• What’s Good:The genre’s most literal comic book film coming from its most literal directors. More of a bonus feature for fans than an actual movie in fact. Rejoice, someone finally attempted to make “The Watchmen” and this is as good as it’s ever going to get.
• What’s Not: Snyder does not update Moore’s postmodern superhero paradigm. He does skim the surface of the evolution of superheroes but all that amounts to is a pair of batman nipples on Ozymandias. The performances are iffy and the lack of some major plot details sting (especially the retarded ending). Also, the only thing I dislike more than flash-backs is period music. This has both!

Alan Moore’s Watchmen graphic novel is one of the most literate and enjoyable stories ever told. It is the ”Citizen Kane” of graphic novels. Zach Snyder’s version… is not. Should it be? No. Could it be? No. Does it think it is? YES. Watchmen proper exists in its own universe and cannot be replicated or recaptured. It’s cannon. But it’s also universal and infinitely applicable to post-80s American culture so trying and failing is better than not trying at all. ”Visionary” director Zach Snyder (dude, being visionary is not the same thing as as continually adapting visionary material!) and his bold/cocky filmmaking may prove to be a case of wings of wax soaring towards the sun but, you know, that hubris is exactly what was needed to pull the trigger on this bad boy. I’m just grateful someone had the balls to film the unfilmable and not only that but film it for comic book fans instead of moronic multiplex moviegoers. The film, such as it is, is endlessly entertaining if not entirely satisfying (because how could it be?). But it also begs the question: if you’re going to make “Watchmen” with total devotion and utter fidelity with respect to the source material then why make it at all? Well, perhaps because it isn’t so much a fully autonomous film as it is a treasure trove for fans of the novel (at least, those open enough to accept a film version for what it is) and an insane adventure for anyone who hasn’t heard of it. Win/win.

Alan Moore’s Watchmen is to this day the premire source for superhero parody and political allegory. What makes it so unique and fly so effictivley is how subtle the first trait is and how blunt the second. Blowhard mystic/anarchist Moore made a bleak and bombastic doomsday parody before such a thing was commonplace (watch the brilliant “Southland Tales” to see the modern incarnation of this genre). It’s tone (more pastiche than parody) and presentation is a thing of non-linear perfection–a marvelous marriage of style and concept that trancends any limitations of “the page” that we thought were there. The problem with the film, or any film, is that it is so literal. The non-problem with this film is that Snyder is as non-imaginative as directors come in terms of producing new ideas vis-à-vis old content. But that’s not a knock because what he adds is a fresh and purely cinematic veneer that few modern directors are as adept at presenting. Here is a man who remade “Dawn of the Dead” and not only added nothing new but took away a few things (!) and the film is still better than Romerio’s overrated version. On ”300″ Snyder latched on to the text and, like a self-fapping computer virus, downloaded a living and breathing monster of kineticism and madness to film. Snyder’s copy/paste approach with ”Watchmen” is similar in terms of intent except instead of fascist porn (which I like as it turns out) is a celebration of political and personal anarchy (which I like even more).

It’s one thing to see sketches of Nite Owl and another to see a dude dressed up as an owl. Multiply that many times over and you have the problematic Dr. Manhattan who is so far beyond human that he is an abstract elemental figure in the book and, well, one-third of the blue man group in the film. However the fact remains that this Dr. Manhattan (and Billy Crudup’s stoic, post-human acting style) is as good as he’ll ever get. The reason: penis. By going there and showing Manhattan’s member the film goes a long way (teehe) toward legitimizing itself and emerges as a non-sanitized Hollywood product. I’m astounded at how risky this film is and glad a studio gave somebody so much money to make something so quirky. I shudder to imagine Terry Gilliam circus freak show or Paul Greengrass heavy handed war on terror version that was very close to being made. Snyder’s answer is (and quite wisely) to focus on the everyday nature of these superheroes and really dig deep to explore the mentality behind people who run around in superhero costumes. While the superheroes in this film are driven to save people more than the people want or need to be saved this is no “Dark Knight.” Not even close. The fundamental problem is that the film doesn’t explain why they’re so super in terms of strength or intelligence. The slow-mo visual wallop looks cool to be sure but this only ends up contradicting the story in a big way.

What suffers most is not Snyder’s approach but those who are asked to bring such a concept to life. The performers struggle to grasp the nuances and tonal biplay inheret to the material, sometimes going for slapstick, sometimes tragic and sometimes realism. Patrick Wilson, an actor I like these days, never really gets across the notion that there’s a vengeance seeking creature of the night (owl) deep inside this slob, waiting to pounce on its prey. The passive dummy’s latex muse, Malin Akerman as Silk Spectre II, is horribly, horribly, horribly miscast and incapable of understanding the difference between what she’s saying and what Moore means (hum, casting couch???). Jackie Earle Haley as the masked Rorschach gets it alright, but perhaps too much as he goes overboard most the time and soon becomes a parody of Rorschach, a character, mind you, who was already a parody. Faring better is Crudup as Dr. Manhattan/Jon Osterman (his flashback is by far the best and most poetic) but the role is cold and will always work better on paper. Jeffrey Dean Morgan as The Comedian has the impossible task of being the most magnetic and likable rapist/mass murderer/presidential killer of all time. Most surprising is how effective Matthew Goode’s Ozymandias is. I thought the actor was out of place and potentially the film’s weakest link but along with Morgan he holds the thing together! While the character is underwritten and mishandled at times (not enough TV watching, a random introduction of his big cat, no genetically engineered alien masterplan and no mention of his homosexual orientation) the performance is good enough to get all that across. Set on the hundredth-something floor of his building the scene where this openly “out” superhero Veidt talks to crabby oilmen about the future of alternative energy sources while, in the background, one of his blimps can barley be seen heading right towards the twin towers is stunning and the exception that proves my theory that Snyder and his actors add nothing new to the material.  

Overwrought is the word of the day. If the filmmaker’s “300″ was overwrought to the point hypewroughtness then “Watchmen” is so far beyond ”300″ that it lands in the realm of metawrought. Manic ideological supremacy and delusions of genus don’t just describe Snyder and his effort on the “Watchmen” but apply just as forcefully to Alan Moore’s work. Though the two express themselves in different venues, use different narrative pitches and posses different aspirations (Moore the shaman vs. Snyder the, what, capitalist?), the necessary element to make this story work is, in a word, crazy.     

Grade: B+