Finally, between finding a wee bit of inspiration and a few minutes of free time, the stars have aligned for me to make a post. I saw WATCHMEN last night at the 2nd-run theater, and was pleasantly surprised. It never occurred to me to see it, largely due to the trailer toting it as being "from visionary director Zack Snyder." You know him as the director of "300," which could be described using many words...visionary is not quite what I would use.
10 things that WATCHMEN has going for it:
1. It is wonderfully self-contained. This is one of the greatest things lacking in high-concept cinema today. It DOES NOT SET ITSELF UP FOR A SEQUEL, thus allowing it to tell a COMPLETE story.
2. Fantastic visuals - not just from the visual effects. Nearly every shot is interesting & different (yet each one flows into the next with great ease), which is an absolute requirement for such an off-beat concept of a movie. Lots of camera movement too, which tickles me in all the right places ;).
3. It does something seemingly impossible: it takes itself seriously and not seriously at the same time. I don't know how on earth you can do that! It's like being a responsible goof (my greatest struggle). It's tongue-in-cheek yet it never goes so far as to parody itself. Comical without being a comedy. I think that's quite inspiring.
4. Non-linear narrative structure. Especially the fact that it uses the entire movie to introduce & offer back-stories on all the main characters. It's really tough to construct a movie this way and still keep everything relevant to the plotline. Each flashback was sort of a self-gratifying showcase piece for the characters, but each one played a very direct part in moving the mystery along.
5. Keeping it set in the 1980s. Brilliant.
6. Even though every sci-fi flick attempts to address this (except the new Star Trek, interestingly), WATCHMEN offers a strong allegory for human nature & social justice...in a very slick way. Not sure whether this theme was a direct translation from the graphic novel, but the way the movie did it had me convinced. Nice work, fellas.
7. Not afraid of nudity, female and male alike (although most of genitalia shown is computer-generated, which is probably how they got away with it). Even though some scenes are meant to be very sexy, their nudity is most definitely not gratuitous. I mean, c'mon, people are naked sometimes! Especially when they have sex! If you disagree with me then you should consider sewing your clothes onto your skin.
8. None of the dialogue seems overly-theatrical... the main characters talk like normal people (I'm mainly comparing it with other graphic novel movies, like Sin City). Even the gruff male diary voice-overs don't use too big of words. Yet every spoken line is quite intriguing.
9. It effectively dealt with the cosmic (apocalypse, space/time-travel), and the small (micro-stories of love or crime-fighting). Both very cool things, but hard to combine.
10. Another seemingly impossible feat: it did for comic books & super hero movies what I though Rodriguez did for zombie flicks with Planet Terror. It took most of the bad & campy things from its genre, and somehow made them GOOD.
While watching WATCHMEN I had to say to myself, "this has to be one of the greatest comic book movies ever made." No shit. Definitely check it out...I know I'll be watching it again, multiple times. If I had to watch X-Men Origins: Wolverine even one more time, I would shoot myself.
