Jump to content

Who Watches the Watchmen?


Wycket

Recommended Posts

Despite what people may think of Zack Synder and his previous work, this is one film I have been anticipating for quite some time. The story is absolutely fantastic and the book itself is one of the best pieces of literature from the 1980s. Now that WB and FOX have settled their lawsuit, I can actually look forward to this movie's release. The site was just updated with character bios and some of Tyler Bates' score from the film. There is a definite Blade Runner vide, as well as some Michael Kamen there, so the score is looking to be exactly what I thought it would be.

Please discuss, as its been quite some time since I started a thread on this board (the last might have been when Williams was performing at the World Series 2 years ago).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am very, very excited about the movie. I've been a fan of the comic for about a decade, and it looks like the movie is going to be a fair representation of it.

Bates worries me. I haven't liked one single thing he's done. 300 had an odious score.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Isn't the release date 03-06-09?

Neil

Like a clock(or watch)! 3 O'clock 6 O'Clock 9 O'Clock! Or that's what I guess is the reason for the date.

I hated the ending to the comic, although everything leading up to it is just amazing. I hate the choice of director, but I think this story has a lot of potential. I'll see whether this movie satisfies. The last Alan Moore movie I saw, V For Vendetta, was amazing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am very excited about it too. Even more since I never read the book and just started it this past week. I'm half way through it and I can't put it down. I liked 300, although I only saw it once and can't remember for the life of me what Bates' score sounded like.

Is there any score by him worth checking out?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I liked 300, although I only saw it once and can't remember for the life of me what Bates' score sounded like.

It sounded like Titus :P

Sounded? I was under the impression it was direct plagiarism.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I can't wait to see this, but I'm also very, very worried about it.

I agree with the second part. Well, I wouldn't say that I'm especially worried, because I already know enough about the project to make an educated guess that it will not be a good adaptation. Why they gave the film adaptation of arguably the single best work in the comic book genre to an inexperienced director known for making action movies with all style and no brains I can't understand.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My theater showed a stupid little featurette with Snyder for a little bit, and he said that Watchmen has always been looked as the unfilmable graphic novel. So why the eff are you trying to film it?

He also said it's a visual style like nothing you've seen before. Except I have seen it, with 300.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My theater showed a stupid little featurette with Snyder for a little bit, and he said that Watchmen has always been looked as the unfilmable graphic novel. So why the eff are you trying to film it?

He also said it's a visual style like nothing you've seen before. Except I have seen it, with 300.

I wouldn't say it's unfilmable, because I don't think anything is unfilmable. But for something of this magnitude surely there is someone with better qualifications to direct it than the 300 guy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Am I the only one who sees Robert Downey jr in the trailer

No, me and my friends saw it too and commented on it. Bizarre how much it looked like him.

Also, the husky voice-over and one of the characters greatly resemble Bale's Batman. That also confused the hell out of me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My theater showed a stupid little featurette with Snyder for a little bit, and he said that Watchmen has always been looked as the unfilmable graphic novel. So why the eff are you trying to film it?

He also said it's a visual style like nothing you've seen before. Except I have seen it, with 300.

I wouldn't say it's unfilmable, because I don't think anything is unfilmable. But for something of this magnitude surely there is someone with better qualifications to direct it than the 300 guy.

Gilliam and Greengrass failed to do it (not totally their fault)

You could do a lot worse than Snyder though. At least he's really trying to remain faithful (while still making it relevant as a film)

Cautiously optimistic here

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gilliam and Greengrass failed to do it (not totally their fault)

You could do a lot worse than Snyder though. At least he's really trying to remain faithful (while still making it relevant as a film)

Cautiously optimistic here

Seeing what Gilliam would have done would have been great. Greengrass.. ugh. I'd rather see two hours of the super-slow-motion style of Snyder than Greengrass' epileptic style of editing camera work.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am cautiously optimistic, however, the trailers seem to imply that there's ntohing in the movie that not in the comic book. So, hopefully, it will be a solid representation of a comic book, but I have my doubts as to whether it will really take flight on screen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, I messed up on the title. I guess I was multi-tasking and just put stuff in the wrong place.

