I'm not going to say a whole lot about it. This week I'm rereading the comic and then next weekend I'll probably see it again since my gf is still confused but wants to see it again.

3/9/2009 12:43:43 AM

Quote :

"I love the line about doing it 35 minutes ago. It would fit perfectly in a Bond movie."

The nifty thing is Watchmen is also a deconstruction of the superhero genre, which is to say that it takes all of the typical traits of the genre and examines/criticizes them (in essence, taking the genre apart, ie deconstructing it). The "35 minutes ago" line is a perfect example of this. In most stories, the antagonist will confront the protagonist and proceed to spell out in complete detail how his plans for <insert end goal, but it's usually something like world domination> are to unfold. Now that the protagonist knows what's going to happen, he has a chance to stop it.

There is absolutely no reason for this to happen in real life. To paraphrase Ozy's gloating, "why would I tell you my master plan if there was even the slightest chance that you could foil it?" The only reason action heroes like Bond ever manage to stop the bad guy is because the bad guy lets his hubris get the better of him. Ozy's too clever (genre savy?) to fall into that trap. This isn't like a tragedy where the hero has the opportunity to stop the calamity but fails to do so because of some personal failing, the heroes simply couldn't save the day because the villain was competent for a change.

3/9/2009 4:45:11 AM

10/10 movie, would watch again

3/9/2009 5:22:25 AM

me too, but not for a while. I'm still taking in the 1st viewing

3/9/2009 5:40:10 AM

haha i know, 3 hours was too long for me

3/9/2009 5:41:37 AM

I can't wait to get the directors cut of the dvd - it'll be an extra hour because it will be putting "Tales of the Black Freighter" into it as well as including stuff back like Hollis' murder that were cut for time reasons.

3/9/2009 6:05:50 AM

it'll be epic

3/9/2009 6:06:47 AM

Don't know if this has been posted yet, but.....Saturday morning cartoon Watchmen intro!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDDHHrt6l4w

It's not real, btw. It's just something funny that somebody made.

3/9/2009 6:27:30 AM

yea that's awesome

3/9/2009 6:37:18 AM

This movie made me question my ethics. I thought it was good. A little long, but good.

3/9/2009 9:26:05 AM

apparently this is a movie for nerds/geeks (take no offense, because I often fall into that category). 3 of my friends just saw this having no knowledge of the movie or book. 2 guys and 1 girl. They all HATED it. Wanted to get up and leave, and they said numerous people did. Completely turned me off from wanting to see it.



[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 9:36 AM. Reason : .]

3/9/2009 9:34:12 AM

Quote :

"Wanted to get up and leave, and they said numerous people did"

about 1/4 of the people in the theatre did this when i went yesterday. my wife included.

I knew what i was getting into, but the movie just sucked.

3/9/2009 9:42:09 AM

some big fat woman started making obnoxious snoring sounds during the scene on mars where dr. manhattan is explainging things

i wanted to throw a shoe

3/9/2009 9:48:59 AM

my gf wanted to see it actually, and thought it was ok--->good at least

apparently you all went to a movie with morons

3/9/2009 9:56:26 AM

Quote :

"Don't know if this has been posted yet, but.....Saturday morning cartoon Watchmen intro! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDDHHrt6l4w It's not real, btw. It's just something funny that somebody made."

i would like to point out

this person used the exact same pronunciation of "Rorschach" i suggested on page 5

RO SHARK

3/9/2009 9:58:22 AM

I really liked this movie. I did not read the comic but went with someone that did and he said it was the closest adaptation from book to film he has ever seen in a movie like this, other than the ending which was changed slightly however keeping the same overall effect.

I really enjoyed the movie, didn't think it was too long at all. The pacing was great, maybe better than that of the Dark Knight which just felt too long to me. I really enjoyed the characters and felt like I really got to know them and understand what drives them. Great action scenes and it raises the question to me why so many films like this opt for a PG-13 rating when clearly this movie was that much better being rated R. Some interesting choices of music in some areas however overall the soundtrack was good.

3/9/2009 9:59:02 AM

I absolutely loved the movie and I had no prior knowledge of The Watchmen. The girl I was with loved it too. We are both nerds though, so that might have helped. Neither of us thought it was complicated, we were both able to follow it really easily.

3/9/2009 10:46:19 AM

i thought it was very good and didnt feel overly long. i could tell it was long about the time they were going to the antarctic, but that was near the end as it was.

i think the problem some people will have isnt that it is a "nerd" move. i didn't know anything about the movie going in but can easily see why some would have issues...

1. it is long. nearly 3 hours for average joe is a bit much, even if they like movies in general.
2. it is a superhero movie. certainly i said that wasn't the only reason, but combining it with the length probably would turn some people off. doubly true since it isn't as action packed as some others in the genre.
3. it has an artsy flair. i wouldn't call the movie artsy, but it has a lot of intertwining stories, integrated flashbacks, seemingly deep discussions, and visual aspects. it was at least trying for a more in-depth feeling and i think that would turn some people off. maybe artsy is the wrong word, but i imagine you get what i am talking about.

