Too much material for one film

Rating: 4/10 (1 December 2012)

'Watchmen', one of what sometimes seems like an interminable number of comic-book adaptations, is fundamentally a very strange film. On one hand, it's a straightforward superhero movie; on another, it's a neo-noir tale of an alternate world where that dangerous peacenik Richard Nixon has enjoyed decades of unbroken power and the world has been ruined by liberal conspiracy. On yet a third hand, it's an over-the-top (and half-baked) piece of science fiction fantasy of wild incoherence. Half of the superheroes in this film are just ordinary policemen and women wearing capes; one of the others transcends all laws of physics. Ultimately, this is a movie about style over substance, but its insane length makes no sense given it has so little integral meaning. I've never read the comic it was based on; but this is a self-important mess of a film.