Watchmen

After 14 years I watched this film again. And after all the MCU shenanigans, I gotta say this film is a masterpiece, from the story to the music and the super heroes. The fact that they are vulnerable makes it more interesting.

Like I said in the tittle, the world wasn't ready for this movie, if it had came out in this time it would've blown the front door. The way it was made, special effects, graphic fight scenes, nudity, dark tone and soundtrack, Zack Snyder really knocked it out of the park with this one. This is how every super hero film should be made. Not a blockbuster comedy wanna be.

For a super hero film, a true 10/10 in my book!

Watchmen turned out to be an engrossing film, one definitely worth seeing. I have to say, I wasn't enthusiastic about watching it at first. It's based on the great graphic novel by Alan Moore. It's widely considered to be the best graphic novel ever. Films adapted form great literary works usually don't turn out well. The film also didn't have a big budget. More money was thrown at making Iron Man (2008) and The Dark Knight (2008), for example. This doesn't matter though because Watchmen surpasses all comic book films in terms of professionalism. Zack Snyder is a good action director. Just watch 300 (2007) for proof. With Watchmen he demonstrated that he is just a good director overall. He works well with actors. The acting in the film is almost universally excellent. Everyone gets to shine. Even Malin Akerman had her moments. Not one character feels like a throwaway. All this is further complimented by the good choices in costumes. No one can deny that the heroes in Watchmen look cool. The CGI is excellent too. Be it Doctor Manhattan or Nite Owl's airship, everything looks just right. Snyder staged some truly impressive dramatic scenes. The use of music is inspired. The score by Tyler Bates is obviously fitting, but the choices in songs may surprise some people. I, however, think that the songs are just right. It was good to hear Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are a-Changing" at the beginning and Leonard Cohen's "First We Take Manhattan" at the end. What made me like the film even more is its cinematography by Larry Fong. The look of each decade was captured perfectly. The 1980s are somewhat dark in the film's alternate reality though. Nuclear war seems close, and society is sick. To all this is added the sweet look that's also present in the graphic novel. There are many images in Watchmen that are memorable, even unforgettable. There are so many interesting details that I couldn't wait to watch the film more than once to pick up what I missed on first viewing. Thankfully, Snyder didn't change the politics and observations of the graphic novel for the film. Some parts are missing but the endeavour is still a thought-provoking two-and-a-half hours. Plus, it has a clear narrative. This is a comic book film for mature audiences. It stands above other comic book films because it's smart and because it tackles some of the most important issues, even mankind's existence. Watchmen was expertly made, there is a lot to like about it. I respect it and I like it more than any other superhero motion picture. It gets a high recommendation from me.

I thought this movie was just OK when it came out in 2009. Now watching it in 2023 I am watching this movie realizing I was an idiot in 2009. I see the Boys and almost every comic movie since in it in 2023. They've all pulled something from Watchmen. Superheroes with real people problems that have real opinions negative and positive doing both good and bad things all the time. It's great and I'm finally seeing what those that got back in 2009 that were way ahead of the curve. Acting, camerawork, effects, costumes, story, nostalgia, all put on full display in this movie. Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Jackie Earle Haley put on a show in a movie that I felt like everyone was exceptional. That's how good they are. Give this another go if you're somehow here reading this debating on whether you should watch this movie.

Let's get this out of the way - Watchmen the movie is not as good as the graphic novel.

Zack Snyder's Watchmen is not your average graphic novel adaptation. Unlike with 300, which was short and sharp and shallow and easy to adapt, the original Watchmen is incredibly dense and, as written, unfilmable. So Snyder did something very smart - he didn't even try. What he did instead was to take the world of Watchmen and rebuild it in a way which made a virtue of this new medium (film) rather than try to cram the graphic novel into a cinematic form.

