One Man, One Watch

Rating: Null/10 (14 June 2009)

This to my taste is another clumsy deal: centered on an existing product, the attempts at being visually coherent should be more successful than they are. Its a mess, visually and rhythmically.
There are two things that impressed me though.
I thought the "Rorschach" character was very successful, in part because he pushed a strong path through the chaos that was both the world of the movie and the movie. He was fully integrated: story, bearing, visuals, including some of the setups. Its baffling to me how everyone else would be so clearly inferior in execution. This idea of having a "mask" (which is basically just a headsock) that forms dynamic blots — it is genius.
The other thing, dear reader, is something of a personal quirk. I have a fascination with orreries. These are — originally — models of the solar system that were by gears and tracks, novel machinery of different types, supposed to model the movement of at least the planets. As an student of modeling and abstraction, these have a historical significance for me, and I find that they have become a sort of minor but very strong icon in film.
Here we have one, a modern type. It is almost a perfect blend of Superman's crystal fort in the first movie, and the "device" in "Contact." We are supposed to believe that this is the perfect creation of a perfect mind, one that can see everything in how it works and can model it in such a way that it controls those forces. It is, thus, a model of himself, everything he knows and his transit and container. There is a plot point where the lover's emotions destroy is by simply existing, but that is another story.
I loved the design of the thing; its just marvelous. These three dimensional model- environments just thrill me. I wanted to recommend "Knowing" just based on the stellated spaceship alone. This is so much more laden with visual mysticism.
Try to sit through this mess for the successful character and this orrery.
Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.