I understand the Bates hating (I don't love the guy either) but I at least think he captured the scope of 1980s film music at least from the samples I've heard. I definitely think of Blade Runner or a Michael Kamen score when I listen to the samples and that is a good thing. Let's just wait for the film before we say he plagerized again.

As for the hate on Synder, I really don't get it. I thought both Dawn of the Dead and 300 were solid efforts. He definitely shows a respect to the works that he is using and at least you have to appreciate him for that. As for the super slow-mo, I blame that on him just trying to make 300 a little more interesting of a film than the source and I think he did a good job. If its used sparingly in Watchmen I guess I will tolerate it, because don't forget, there won't (i.e. shouldn't) be that much action in this film considering the book.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As for the hate on Synder, I really don't get it. I thought both Dawn of the Dead and 300 were solid efforts. He definitely shows a respect to the works that he is using and at least you have to appreciate him for that.

I think he showed too much respect to 300, like SIN CITY. I think the literal translation of those comics hurt the movies, and in terms of 300, while it was striking in some respects, in other respects it's hilarious, but I think Frank Miller was in on the joke but Snyder wasn't. Although, saying that, I don't think he showed any respect for DAWN. While it's an ok horror-action, it bears little to no resemblance to Romero's film, bar zombies, a mall, and a big black guy, and like Bay's terrible TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE remake, just seemed to be an attempt to make money off an existing brand, which as a fan of the original, didn't enthuse me to it. It's not awful, though. However, making too literal a translation of WATCHMEN is the least of my worries where the film is concerned, although Dave Gibbons' approval slows my cynicism a tiny bit.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am cautiously optimistic, however, the trailers seem to imply that there's ntohing in the movie that not in the comic book. So, hopefully, it will be a solid representation of a comic book, but I have my doubts as to whether it will really take flight on screen.

Well, there is alreadya lot of meterial cut out from the film. They plan the 4-hour director's cut. Which is what I'm waiting for. With the "Black Freighter" story in it.

But, really, it can't possibly work. Watchmen, the comic book, works not because of its story, but because of the way it is told. In a 12 chapters, with flashback, many layers of information. It is this that's most unique about it. Now these things are everywhere (Lost owes much to Watchmen, for example). It could be interesting TV show, but not as a 2,5-hour film.

Besides, the whole superhero concept can ever work in its original medium. As much as I love things like TDK, it still seems awkward on screen, to an extent. You know, people in superhero suits fighting crime. It is natural in the comics. Not so in the movies. And Watchmen is prime example why these things should be left as they are.

Karol - who thinks most people won't buy Watchmen movie.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Karol - who thinks most people won't buy Watchmen movie.

I think it'll go one of two ways. People will embrace it like they did X-MEN (which, while still being a huge famous brand, was probably not hugely in the public eye as the same way SPIDER-MAN or BATMAN was), or it'll bomb like MYSTERY MEN. As revered as the graphic novel is, I'm not convinced it's a popular enough brand on its own to break the bank.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, there is alreadya lot of meterial cut out from the film. They plan the 4-hour director's cut. Which is what I'm waiting for. With the "Black Freighter" story in it.

They shot that? Wow. I assumed that would be the first thing to be cut.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, there is alreadya lot of meterial cut out from the film. They plan the 4-hour director's cut. Which is what I'm waiting for. With the "Black Freighter" story in it.

They shot that? Wow. I assumed that would be the first thing to be cut.

As far as I understand it, it is being done as a animated feature and will be released separately in a DVD to coincide with the theatrical release. But will be incorporated into the film for a theatrical cut. Along with many different things.

What I'm most bothered about, however, is the change

in the ending

.

