a little YouTube searching brings up:
<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="https://www.youtube.com/v/NDGhd3mlAbc&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="https://www.youtube.com/v/NDGhd3mlAbc&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

 

[CelticPredator]

I guess the Directors Cut will obviously be better.

 

[BadMoon]

All I can say is if someone comes in here and says "It's a good popcorn flick" I know it is ^^^^ty.

 

[Scar]

As powerful and intelligent as Dr. M is, it's amazing how powerless and ignorant he is throughout the story. He is far from all-knowing. He's very much a pawn of events, in the end, confused and wondering how things got so ^^^^ed, but ultimately not caring and wandering off into the the universe, distracted by something shiny.



I'm pretty sure that's was the motivation for changing the ending and calling the group "Watchmen". But that's the problem with adapting a strange story like Watchmen and repackaging it for mass market, main stream appeal. In the attempt to make it clearer, more accessible to the average schlub and less "wtf", they gut it of some, or all, in the case of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, of what makes it such a good story in the first place. Understandably, this is a big reason Moore wants nothing to do with Hollywood adaptations.

I think the squid could've worked just as well in a film narrative as in does the comic, but the average movie goer would probably not get it or like it and would have an odd wtf, distancing reaction. I think most will probably have that anyway - naked blue guy, rape, dog killing, etc. - so they might as well have kept the whole shebang. I don't think the squid itself is one of the untranslatable bits. I don't believe that the average person accepts the notion of alien invasion or finds the squid any less goofy in the comic than they would in a film. What is completely untranslatable is the basic construction of the comic, the unique aspects of sequential art storytelling. The lay out of the pages, the construction of the 12 issue thing, the beats between panels, the design of it to drawn your eye over the images in a certain order and pace, the juxtaposing of images and interweaving of stories like TotBF or Under the Hood, can't be replicated the same way in another medium. Just look at the beautiful mirroring and framing at work in issue #5, Fearful Symmetry. How the hell do you translate the craft of that into another medium?

That was what always intrigued me about Jon. He can readily prophesy things which will happen, describe future events in which he is involved... but he does have limitations. What those are exactly we don't know, but Manhattan always struck not necessarily the god everyone describes him as, but on his way to becoming a god. The best way I can think of to describe it is if you can imagine an infant being given infinite intellectual capacity and potential power. Such power endowed in a being ultimately ignorant of human nature and motivation. The parallel to god is that if there is a god he should ultimately be beyond something like human emotion, considered a weakness; what Jon's puerile character explores is if being "beyond" emotion can distance one from humanity in such a way that a being if infinite intellect can find himself ignorant. As Brian Azzarello put it, to devote oneself to humanity is to understand humanity, and ultimately find oneself the most human. I think Jon's primary issue is that he is never intrigued by human emotion enough to study and understand it. If Jon saw someone smile, he wouldn't be interested in why that individual was smiling or how he or she felt, so much as the exact muscular interactions which created the smile in the first place.

I certainly believe the squid was doable, but it would most definitely have been as comical and unanticipated in the film as it was in the graphic novel; the reason for the change was not that the shock would be any bit greater, but that it would have just been on a much greater scale since a total movie audience will vastly surpass the people who have sat down all at once to read the GN. It's the mass surprise of the sheep, feeling they've been had and becoming confused, that the filmmakers tried to avert. But in the GN that feeling of having been had, because you were and you knew it, and you knew the reasons behind it, made the experience all the more shocking. Shock was an inextricable aspect of the experience, and the change was so as not to alienate. I'm sure we'll all continue to debate the necessity of the squid for years to come. I'm sure we'll all agree the movie will fall short of the book, as is always the case, but how far is where everyone will differ.

yup. Just go read the Sam Hamm script. Yikes!

Jesus... yea, it could have been much... much much worse.

Where is Irish with his review?

I've been wondering the same thing. Either the experience was exhausting and utterly mind-blowing for a Watchmen fan, or it was a staggering failure. I'm sincerely hoping the former. We'll see soon enough. Hopefully we'll see by tomorrow.

 

[wofford29]

I thought Irish was going to be in Florida this weekend?

 

[Scar]

Also, the WCM review has me extremely optimistic... except for the bit about Rorschach's interview with Dr. Long. If that isn't powerful, then Snyder dropped the ball, and for me personally I don't know if I could consider the rest of the movie justified. That was the most shocking, horrific, and gut-wrenching characterization when, as a reader, you find yourself empathizing with Rorschach; you understand why he punishes evil, real evil, in the world, and you root for him to kill that man and render justice. The way Rorschach gradually wears down Dr. Long's hope and optimism, replacing these emotions with a more realistic vision of human nature indelibly tarnished, caked with filth and depravity which can never come clean. If that scene fails, the movie will fail me.

 

[Entropy]

As awesome as the movie will be, I think the best thing to come of it has been the motion comic. I love it. The swag and prequel video game are pretty cool too.