Movie: The Watchmen

[elfs]

Summary: Great movie. Irresponsibly bad metadata.

Omaha and I went to see The Watchmen movie last Friday and, I have to say, it was remarkably honest to the comic book and didn't sacrifice too much to get its point across. A lot of the actors seemed to think that being in a comic book meant they didn't have to invest much energy into it, and I thought Malin Ackerman and Matthew Goode were weak as the Silk Spectre and Ozymandias, but all in all the film was an amazing movie that did a better job of hewing to its original material than many a comic book adaptation.

I did kinda miss the squid, though.

This film deserved more than an R rating. It should have been NC-17. My reaction to the level of gore, violence, and sex in it was simply this: no responsible parent would let a child under the age of 16 watch that movie. I could not believe that there were two adolescent boys in the theater with no adult supervision, and later learned that of Yamaraashi-chan's friends, one has already seen it-- with her father, no less!-- and one was scheduled to go see it this weekend with her friends. It was true to the book, and the book was a masterpiece of its time with its remarkable re-intepretation of the superhero myth, but the book's reinterpretation took a cold, hard look at the passion and necessary violence that emerges when vigilantism tries to deal with the nastiest corners of our society.

The other problem with the film is the advertising: it presents The Watchmen as a superhero movie, but it's a superhero movie only superficially. This ain't The X-Men or Spider-Man. The Watchmen is an exegesis on what it means to be a hero, the limits of heroism, and the kind of personal toll trying to be a hero, some kind of ur-role model, has on the psyches of the people who play that game. It's very talky, and there's more depth to it than most people are going to want in a superhero flick. Okay, yeah, you get to watch some fight scenes, some of them more than a little amazing, but you also get to watch the best-trained warriors on the planet just beat the snot out of people who've got little to no hope of defeating them, which is not really what you go to a superhero movie to see. The fights are all one-sided; it's the ideas thrown around, and not the bodies, that made Watchmen interesting. (Well, okay, the love scene is an equal match of bodies, but that's, er, well, okay.)

If you're an adult and you love comics, go see it. If you're a parent, leave the kids at home.

Comments

[hydrolagus.livejournal.com]

Spoiler under a cut, please?

[elfs.livejournal.com]

What there do you consider spoilery? If you know what I'm talking about, you already know about it and you're incensed by the change. If you don't know what I'm talking about, the comment is meaningless until you decide to read the comic.

[hydrolagus.livejournal.com]

I've read the comic; I haven't seen the movie. I don't currently know the ways the movie differs from the book.

[hydrolagus.livejournal.com]

OK, I went ahead and read the post. Not as much spoilery as I thought, other than the squid (and its absence would be a pity). Sorry.

[charleshaynes.livejournal.com]

"no responsible parent would let a child under the age of 16 watch that movie."

Elf you're getting old. The violence was less than in a lot of current R-rated movies, and the sex was stuff I had *done* by age 16.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

True, and my high school was an almost totalizing single-sex institution, so my perception of appropriatness is skewed by my historical sensibilities.

[ionotter.livejournal.com]

*shrugs*

It's rated R. I know that's lost some of it's meaning these days, but frankly, it's there for a reason. Also, NC-17 is also known as "The Kiss of Death" for a movie. Movies that are cursed with such a rating never do well, since too many people stay away.

[codeamazon.livejournal.com]

Appreciate the heads up as I was considering taking Stone as a Thursday Works Done reward.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

I suggest you see it first with LSB and make your own judgement. I don't think Stone would be likely to act out anything in it, but it is adult fare, not a superhero movie.

[areitu.livejournal.com]

I went to see the movie with some friends and my sister...my mom and a friend's mom wanted to see what the kids were seeing these days, and it just had to be this movie. They didn't seem to mind. I got bombarded with questions about a number of things, mostly 'What's up with Rorschach's mask?' since I'd actually read the comic.

Regarding the changes, I thought it weaked two characters, but in the same way that Lucas weakened Han by having Greedo shoot first.

[icebluenothing.livejournal.com]

of Yamaraashi-chan's friends, one has already seen it-- with her father, no less!

That's -- the whole idea of an "R"-rating, though, right? That if someone under 17 is seeing it, it *has* to be with their parent or guardian? So why the shock that this was the case?

[elfs.livejournal.com]

I suppose because I, as a father, simply wouldn't take an eleven-year-old girl to see The Watchmen. And I don't recommend anyone else do so, either.

[xengar.livejournal.com]

no responsible parent would let a child under the age of 16 watch that movie.

Right, but this country teems with irresponsible parents. I saw Saving Private Ryan in the theater and during the storming of the beaches of Normandy scene I heard a 5-10 year old voice nearby me say plaintively "Mommy, I don't think I'm supposed to be here." I personally wouldn't want to put a specific age limit on it because people mature at different rates, but what other practical option is there?

[invisogoth.livejournal.com]

Honestly, I thought they jumped the shark with the cgi gore. Lovingly done graphics of our "heros" and their world? Check.
Keeping *most* of Moores ideas? Check. (although I missed the newsstand for example). This was one of the few movies I've ever walked out on, and I loved the book. I feel that Moore's message was drowned out by the graphic gore level. Yes, it's a dark, ugly world, but seriously. If I'd gotten all the way down to find they cut the squid too, it only would have added insult to injury. I've heard lots of people say it was very good, and YMMV of course.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

The problem is that I went back and re-read the comic afterward and yes, it's just as gory. The prison scene? Check. The bathroom scene? Check. Fight scene in the alleyway? Check. Only Rorschach's origin story was more gory in the movie than in the comic. The finale was much more bloody in the comic than in the movie. I can't fault the movie for its violence: that was a point Gibbs was trying to make