Watchmen (2009)

Watching Watchmen is a plastic and sterile experience. Disappointing and surprising, since I'm a big fan of the Allan Moore comic (he took his name off the film, but then he never wanted a film in the first place.)

Even though the digitial whiz yet story-challenged Zack Snyder is very true to the source story and the visuals (the comic is more or less a faithful storyboard for the film), that may be exactly what's wrong with this thing. The whole thing feels airless and dry and also suffers from some weak casting in at least two key roles.

Watchmen is a dystopian take on post cold war America, one in which self appointed superheroes have captured the public's imagination after WWII (Minutemen), then been banned, then a resurgance in the sixties with a new group (The Watchmen), who lose the favour of the authorities and are banned once again. The U.S. has won the Vietnam war and is lording over the Soviets in the cold war (thanks to the iconic character Dr. Manhattan, a godlike victim of a radiation overdose) . As Richard Nixon is on to his fourth term, the story is a meditation on the American dream, the disillusionment of the sixties, the role of vigilantes and super heroes and how they are coopted by the powers that be, and many many other complicated themes and story points, All of them are crammed into the film and as a result, we have very superficial character development and perfunctory and cold action scenes.

I'm more and more convinced that good film versions of complex literature, even comics in this case, require the filmmaker to select one or two simple ideas and explore them rather than trying to capture every philosophical theme and minute plot point. This problem was almost identical in Moore's V for Vendetta adaptation. I know there's also a fear of the geeky fans not approving, especially with a property with armies of nerdy fans, who for some reason have the power to scuttle a film franchise.

On the plus side of performances, Jackie Earle Haley is an excellent Rorschak, an obsessive and weasly (and mostly masked) performance, Jeffery Dean Morgan is a macho and charismatic Comedian, it's a shame he doesn't get more screen time, and even with all the CG, Billy Crudup (and his digital doppelganger as Dr. Manhattan) are mezmerizing to watch. Carla Gugino, excellent in everything, ages four decades here and is wonderful as ex-superhero and mother of the Silk Spectre. Patrick Wilson does fine as the nerdy geek Night Owl.

On the down side, Malin Ackerman is incredibly wooden as the Silk Spectre (Dr. Manhattan's love interest) a shame, because I usually enjoy her in comedies and she's beautiful, Matthew Goode falls completely flat as super genius and ambiguous hero Ozymandius, which brings the film down because his role is pivotal.

Also on the down side is the too obvious on the nose choice of musical tracks from the era, Dylan's "Times They are A-changing' for the protest sixties stuff and Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah' for a bad sex scene with Night Owl and Silk Specter in a rocket ship.

All that said, the film is almost three hours long but goes by quite quickly due to fun visuals, some very memorable lines, all lifted right out of Moore's orignal book, and lots of cheesy fun here and there. Okay for a rainy Sunday for something that's cool enough to watch with teens.