The end result is less than satisfying, but the entertainment value throughout is through the roof.

Rating: 7/10 (16 April 2009)

It seems as though the result of a truly good movie would be to make the viewer think long and hard about what they just watched. "Watchmen" does make the audience think, but not in a good way. It's overly long, with a climax that really isn't that great, and because of this the last 45 minutes drag and go on and on. As for entertainment, there is much to be found, but this mish mash of a movie just isn't the great superhero character study it could and should be.
After the murder of superhero The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), members of a disbanded super group meet together for the first time in years. There seems to be a murderer after these superheroes, but who it is, is a mystery. Many sub-plots ensue.
The characters are all written fairly well. The Silk Spectre (Malin Ackerman) is poorly acted, which brings down the character a bit, but it's just a minor thing. The writing is at times good, and at times too soap operatic and melodramatic, but again this is just a minor thing. The direction is what really stood out, and it was quite snappy, if not repetitive. Slow motion is used every 2 minutes, but it goes unnoticed because of how cool the scenes are being shown in that slow motion. The special effects add to the cool and slick direction, and make this a good looking movie, if nothing else.
The climax of the movie takes these characters that we've grown to like over the past 2 hours plus, and puts things in perspective....this is not a good thing. First off, it compromises the characters, making their morals that were previously what drove them, pointless. Second, the ending takes us away from what the movie is (a character piece), and it focuses on the human race as a whole, something that should have been done long before. Our focus does a complete 180, and no longer do we care about the well developed characters, but instead about the complete strangers who have been hanging out in the background this entire movie. This switch didn't work too well for me.
Overall, this is a stylish and entertaining film, but it is overly long, takes itself too seriously and has an unsatisfying ending. But of course, this is just one person's opinion.
My rating: ** 1/2 out of ****. 161 mins. R for strong violence, language, nudity and sexuality.