Watchmen Adaptation Works Despite Departures from Text
Nick Moorhead '10
Issue date: 3/10/09 Section: Arts
Calling Watchmen a movie about superheroes is like calling "Lost" a show about a desert island. Watchmen covers topics as diverse as nuclear war, psychological instability, and even erectile dysfunction, magnified by Orwellian overtones. The movie is based on a graphic novel (a clever marketing term for adults too insecure to admit they read comic books) that re-defined the medium when it was released in the late 1980s.
Watchmen is the Citizen Kane of comic books; people thought the story was unfilmable. It didn't help that Watchmen's author, Alan Moore, is almost as reclusive as J.D. Salinger and equally as wary of Hollywood. Moore rocks obscenely long, hobo-status facial hair, worships an ancient snake god, and "has likened the cinema-going public to freshly hatched birds with mouths open as Hollywood feeds them regurgitated worms."
Moore's reservations about the silver screen haven't stopped movie execs from adapting his work - he is responsible for V for Vendetta, From Hell, and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Anyone who's had the misfortune of witnessing Extraordinary Gentlemen can probably understand his trepidation about Tinseltown.
Hollywood decided to move ahead without Moore's blessing, but they still couldn't find a way to make this movie. Directors as talented as Terry Gilliam (Monty Python, Brazil) tried, and failed. Then someone saw 300 and decided director Zack Snyder would be up to the task. I don't know why - 300 has some stunning action sequences and is visually impressive, but it is thematically shallow and somewhat of a Gladiator rip-off. These producers had faith, though, and they were actually right. It would be sweet and legitimate to sit around and complain about how Snyder ruined this timeless graphic novel (Snyder turns Ozymandias into a total weenie, for example), but I won't do that, because Snyder pretty much nails Watchmen.
The film opens with the death of the Comedian (Snyder's decision to show his death is the first of several departures from the original text) and a montage featuring most of his colleagues meeting their doom. We are in an alternate 1980s where Nixon is serving a fifth term, and it looks like someone is trying to exterminate all costumed heroes before staging a nuclear armageddon. The remaining superheroes resolve to find the killer and prevent a potential World War III.
Watchmen is the Citizen Kane of comic books; people thought the story was unfilmable. It didn't help that Watchmen's author, Alan Moore, is almost as reclusive as J.D. Salinger and equally as wary of Hollywood. Moore rocks obscenely long, hobo-status facial hair, worships an ancient snake god, and "has likened the cinema-going public to freshly hatched birds with mouths open as Hollywood feeds them regurgitated worms."
Moore's reservations about the silver screen haven't stopped movie execs from adapting his work - he is responsible for V for Vendetta, From Hell, and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Anyone who's had the misfortune of witnessing Extraordinary Gentlemen can probably understand his trepidation about Tinseltown.
Hollywood decided to move ahead without Moore's blessing, but they still couldn't find a way to make this movie. Directors as talented as Terry Gilliam (Monty Python, Brazil) tried, and failed. Then someone saw 300 and decided director Zack Snyder would be up to the task. I don't know why - 300 has some stunning action sequences and is visually impressive, but it is thematically shallow and somewhat of a Gladiator rip-off. These producers had faith, though, and they were actually right. It would be sweet and legitimate to sit around and complain about how Snyder ruined this timeless graphic novel (Snyder turns Ozymandias into a total weenie, for example), but I won't do that, because Snyder pretty much nails Watchmen.
The film opens with the death of the Comedian (Snyder's decision to show his death is the first of several departures from the original text) and a montage featuring most of his colleagues meeting their doom. We are in an alternate 1980s where Nixon is serving a fifth term, and it looks like someone is trying to exterminate all costumed heroes before staging a nuclear armageddon. The remaining superheroes resolve to find the killer and prevent a potential World War III.
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