A Layman's Critique of Watchmen

Rating: 6/10 (7 March 2009)

I entered the theatre with only a very brief notion of what The Whatchmen was supposed to be, 'a group of super heroes that are as confused by the human condition as everyday people are.' But really, even having that bit of information fed to me before hand, I went into the movie with no preconceived notions. (if you can believe that anyone is capable of such a feat) : P
The opening montage laid a great foundation for the rest of the film and explained the setting, era, style and plot basics effectively enough for me to be ready to appreciate 'The Watchmen' and their situation. The first character I was introduced to was 'The Comedian' who became one of my favorites. Even though he received very little of the screen time, the spirit of what he represented was delivered potently and used well throughout the movie. I consider this to be one of the film's strong points.
After the starting storyline was established, the next notable motivation of the movie was a series of developed introductions to key players in The Watchmen organization. This portion of the movie was also very satisfying, continuing to give me interesting and important background information and also presenting the characters in a variety of clever and moving ways. At this point (about an hour into the movie) I was pretty stoked for the rest of story.
It is here that my personal disappointment began. The plot took a turn toward the 'hot super-chick' (who's most efficacious quality turns out to be that she's hot). I know you're reading this and noticing some angst, fair enough, but if you can indulge me for a bit hopefully you will see that my criticisms are beyond mere contempt for pretty people in Hollywood. This movie struck me as an attempt at disenfranchising the super hero in a more serious fashion than a movie like Hancock. However, for me, everything that it built up in originality was deflated by presenting me with a played-out plot dynamic that I can find in any super hero movie: That is, a gravitating twist of the story based on the turmoil that a hero experiences because of his involvement with some girl. Honestly, of all the things that a character like 'Mr. Manhattan' could come to struggle with, it turns out to be a female who's not really developed within the movie as being interesting in the first place. If they wanted to make 'The Silk Spectre II' a character of such significance based on her relationship with Mr. Manhattan, then they needed to show me more than a couple of sex scenes to give her weight to throw around in the story.
While I'm on the topic of Mr. Manhattan, I'll mention that he was a fascinating character for me, who sadly was unable to fulfill what I had built him up to be in my mind. The best I can explain this supposed shortcoming is in this way: In the middle of the movie his magnitude was created from giving the viewer a sense of awe and limitless possibility in Mr. Manhattan. His conflict with The Silk Spectre II didn't really diminish this effect, however he was eventually duped too easily by the movie's semi-villain, and then sold short with a couple cheesy one-liners towards the end of the movie to provide some resolve. I think the writers would have done better to preserve the mysteriousness of Mr. Manhattan, but of course you could always propose the defense that these were intended to be extraordinary beings with all too human problems.
Those are my two biggest gripes with the film, and unfortunately they were too important to the overall project to be overlooked completely. On the good side, the film featured a really cohesive theme all throughout. The successful occupation of Vietnam due to super-human intervention was a cool historically revisionist approach. I like that they kept the revolutionary (hippie) movement and then used it as a prevailing theme to color the story and soundtrack. I also enjoyed the generic, non-commercialized showcasing of the characters. It fit nicely with the 'dethroning' of idealized super heroes.
A side note / conspiracy theory: I don't have much evidence to support this, but I get the feeling that major players in American culture/business are subsidizing film makers to incorporate subtle advertisements into their movies. I noticed it first with 'Constantine' which seemed to be a not-so-subtle anti-smoking ad. I'll cut to the point, for some reason 'Night Owl II' had a problem with erectile dysfunction which was completely superfluous to the story. They introduced us to it in the middle of the movie and then in the end had a mini ED prescription ad when Silk Spectre II asked him "Is everything alright down there?" To which he vaguely replied (I can't remember exactly what he said) "I checked it out and got it fixed!" Does anyone else detect these weird things in our movies these days or is it just me?