I Watched the Watchmen

Note, I tried to keep the most important spoiler out of this review and in the footnote at the end.

I got the chance to see Watchmen earlier this week. A while ago, I made a somewhat doom’n’gloomy prediction a while back:

“My official prediction for Watchmen is that it will be visually awesome, but will be pretty shallow, stripping down too much of the story. We'll occasionally wonder if Zack Snyder really "gets" the story, or if he is adapting it more at face value as an action movie. I'm hugely excited about it, but I'm also pretty worried about the final product. I'll quote myself in a few weeks and see if I'm right or (hopefully) wrong.”

Fortunately, the film exceeded these expectations. It was not perfect by any means, but after one viewing I would say it's very good overall. As a standalone product, I felt it actually worked - it's impossible for me to tell for certain, but I don't think understanding the film really required knowledge of the graphic novel. It seemed like the film was structured well enough as a drama with a fair amount of action, giving the viewer enough information to understand the characters' motivations and actions. In that respect, I think the film generally succeeded.

It did have problems as an adaptation, however, though they weren't as significant as I had predicted above. Compared to the comic, the movie’s characters often lose some nuances in their representation. After the backstories and plot were compressed and edited, the film is almost like Cliff's Notes versions of the original story. After thinking about it, though, that really doesn't bother me too much - an adaptation can only use so much of the original material, and I think this one did a good job at providing viewers with the essentials of the characters. The same goes for the change in the ending - some nuances of the comic's ending are lost, but the film's ending captures much of the meaning and works well (or better, within the film*) on its own. Overall, I rarely got the feeling that Snyder didn’t “get” the original story; in the end, the changes seemed conscious on his part to alter it into something a bit more filmable.

Aside from the compression of the story, I think my main problems had to do with the dialogue and violence. Some of it is awkward because it’s too close to the written story – what works in a written, exaggeratedly noir-ish style doesn’t necessarily work in spoken words. Rorschach’s narration is the biggest problem here – some of the journal entries were already a bit much to take seriously, and they just sound more bizarre here. At other times, the dialogue is just clunky, or sounds like it’s been summarized from various points in the novel and thrown into the film. The violence is also a bit much – it’s a violent book, and I can handle violent films, but some of the scenes are so overboard as to be ludicrous. Do we really need people’s legs snapping or blood fountaining absurdly during the fight scenes?

Some of the acting was mixed - Laurie’s actress was easily the worst, and Veidt occasionally came across a bit flat. Dr. Manhattan was very well done in general – initially, I couldn’t stand his somewhat thin, higher-pitched voice, but eventually I came to think that it actually fit the character very well. Finally, Dan, the Comedian, and Rorschach were almost perfectly portrayed – the actors were spot-on aside from a few bad line reads and a few awkward growly-voiced moments for Rorschach.

Stylistically, I think the film was very well done. In addition to the scenes mentioned above, the direction of the action worked well, and the representation of period superhero costumes was awesome. I loved the earliest superhero costumes, which were straight out of old serials and TV shows. I also thought the updates to the main characters costumes worked pretty well in general – they’re more high-tech and modern-looking than the ones in the original story, but I think that works because they’re a conscious mirror of modern superhero films.

From another review: “No mere comic book could have properly captured the awesome spectacle of Dr. Manhattan unleashing hell on Vietnam to the strains of 'Ride of the Valkyrie,' or captured the pathos of a funeral for a man nobody loved, accompanied by 'The Sounds of Silence.' And the opening credits sequence (which has been rightfully praised elsewhere) is unique to the film, and a grand contribution to the canon.”

This states very well exactly how I feel about the high points of the film: at best, it uses its medium extremely well to show things that couldn’t be done in the written material. Overall, I think these great moments outweigh the problems in the film, and another example I’d add would be the first interlude on Mars. This section was possibly my favorite in the book, as it was almost a pause in the action that really laid out Manhattan’s character, his simultaneous incredible power and feeling of helplessness due to seeing his future actions played out already. The film simplifies some of this, but they managed to convey a lot of the material while adding some incredible visuals and music. I’d have to watch it again, but on first viewing, that struck me as about as an incredible scene. The return to Mars later in the film doesn’t succeed as well, mainly because it seems compressed too much (and because Manhattan, out of nowhere, says the completely obvious line about Laurie’s father for the benefit of the duller audience members). That second scene was adequate in the film, but the first made up for it to me.

Overall, as I’ve said, there were a lot of problems throughout the film. On the other hand, though, so much was done well, particularly using the film medium to do things that are difficult to get across in comics. I’ll need to watch it again to solidify my opinion and see how it holds up over more viewings, but I think 3 ½ out of 4 stars would be the rating: incredible and epic at parts, but enough flaws to keep the overall rating below the best of the best in superhero films.

SPOILERS IN THIS FOOTNOTE!!!

*I still have some issues with the original ending. Thematically, it's perfect, but I still feel it’s something of a stretch in its execution. If we can accept that Dr. Manhattan was given his powers through “SCIENCE,” almost everything else in the story follows naturally – the technology the characters use is mainly based on mechanical breakthroughs from knowledge gained from Manhattan. The construction of a giant telepathic space squid which is designed well enough to pass for a natural life form even after scientific analysis (which we have to assume would take place) is not that believable for me in the story. The implications of its use in the story’s themes are fantastic, but I just don’t feel it fits in that well with the rest of the story. The film has a simpler solution which I like better in some ways – it loses something thematically, but works better overall for me.

END SPOILERS!!!!