Monthly Archive for March, 2009

I was not pleased with the Watchmen.

I knew that the reviews were mixed, so I didn’t expect to be blown away. However, I also know that there is a cult following around the graphic novel, which I still plan to read at some point, so I thought that I would be surprisingly pleased.

I was wrong.

Music

One thing I found offensive about this film was its use of music. I do not hold anything sacred, but the use of Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel, and Jimi Hendrix in this film, among others, certainly pushed my boundaries.

In short, the use of music in this film felt nothing less than trite, pompous, and self-important, as if it were trying to put itself in the same league as other movies that have used these songs and the times that these songs belong to.

Acting

Another aspect that made this film difficult to watch was the acting. This is not to say that all of the actors were that terrible. In fact, I thought some of the performances were quite outstanding, such as Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s perplexingly endearing Robert Downey Jr.-esque performance of The Comedian and Jackie Earle Haley’s performance of Rorschach. I even enjoyed Patrick Wilson as Nite Owl II, though that may be because he reminded me of Brad from the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Overall, though, the acting was uneven and was further hampered by the terrible performance of Matthew Goode as Ozymandias, one of the most important characters in the film.

Plot

I am a fairly patient movie viewer (for example, Stalker was my favorite film for the longest time), but the plot was simply too mangled and long for my tastes. The argument made at the end of the film was somewhat interesting, but it had taken so long to get there that by that point I simply didn’t care.

I do realize, at least, that this is likely a result of the difficulty of translating something that would read better as a graphic novel than a movie, but the execution still left much to be desired.

Violence

Just before watching this movie I was tipped off on the presence of extreme violence in this film. It did have quite a presence in the film, but it wasn’t quite as gruesome as I thought it might be. I did tear up at the opening scene where The Comedian is murdered, but that was more at thinking about the sad state of humans rather than the film itself. The violence is gruesome enough, however, that I don’t think this is a kid-friendly film, which some might think simply because it is based on a “comic book.”

As a side note, the most disturbing thing about the violence in this film did not have to do with the film itself but the audience’s response. In the theater where I watched this movie the audience laughed heartily when Rorschach melted another man’s face and body with hot oil. I squirmed in my chair and found myself despondent, saddened, and alienated.

Conclusion

I really tried to be generous with this film, but even with that, it left me wanting. Even now as I search for things that I enjoyed about this film in an attempt to be fair I find it difficult to think of anything.

There is one thing. I did enjoy watching the structure that Dr. Manhattan created on Mars. It fit well with the remarks he made about his father abandoning watch making after Einstein discovered the theory of relativity, and the scene of him sitting in front of all the tiny pieces of a watch as a young boy, both of which I also enjoyed.

But dear Cheese in Deli, why oh why did they have to mispronounce Rorschach’s name? Sigh.