qui custodiet ipsos custodes?
This weekend I saw the new Watchmen movie. Twice. I treated myself to a viewing at the Orinda Theater Friday night (opening night with a dozen other people in the theater) and then was invited to go along with a group of friends Saturday night — I went mostly for the fellowship and sociability, but also I was curious whether I’d pick up on any details I’d missed the first time.
It’s a movie that I wish, if the technology had existed, had been made two decades ago. It is exceptionally true to the original comic book by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. At moments it seems the original comic was used for storyboards. This film is the answer to why I double-majored in college: painting and filmmaking. Before then I had been doing comic book illustration, and both fields were attempts for me to take those skills and apply them to a «respectable» field. There was nowhere I could be a Sequential Artwork major. It was hard in those days, making other people understand the connection between cartoon art and movies. The visual language is very similar, and the translation of time into slices is nearly identical. Even if you disregard the illusionistic effect of running images at 24 frames per second, the relationship between the frames of a comic book page follow exactly the rules of cinematic montage.
There have been a number of movies made from comics in the last few years. It seems as though every year a half-dozen or more comic book titles are plundered for big-screen material. Until Watchmen, however, only the characters were taken. New plots were written, usually in amalgamation of plot elements from stories originally published decades apart. The first Spider-Man movie was very entertaining, but the very thought of Mary Jane Watson taking Gwen Stacy’s place falling from the top of the Brooklyn Bridge is troubling in a way not unlike the effect of seeing a movie made of Moby Dick where the White Whale is replaced by a white squid.
Watchmen made a few edits to the original story, true, but on the whole they made a film with the same story as the original comic. Most of the same thematic elements were present and there were only a few plot shortcuts made. On this level, Watchmen was an unparalleled triumph. It really proved that the material from one medium can be faithfully translated to another.
It’s a great story, one whose relevance may be dimmed in those who don’t remember living beneath the Cold War Sword of Damocles. Yes, modern terrorism is a frightening enough bogeyman, but I don’t think there’s more than the most remote chance that terrorists of any flavor will succeed in ending life on Earth as we know it. In 1986 when Watchmen was published the idea that billions could be saved by killing millions, although grotesque, was easier to come to terms with. I think it is harder for modern audiences to understand sacrifice in any form, and without the imminent threat of global annihilation, Watchmen’s final premise that the world could be saved by a calculated act of terrorism seems to be a purely intellectual exercise, and one in particularly poor taste at that.
What’s really wrong with Watchmen is that in trying to remain faithful to the original story, the producers succeeded in creating a movie with little internal life of its own. Each scene was beautifully executed but the overall pacing was wooden. Some of the acting was excellent while some was exceptionally bad. The end result is like hearing a MIDI-sequenced rendition of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony made straight from sheet music. It’s beautiful but essentially hollow and lifeless.
I wish I could wholeheartedly recommend this film. Instead I have to suggest reading the graphic novel, perhaps only then going and seeing the film. Having read the original will bring the missing depth to the moviegoing experience, and then it can be like reliving the comic but with amazing special effects.
Loved it.
This is a terrific, incisive review. I just read the thread on FPN and I thought I would come over here and say that as a woman and someone who considers herself a feminist, I really liked the comic and I actually quite liked the movie as well.
My issues with it stemmed more from a hollywoodization of the women — I thought the comic showed them as aged, flawed — even Laurie. In the film, she looks like she’s still in her early 20s, even when she’s supposed to be in her 30s, with a little extra padding, a few lines on her face here and there. THAT offends me as a woman more than the actual (nuanced and frightening and important) plot.
Definitely — I hope people who see this movie without having read the graphic novel go read it.
In the defense of hollywoodization
Kim, your point is a good one, but I cut them a little bit of slack here. They needed actors who, with the aid of prosthetics and makeup, could play a wide range of ages. The actress who played Laurie had to play her at seventeen as well as at thirty-six. Even the actress playing her mother, Sally, looked and sounded like a twenty-five-year old covered in latex in the scenes when she was supposed to be in the neighborhood of sixty.
Side-lines
Although I have been a DC/comic book movie fan, I haven’t seen the movie yet. I’m waiting for it on DVD. There has been so much back and forth, I wasn’t curious enough to see it for myself. My car enthusiast friend gave high marks for the Owl Ship but that wasn’t enough to get me to the theater. It’s always tricky when making a movie from a book or a graphic novel. You can’t please everyone.