3/9/2009 12:28:18 PM

yeah, I definitely viewed it as a drama that just happened to be about superheroes and not a superhero movie... kind of like how Smokey and the Bandit is a drama about policemen in the deep south.

Liked it a lot more than the Dark Knight which seemed overly long to me but for some reason I never noticed the time on this one.

3/9/2009 12:58:46 PM

Yeah, it's definitely not a "superhero" story. They added a lot of action compared to what was in the book, which is perfectly reasonable for a movie to do and didn't really take anything away from the story. When we were walking out I asked my girlfriend if she had remembered everyone being a ninja in the book. I mean, there were some fist fights and ass kicking, and I believe Ozymandius was a very skilled martial artist, but everyone wasn't busting out ninjitsu flip tricks all over the place like in the movie. Like I said though, it didn't take away from the story at all and everyone likes a good fight scene.

3/9/2009 1:55:35 PM

I just think it's interesting how polarized the reviews are. People seem to either hate it or love it. I thought it was meh.

3/9/2009 2:41:23 PM

I have never been to ANY movie and seen people walk out, yet I read about such events on places like TWW and IMDB. I thought about walking out of Pearl Harbor back in the day, but the Jew in me said "you already paid to see this shit, might as well stick it out"

3/9/2009 2:55:13 PM

i think most of the folks that walk out early weren't able to follow it

i mean shit, G.O.D and I just watched Monsters Ball last night and thought it was pretty dull they could have clipped a good 30 minutes off of it and missed nothing.

[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 2:58 PM. Reason : s]

3/9/2009 2:56:54 PM

Quote :

"haha, I was the opposite, I LOVED it up until the last hour"

My thoughts throughout the movie were like "damn that was bloody, the comedian is an asshole i'm glad he's dead, holy fuck what's up with nixon's nose, dan's kinda likable, how much glowing blue penis does one movie need, give that fucker the speedo back, that one chick keeps going from kinda hot to kinda busted, a lot of monologues makes it feels like Sin City, holy crap that was bloody too, rorshach is kind of an asshole too, maybe that's why he hates liberals , hey there's mickey from seinfeld, blah blah speeches, my god these guys are emo, whoa wait that one dude with the bad haircut is the bad guy, now we're getting interesting..."

I found it interesting that both this and Batman: TDK conclude with the heroes perpetuating a lie for the 'greater good' of humanity.

Quote :

"In most stories, the antagonist will confront the protagonist and proceed to spell out in complete detail how his plans for are to unfold. Now that the protagonist knows what's going to happen, he has a chance to stop it. There is absolutely no reason for this to happen in real life. To paraphrase Ozy's gloating, "why would I tell you my master plan if there was even the slightest chance that you could foil it?" The only reason action heroes like Bond ever manage to stop the bad guy is because the bad guy lets his hubris get the better of him. Ozy's too clever (genre savy?) to fall into that trap. This isn't like a tragedy where the hero has the opportunity to stop the calamity but fails to do so because of some personal failing, the heroes simply couldn't save the day because the villain was competent for a change."

you really did not need to explain this. I do think it's silly that he bothered to fight them at all when his plan was already being carried out.

3/9/2009 3:09:01 PM

^Because they were going to try and expose him

3/9/2009 3:12:15 PM

So, apparently the blue guy runs around with his ding dong hanging out all over the place. What the fuck is that for? Was it really necessary?

3/9/2009 3:30:46 PM

He has no need for clothes on Mars.

3/9/2009 3:32:37 PM

but he does have a need for symbolic watches

3/9/2009 3:47:36 PM

Quote :

"So, apparently the blue guy runs around with his ding dong hanging out all over the place. What the fuck is that for? Was it really necessary?"

So I've never read the book, but based on the movie, I'd say it's because clothes are a human construct and he's slipping further and further away from humanity.

3/9/2009 3:48:14 PM

but to go along with that, why would he even need a human body form to begin with?

I guess cause its easier to draw than a floating ball of smartness

3/9/2009 3:57:46 PM

I understand the symbolic reason for his junk being strung all over the place, but I think its probably one of those details that doesnt add anything to the movie except "wtf". but then again, I havent seen this. As a general rule, however, audiences dont love looking at male junk unless its in a porn movie. Otherwise it seems just wrong.

3/9/2009 4:24:53 PM

Ah, America.

Violence is great, but a flaccid CGI penis is a blight on society.

Dr. Manhattan has no use for clothes, so he doesn't wear them. He would look fucking stupid with that speedo on through the whole flick, too. BTW, ^^, I was always under the impression that he stayed in human form because his first experiment with quantam particles was reassembling his human form, and he has no real reason to exist in any other form.

Also, the mere fact that this movie exists is a big "fuck you" to the standard movie audience, so any argument against what audiences do/don't care for isn't of much use.

