A flawed but impressive attempt at the so-called 'unfilmable' book

Rating: 8/10 (15 March 2009)

After the murder of a costumed hero called 'The Comedian,' another hero called Rorschach begins an investigation, which reveals a bigger and more terrifying plot...
Alan Moore, the writer of the original graphic novel wants nothing to do with Watchmen the movie. He calls the book unfilmable. Terry Gilliam said it could be only done in a mini-series. Both Paul Greengrass and Darren Aronofsky tried to make it, but plans fell through. In the end it was Zack Snyder, director of 300 who finally got the job done. And despite some flaws, he's done a very good job of it.
Anyone going into see Watchmen, expecting another Ironman, or Dark Knight, are in for a shock. The Watchmen story is far more complex than that. While there is action sequences in the movie, the story isn't about that. This is a movie about costumed superheroes, that plays much more like a drama than action film. I know that some of the audience at the screening I was at were surprised by what they were seeing. You don't go into a movie about superheroes expecting long flashbacks, brutal violence (including the attempted rape of a hero), a strong sex scene, and heroes actually killing the bad guys, and sometimes the innocent too. It fully justifies it's 18 certificate in the UK.
Let's be clear. There is no way you could film Watchmen and keep everything in. Gilliam was right about that. So there has been parts of the story cut out. The ending of the book has been changed too. But writers David Hayter and Alex Tse have done an impressive job trimming the story down. Fans of the graphic novel will probably not like the changes but overall I think they work well.
Snyder deserves credit for some of his choices for the movie. As I said, then ending has been altered, but still works as well as the book does. And by changing the ending, he's allowed himself to cut out a sub-plot to help the running time (though part of this, Tales From The Black Freighter has been turned into an animated movie and is available on DVD I believe). But he doesn't cut back on the violence or the blood when it's needed. It's clear he is a fan of the material, but that does bring up some of the flaws the movie has.
Snyder is probably too faithful to the material a times. And yet he does remove or change little scenes that should be there (I'm thinking of an exchange between 2 characters towards the end). Perhaps if he could have stepped back from the material, this would have helped. Also, his use of slow-motion during some fight and action scenes is a little jarring. I think he should have just let the scenes flow. They would have worked fine without it.
The soundtrack too has a problem. While the songs themselves are good ( Hendrix's All Along The Watchtower for example), where he puts them into the movie at times just feel odd. And then over the end credits, after using mostly music from the past, they include a cover version of Desolation Row by My Chemical Romance! The songs don't quite gel with the movie.
Hayter and Tse's script does lift a lot of lines from the novel and is a good adaptation. And by casting lesser known actors instead of big name stars, Snyder gets performances that are all first rate,with special mention going to Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach, Jeffrey Dean Morgan as The Comedian, and Patrick Wilson as Nite Owl. Billy Crudup playing Doctor Manhattan does a good job, and the use of CGI in his on screen appearance is impressive.
In fact, the whole production is impressive. The CGI, both for Manhattan, the scenes on Mars, and at the end are all stunning. Having the original books co-creator and illustrator Dave Gibbons on board certainly would have helped with this. It is true that some of the make-up doesn't work quite as well, but this is only a minor flaw.
Overall though you get the impression the makers wanted to do the best version of the book they possibly could. And while there are flaws with what they have done, I think they've come up with a movie that while not up there with the The Dark Knight (still the best comic book movie ever made), is still a very impressive movie.
One of the lines for this movie, is 'Who watches the Watchmen?' After seeing this, I hope a lot of people do. It may be a long movie, but it is worth it.