"At midnight all the agents and superhuman crew..."

At 12:01 AM this morning, I had the opportunity to see a film that I was very interested in since its announcement: "Watchmen." Based on the genre defining graphic novel by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, "Watchmen" is a story that is so robust in nature that it is practically impossible to deliver a synopsis in a few short sentences. The book is rich with visual and written metaphor, allowing for the reader to experience several different interpretations upon multiple readings. It's literary in the sense that it presents powerful, timeless and very mature themes and applies them to a medium that years before had been widely regarded as nothing more than children's entertainment. Everything about the graphic novel works in near flawless synchronicity to communicate a gripping story, combined with raising challenging questions that had never been presented in such a medium before.
But enough about my praise on the graphic novel, this review is dedicated towards the film adaptation. But first, a brief back story. During this decade, it seems that Hollywood has been jumping on the comic book/superhero adaptation bandwagon beginning with X-men in 2000, but truly taking off with the tremendous success of Spider-man in 2002. Ever since then, Hollywood has been buying up comic book licensing properties like wildfire, knowing that by combining the crowd thrilling special effects extravaganzas that comic book movies usually bring, with the already massive fanbase that comic books in general have, they are guaranteed to make hundreds of millions of dollars.
However, while several of the superhero driven comic book films follow this formula very well, a graphic novel like "Watchmen," which doesn't have as much action sequences as many other comic stories, would most likely not be a good translation to the big screen, or at least, wouldn't fit into the mold that Hollywood wishes for. This is why "Watchmen" has always been referred to as the "unfilmable graphic novel." It is far too complex, rich, and literary to be interpreted on film in the 2-3 hour time span that movies usually limit themselves to. However, "Dawn of the Dead" and "300" director Zack Snyder, decided to try the impossible, and turn "Watchmen" into a feature length film. There was a lot of hype surrounding the film, with some "Watchmen" fans excited beyond belief to see their favorite characters finally being assimilated into a more physical medium, while other fans felt disheartened that someone would be so bold as to try and film the unfilmable. To try and calm the outraged fans, Snyder promised to do the graphic novel justice by being faithful and respectful to the source material. But the question loomed in everyone's mind. Would Zack Snyder succeed, and do the impossible?

**I should warn anyone who has not seen the movie or read the graphic novel and would like to do so, should stop reading now as I will be spoiling critical plot details in the coming review.**

The answer to the previous question is like explaining the premise for "Watchmen:" too difficult to try to summarize in a few sentences. Snyder's film version kept much of the original story intact, with very few alterations to the overall narrative. Although, as I sat in the theater, watching the first scene with the Comedian being beaten, I couldn't help but notice how...commercialized, mainstreamed, diluted that the movie felt. Same story, yes, but it was as if there was something that was missing to truly make me feel as though Zack Snyder had made "Watchmen" into the triumphant adaptation as I expected. For example, the music was just...strange. The best way I can describe the musical experienced is if I was reading "Watchmen," but now imagine if while I read it, occasionally there would be someone looking over my shoulder, and playing extremely odd, even inappropriate music whenever they saw my eyes focus upon a crucial moment in the story, almost as if it's being played in an effort embarrass me for some reason. I mean, what was the point in playing "Ride of the Valkyries" during Dr. Manhattan's battle in Vietnam? It was like the composer didn't feel like writing an epic piece of music for that scene, so they just decided "Hey! What about Ride of the Valkyries?! Everyone knows it, and it's really cliche too!"
Also, when Dan Dreiberg meets up with Silk Spectre in the Diner, they play 99 Luftballoons...why? The song's about Nuclear War, I get that connection to the story, but how does that have to do with old teammates meeting up for dinner? Imagine, if you will, in "Casablanca," when Ingrid Bergman walks into the bar, and just as Humphrey Bogart sees her, that "Rock You Like a Hurricane" by The Scorpions starts playing. It's just so out of place and awkward. The music selection was really not well thought out, as most of the scenes would have been so much more effective without any music at all.
Honestly, there were only three music cues that I liked in the film:
1. The opening credits, with Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A Changin'" Actually, this was one of my favorite moments of the film.
2. Jon Osterman's back story, with...(it's a Philip Glass song, which I can't recall at the moment)
3. Nite Owl and Rorschach's trip to Antarctica, with Jimi Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower." (Though I would have preferred the Dylan version)