3/9/2009 4:40:29 PM

I guarantee the abundance of man-junk will cost this movie a good $10-20 million. I kinda assumed the same thing about Forgetting Sarah Marshall

3/9/2009 4:42:51 PM

^^ and why was he big in that first scene? he can just manipulate particles at will, he would never need to be "big"

3/9/2009 4:46:04 PM

vinyl, I am not all for the violence, either. When I heard there would be a rape scene, that was the first thing that didnt sit well. Of course, I have no idea how that scene was done in the movie. Its not possible for it to be a tasteful rape scene, but maybe it wasnt too overly graphic.

[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 4:46 PM. Reason : .]

3/9/2009 4:46:19 PM

it was pretty graphic, well, attempted rape

[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 4:47 PM. Reason : d]

3/9/2009 4:46:55 PM

...and a crucial part of the story.

3/9/2009 4:47:34 PM

Is your brain incapable of handling sensitive material?

Rapes happen.

I wish they didn't, but they do. And one happens in the lives of these characters.

And yes, it's very important to the story. Just like when Blake murders the woman who's pregnant with his child in public.

3/9/2009 4:50:27 PM

No. If I have a choice of watching something that is entertainment, I generally chose not to watch something involving certain types of human suffering. Rape is one of those. I also choose not to watch movies like Hostel because its just pointless sick violence.

3/9/2009 4:52:03 PM

ahah

if you dont want to watch a movie about the human condition and some of it's darkest parts, then clearly you're not going to want to even bother

[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 4:54 PM. Reason : e]

3/9/2009 4:53:25 PM

Guess I wont! Thats $10 less they'll get!

3/9/2009 4:54:17 PM

Fair enough, I suppose. For what it's worth, though, there is no pointless violence in this movie (unless you want to argue about Vietnam, I guess, but that's a whole different conversation). The source material is so well-crafted that every single detail has significant weight in plot and character development. At best, though, Watchmen is about the choices of morally ambiguous people, and at worst, people whose morals sit very clearly on the dark side of humanity.

3/9/2009 4:54:20 PM

The overwhelming theme of the entire story is that you pretty much have to be psychologically fucked up to want to be a costumed hero. Every character in this story has something fundamentally wrong with them, whether it stems from childhood trauma or they were simply always unstable to begin with.

3/9/2009 5:22:17 PM

SPOILERS, but if you haven't seen the movie, why are you here anyways.

It was a lot more violent than the novel so I would say a lot of it was pointless. Showing the girl's chewed up leg? Come the fuck on, the bare bone got the point across fine in the book. Hacking the guy in the forehead with a meat cleaver? Yes it was awesome, but the way it went down in the book was a lot more sinister. They were going for a shock value that seemed to cheapen the experience for me. Also, see sex scene. I have to say though, people exploding into piles of mush was awesome.

I liked this ending, aside from parts of the story being left out. It always irked me that in the comic there were psychics thrown into the end of the story out of nowhere. So this world has a lot of kick ass people in masks, one blue dude who can do anything, and... psychics? Where the hell did that come from. It makes sense to use Dr. Manhattan as he was peacing out anyways. The only thing is that it was more believable that the US and soviets would band together over the threat of alien invasion.

Also, way to drop the ball and not explain why Oz was watching all the TVs, that was one of the bigger, Oh Shit moments of the novel and would have cleaned up the ending imo.

3/9/2009 5:33:54 PM

Quote :

"Yes it was awesome, but the way it went down in the book was a lot more sinister."

The argument against this is that between the book's publication and the production of the movie, an entire feature film was made on the premise of that original scene.

3/9/2009 5:40:44 PM

Quote :

"So, apparently the blue guy runs around with his ding dong hanging out all over the place. What the fuck is that for? Was it really necessary?"

Dr. Manhattan felt that clothes were completely pointless.
Think of it like Jaybee's stance on thinking for himself. Why bother when you can be spoon-fed every answer?

3/9/2009 5:56:04 PM

That scene was the pilot (or whatever the movie equivalent is) for the film?

Again, I thought it was a cool scene, it just came off like they were more interested in shocking the audience.



If I were a super scientist that only came out of his lab to bone his girlfriend I'd be naked too.

[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 6:00 PM. Reason : .]

3/9/2009 5:57:13 PM

Oh, I got it.

In the book, Rorschach chains the kidnapper/rapist/murderer to the wood stove, hands him a saw, and lights the house on fire, but tells him that there's no way he'll make it through the chain in time.

That was 1986. The production of Saw effectively removed that story option for the movie.

3/9/2009 6:00:12 PM

you realizxe he's saying that many viewers who hadnt read the book would think they were trying to rip off Saw right

3/9/2009 6:01:37 PM

Ah got it. Still, I don't see how people would try and make that connection.



[Edited on March 9, 2009 at 6:04 PM. Reason : .]

3/9/2009 6:01:50 PM