Nowhere is this approach more obvious than in the film's title sequence. A wonderfully composed collage of images depicts scenes from the universe of Watchmen in a way which is only possible in the movies. In this way, we are subconsciously introduced to a world where costumed heroes are a part of everyday culture and brought, in a stylish and fluid way, from the original days of the Minutemen to those of the Watchmen. This introduction is cinematically perfect and is indicative of the heights which the Watchmen movie is perfectly capable of achieving but not quite capable of sustaining.

Watchen is a brave film for a major studio to make and without a doubt it would not exist in its present form without the success of 300. It is incredibly dark (both in tone as well as shooting style) with events that would be anathema to any other superhero story. The less you know about the story, the better so there will be no spoilers here but suffice to say Watchmen's version of a happy ending is a far cry from the Hollywood norm.

Snyders brings his unique approach to action to bear on Watchmen, expanding on the action scenes in the comic without making it feel too redundant. His efforts are ably supported by the incredibly game cast, excellent cinematography and near perfect visual effects - this film is incredible to look at but also manages to create an entire world in a way which most superhero stories never do. The attention to detail in even the smallest scenes is commendable and the dense flashback structure means the same attention is paid to the presentation of full and complex characters.

Snyder has made a film which is gorgeous to look at, agreeably violent, well written, wonderfully designed and features some of the best small scale action sequences ever committed to celluloid. But, naturally, not everything is perfect. Most of the performances are excellent, with a cast of relative unknowns who manage to distinguish themselves despite constantly competing with overbearing effects and design. Patrick Wilson, in particular, does great work with a difficult role as Nite Owl, while Jackie Earle Hayley is blistering as Rorschach. Unfortunately in a film which could have done with a strong female presence, neither Carla Gugino nor Malin Ackerman make much of an impression, despite having quite a lot of screen time. Synder's musical cues are another bone of contention - often pushing the tone of the film into the realm of parody. And the ending... well let's just say it cheapens the experience in search of the lowest common denominator and the whole package suffers. On a related note, neither of the stories major revelations are handled that well. These moments were genuinely shocking in the graphic novel but are almost glossed over in the film.

Don't get the wrong impression, Watchmen is a good film, sometimes a great film. Snyder has managed to make a movie which is a terrifically well balanced compromise between accessibility and fidelity. That anyone can sit down in the cinema and experience a distillation of the Watchmen universe in just 163 minutes is a marvel. It does not deliver the depth of feeling and connection of the novel but that is more a matter of the differences in the media than a failure on the part of the film.

On its own merits, Zack Synder's Watchmen is a dark and twisted tale peopled with complex characters whose motivations are not obvious even to themselves. It is a solid film, sometimes rising into the extraordinary, and deserves to be successful. This is not Alan Moore's Watchmen but it is a competent extension of the universe into another medium and a worthy cinema-going experience.

A group of ex-heroes now abandoned and limited by governments lives in the shadows until someone starts to eliminate them one by one. Rorschach is one of these heroes that begins searching for clues to his old colleagues' murders. The story is one of the most powerful aspects of the movie. Plot twists are good and complicated enough to make it interesting. I have watched the ultimate cut and it had another story in the story that was visualized by animation and somehow related to the main story.

The cast is another great aspect of the film. Good actors like Jeffrey Dean-Morgan, and Patrick Wilson along with a whole crew of amazing cast is expecting you.

CG, art, costume design, music, and soundtracks are quite good, especially for a movie released 13 years ago. Zack Snyder did his best in converting one of the darkest and most complex comic books into a movie by being faithful to the books. The only setback, in my opinion, is the length of the film. 3 and a half hours even for an ultimate cut is long if you cannot balance the action and dialogs. This made watchmen a little boring in some places, as I said, it's not balanced so there is maybe an hour in the middle of the movie without much going but on the other hand, you have lots of new information in the last 15 minutes.

Overall, Watchmen is a good superhero movie without regular clichés. It can be worth your while if you are into the genre. But it could get boring sometimes in the middle of it.