Karol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I assumed it would be messed with (As long as the changes are not revealed, I don't think there's a problem saying that there were changes here). The original was far too ambivilant to make it to the screen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Wonderful script, with a terrible ending. Snyder will ruin all the good things in the screenplay. Can't wait to miss it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, there is alreadya lot of meterial cut out from the film. They plan the 4-hour director's cut. Which is what I'm waiting for. With the "Black Freighter" story in it.

They shot that? Wow. I assumed that would be the first thing to be cut.

As far as I understand it, it is being done as a animated feature and will be released separately in a DVD to coincide with the theatrical release. But will be incorporated into the film for a theatrical cut. Along with many different things.

What I'm most bothered about, however, is the change

in the ending

.

Karol

Those changes

you are probably talking about the now infamous squid

are exactly what made me decide to read the book before the movie. Haven't finished it yet, I'm half way through it, but it wasn't the incessant whining over at AICN about the ending that really made me curious to read the book. Just to know what the hell everyone was complaining about.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, that's what I'm talking about. it's not a big deal really. But there was a point to have such an ending in the book. Now some of the things from the plot won't make as much sense.

Karol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

No, it's not that the ambivalent ending is absent. It's more about what happens.

Karol

From what I understand the changes do make the ending less ambivalent.

Instead of having the squid Dr. Manhattan will be framed for the things that Ozymandias does, which positions him as far more of a villain than the graphic novel does. One of the great things about the original ending is that Veidt's actions are in a very morally gray area, and can be interpreted as right or wrong. And the squid is more important than you might realize.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I liked how it (the squid) is foreshadowed at the various points of the book. And it is kind of disturbing, the whole concept. Bodies and blood everywhere. It was certainly more powerful. Veidt's character is still ambivalent in the movie though. But the problem I have is different. The whole point of the squid was to convince the world there are larger things at work and more dangerous. And it was supposed to be disorienting so that various conflicts all over the world can be ended immediately. Now that Dr. Manhattan is to be blamed for all this, the threat is known and familiar. So the shock value is considerably lower. I know it might be nitpicking to most people, but I still think it's not as powerful. But then again, the ending in the Hayter script wasn't very different.

Karol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I liked how it (the squid) is foreshadowed at the various points of the book. And it is kind of disturbing, the whole concept. Bodies and blood everywhere. It was certainly more powerful. Veidt's character is still ambivalent in the movie though. But the problem I have is different. The whole point of the squid was to convince the world there are larger things at work and more dangerous. And it was supposed to be disorienting so that various conflicts all over the world can be ended immediately. Now that Dr. Manhattan is to be blamed for all this, the threat is known and familiar. So the shock value is considerably lower. I know it might be nitpicking to most people, but I still think it's not as powerful.

Karol

That's exactly what I'm talking about.

The squid is needed to be the giant foreign threat that causes the disaster and later world peace (based on a lie). For Snyder to say that he didn't include because it wouldn't work in a movie is no excuse, of course it could, at least if done correctly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Which are...?

Karol

The squid. Considering the quandaries of fitting all of the nuances of the book into a 2 and a half hour movie, rendering a giant squid attacking a major metropolitan city seems relatively simple by comparison.

Do half of these comments even need tags?

Yes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As a big fan of the novel, I'm peeved that the ending has been changed. But as long as whatever they've changed it to works for the movie, I won't mind.

They only changed it slightly from what I hear. It should be mainly intact.

I hated the novel's ending, though. Alan Moore, as also proved in his V for Vendetta graphic novel, cannot write the greatest endings, or good endings at all, IMHO.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't understand the appeal of this movie?

Ok?

The changes they've made for the movie, ending aside, I've pretty much had no problem with. They're going about it in the right way, whereas the comic is a commentary on the superhero genre, the movie is a commentary on comic book movies (the costumes, Rorschach's voice...)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The thing with the squid is: how will the Comedian find out about the whole plot if he is now uanble to spot the squid and the island from the airplane, therefore causing his own death at Veidt's hands and triggering Rorchach's investigation?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.