First, a disclaimer: I haven’t read the graphic novel that spawned this film. In fact, before I caught word of the adaptation, I hadn’t even heard of the book.
So I arrived at Watchmen as a complete neophyte, knowing only that the book was bleak, beloved and, supposedly, “unfilmable”. Before the opening credits were through, I already had a sense of the vast scope of the book, and the consequent ambitiousness of the movie — and whatever else I took away from it, I remained impressed by the gutsiness of the attempt through to the end.
Beyond that, I had mixed feelings. I was awed by the near-obsessive rendering of the setting, its stale, dated feeling (those old TV sets!) and unremitting darkness. I was alternately amused and bemused by the rapid sequences of alternate American history, the Watchmen always present somewhere in the foreground like a pack of anti-Forrest Gumps. And I enjoyed the sprawling story lines — though I didn’t need to have read the book to know there were large chunks missing (the stories of the older generation of heroes, for instance), or to feel that the ending was disproportionately, incongruously restrained.
From some reviews I’ve read since, I gather that this is a large part of the problem with Watchmen: to some extent, it’s missed the novel’s point, in that much of it — the gratuitous alley fight scene with Laurie and Dan, for instance — left me wanting to take some names and kick some ass. However, it also left me eager to read the book. No other “comic book movie” can say the same.
by Eva Holland | Source: 35mm Print
16 Mar 2009 11:44 PM | Submit Comment