Another aspect of the movie that I found out of place, and seemed to only be there to attract fans of Snyder's other films, was the gratuitous violence. Sure, the original novel had some pretty graphically violent sequences, but really, this movie just went over the top. There was a moment when Nite Owl and Silk Spectre were fighting some goons in an alleyway, and they seriously pretty much murdered them. I can't even recall specifics of the battle, because I was just so shocked at how incredibly violent it was. It just seemed completely unnecessary to have that amount of violence, other than to please the "Saw" series fans. It seems that Zack Snyder is really into blood and gore, which is what made him a great director for both "Dawn of the Dead" and "300", but for something like "Watchmen," it seems like he decided that the graphic novel had met his expectations for violence, and then took it to the extreme. Putting that much violence in the film didn't advance the storyline whatsoever, and in fact, it was a lot more detrimental to a lot of crucial moments that made the film look like an absurd knock off of a hyper-violent action movie. I didn't appreciate the added blood and gore, and I can't imagine as it was incorporated to do anything but add a shock factor.
What's so strange about the film as well, is that aside from what I already mentioned as being a negative, almost everything else is absolutely wonderful. The acting was fantastic, I don't think there was a performance that I really disliked. Matthew Goode, who played Ozymandias, was probably the weakest, if only because the character is supposed to be British, and I guess Mr. Goode decided a character trait like that was silly for some reason. Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who played the Comedian was stellar, he truly embodied everything about the Comedian, I can't imagine the character being played by anyone better. Again, the acting was probably one of the highlights of the film, as I felt as though all the performances were very strong and engaging.
I also thought the set decoration, costumes, special effects, and all the visuals were astounding. They really looked like Dave Gibbons had drawn them, and then somehow made them become lifelike objects. It was really fun to see all of the drawing from the comic book "come to life" so to speak. The visuals were something to truly marvel.
The writing also deserves some praise. Alex Tse and David Hayter's script was engaging and the character's dialogue seemed very natural. Usually, I'm the first to point out problems with a script in a film, such as awkward dialogue, out of character lines, or poorly/unnaturally constructed exposition, but the faults in the script were few and far between. The fact that they had based the script off of one of the magnum opus of the most brilliant minds in comics doesn't hurt either.
Overall, I enjoyed the film. It was a good look into the world of "Watchmen," and it hit on all of the critical story points of the graphic novel. There was a lot that they left out, such as the death of Hollis Mason, and Jon's father telling him that watchmaking is outdated, both of which I was saddened to to excluded. Also, the film seemed too marketed towards the 18-24 demographic, which changed the overall tone of the story. At times I could just hear in my mind the average "Hot Topic" shopper talking about how "ill" Rorschach is. That was probably the biggest deterrent to my complete enjoyment of the movie.
Snyder also seemed to, almost in the same breath, understand and completely miss, the point of "Watchmen." There would be moments where I thought "Yes, that's it, that's how that is. He nailed it" and then literally, 3 minutes later say "Wait, what is this? What is he thinking?!" One example that comes to mind, is when he pretty much perfectly executed the ending of Ozymandias' master plan, ending with Rorschach's death, and then suddenly Nite Owl goes back inside and beats up Adrian. I was just so confused as to why Snyder thought that even more violence, after a very shocking and gruesome death of perhaps the most popular "Watchmen" character, would be effective. It was moments like this, that just made me keep jumping back and forth between really loving the movie, and disliking it tremendously.
I've heard several rumors that he plans to release a "Director's Cut" that will hopefully be more faithful to the original story, but until then I reserve my judgment and simply say that this was a mediocre attempt at converting Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon's story to the silver screen.