Reviewed by

Christopher Armstead

The year is 1985, though it’s not like any 1985 that any of us have experienced considering Richard M. Nixon is working on his fifth term. The Cold War has reached some rather chillingly high Defense Readiness Conditions (DefCon) levels and the masked super vigilantes which used to help keep the peace for the last forty or so years have been rendered illegal.

After a rather lengthy and stylized opening credits sequence providing with about as much back story as an opening credits sequence can provide we are introduced to Edward Blake (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) who is relaxing in his apartment semi-aware that this is the last day of his life. Blake doesn’t go out like no punk though and gives the masked intruder that has invaded his apartment all that he can handle, but it’s not enough as Blake gets up close and personal with the pavement some thirty odd stories below.

Who killed this cat and why? Well this is what director Zach Snyder’s movie ‘The Watchmen’ centers around. Psychopathic super hero Rorschach (Jackie Earl Haley) who fancies himself as a bit of a Sam Spade style Private Dick, dialog and all, has discovered that Blake is actually the old time superhero known as The Comedian. We should mention that The Comedian doesn’t do anything even remotely funny during this movies damn near three hour running time with a much better name for this ‘hero’ being Brutality Man. Anyway Rorschach has come to the conclusion that someone out there has taken it upon themselves to start murdering the retired super heroes and he’s going to find out why. Rorschach’s first order of business is to track down the remaining heroes to warn them of his concerns which first leads him to Dan Drieberg (Patrick Wilson), formerly known as The Night Owl. The rather skittish Drieberg largely dismisses Rorschach’s concerns as the rantings of loon and goes on about his merry business, but his interest is piqued a bit.

Next Rorschach discusses his theories with the god-like Captain Manhattan (Billy Crudup) and his present lover Laurie Jupiter (Malin Akerman), known to the world as The Silk Spectre but again, no one believes him. Eventually finding some merit in Rorschach’s theories is Drieberg who goes to confer with Adrian Veidt (Matthew Goode), formerly known as Ozymandias with his concerns, especially since Veidt is the only hero whose secret identity is known throughout the world. But Veidt, the smartest and fastest man on the planet seems little concerned about Rorschach’s loony theories and is more concerned in using his intelligence and immense wealth to help stop what looks like an impending nuclear world war.

There is definitely something going on in this deeply textured and complex world that The Watchmen live in, but if you want to find out what that is I’m afraid you’re going to have to donate three hours of your own damn time because I’m not going to be the one to spoil it for you. The question would be was this time well spent? Hmmm…..

‘The Watchmen’ is based on a series of comic books by Alan Moore and as a friend in the know advised me this comic launched the desires of Marvel and DC comics to create a more ‘adult’ themed comic book. The result of the movie is one that is quite the adult themed film with a narrative that is very complex, images that are at times brutally violent and contains plenty of sexuality. I gotta tell you, if Captain Manhattan would’ve decided to put on a pair of pants on occasion I wouldn’t have been mad at him. I realize he has an ethereal consciousness that is generally beyond the wearing of pants but I still wouldn’t have been mad at him.

This is a brand new world for the majority of us going to watch this film with characters and situations that we aren’t familiar with and to that end Snyder fills a lot of his film with as much back story as can possibly be squeezed into a movie of this length to get us up to speed on what we are watching. It was necessary but it still might not have been enough as there were still a lot of sketchy and open ended elements which permeated the film. Comic books by their nature, particular those of the graphic novel variety, have many branching story lines and a plethora of characters and the filmmakers here did their darndest to try to flesh out as much of this imaginary alternate reality as they could, but considering the number of characters, the storylines that were retained and the depth of the plot ‘The Watchmen’ probably would have been better served being a cable television mini-series as opposed to an overly long feature film which still, as it turns out, wasn’t quite long enough if you can believe that.

That being said I still believe that this is a movie that anybody who has even the most remote interest in films like this shouldn’t miss. If you’re at least seventeen. Minor Rant – parents, this ain’t Spiderman and don’t let your brats talk you into seeing this. Visually ‘The Watchmen’ is spectacular, the superhero concept in this movie is more in line to what one would think superhero behavior would be in the real world, certainly more vigilante than the regal and noble distributor of justice that we are used to seeing, and the tale that is told is a very dark and unforgiving one. The film is an ensemble acting piece and truly lacks a central ‘star’ but Jackie Earl Haley’s Rorschach stood out in the middle of a very fine cast as the movies emotional catalyst who was responsible for driving the narrative forward.

But the question still remains, is ‘The Watchmen’ a good movie? It is an impressive achievement that’s for sure. Ambitious in scope to almost epic proportions, bitterly dark in its tone and damn near flawless in its presentation. But it also didn’t completely connect or immerse the audience in its deep and complex narrative. Still worth seeing. And if Captain Manhattan found a pair of pants, we wouldn’t think any less of him.