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After over twenty years in the making, the greatest graphic novel of all
time finally reaches celluloid. Guided by Zach Snyder - the man who brought
300 to life - Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’s groundbreaking work is a dense,
multi-layered, and often nihilistic look at America in a parallel 1985.
Richard Nixon is still President, having passed a bill that saw him
re-elected five times - but needless to say, things are not going well.
America stands on the brink of nuclear war with Russia, and mass panic is
beginning to saturate the streets. With the Doomsday clock edging ever
closer to midnight, The Watchmen, a group of costumed vigilantes who have
retired, partly reform to investigate the murder of one of their former
brethren - the vicious and extremely right-wing Comedian (Morgan). What
unravels is a deeply complex, but frighteningly intelligent plot that
explores the background, motivations and sometimes moral ambiguity of each
and every one of the group, as a conspiracy unfolds that will shake the
foundations of humanity. From the vicious opening scene in which The
Comedian is murdered, to the beautiful title sequence that condenses decades
of back-story and subplot into a mere few minutes, you know you are in store
for something truly special with Watchmen. It takes balls to do what Synder
has done here; delivering a film that is almost endless in terms of scope
and ambition, as well as one that will also appeal to those oblivious to the
source material is no mean feat, and he does so without shying away from the
complicated material, too.
This is not Iron Man, or even The Dark Knight -
it’s something even more visceral and multi-faceted. It is, without a shadow
of a doubt, the best comic adaptation to ever grace the big screen. Snyder
has taken the brilliance of the book and amped up the action, sex and
violence, giving fans exactly what they wanted: a fiercely loyal take on the
material that they all hold so dear. Everything is spot on, from the
aesthetically accurate casting, to the moody ambience and grubby visuals of
a mid-’80s Manhattan. It is a long film at over two and a half hours, but
there is an awful lot packed into that time - it could have clocked in at
well over three hours, and still not manage to include everything. Watchmen
works as a character-driven action flick, and as an adaptation of one of the
best pieces of literature of the past twenty-odd years. Some critics will
undoubtedly not ‘get’ this, and you may need to see it more than once to
take everything in. As it stands, however, this is a stunning cinematic
offering that demands to be consumed by an intelligent, responsive audience.
Add comment March 2nd, 2009
