Thursday, February 19, 2009

Watchmen Round-Up 2/19/09


With only a couple weeks to go, expect there to be tons of Watchmen news sprouting up every day.

Today, we bring you a whole bunch of goodies so get ready.

1. Courtesy of G4 - The first official Watchmen review

Some key points:

"Watchmen is not a bad film, but it’s not a great one either."

"I left the theater thinking, 'Well, it could have been a lot worse.'"

"Obviously, Snyder was shouldered with a difficult task. Watchmen is not an easy story to understand, although you can turn back the page and re-read something: The intricate layers of interpersonal relationships, the slow build up of action, deep characterization and back story. How do you fit all of that into a three hour film?

The answer is, you don’t. And Snyder didn’t. While it’s clear that great pains were taken to try and stay as true to the graphic novel as possible, this is almost to the film’s detriment. What the Watchmen ends up becoming is a series of enjoyables to watch, yet plot-bare vignettes featuring characters you know little about, unless you’ve read the book."

"All of this -- weird montages, no sense of time and place, little character development -- leads to the pacing of the movie being horribly off."

"As one girl put it to me after the movie ended, 'It was like I almost fell asleep and then boom! I was awake! And then it got all weird and sad, and I wanted to sleep again.' Ouch."

"While watching, I couldn’t help but think the people who didn't read the novel were probably completely lost. "

"...parts were enjoyable and boy, was it beautiful to look at. The cinematography was fantastic and it was amazing to see the images from the book come alive so vividly and with such painstaking precision. Great costumes and meticulous attention to detail gave the film an incredible visual appeal"

"Oh, then there were the fight sequences. Every time someone got punched in the face, I found myself wondering how they weren’t dead on first, brutal, vicious contact. Wonderfully choreographed and beautifully executed, no one can say that this film skimps on bone crunching. There are plenty of well-placed and -- dare I say -- classy moments of blood and gore that will leave you reeling and wanting more."

"Snyder also pulls amazing and genuinely heartfelt performances out of his actors. The cast is incredibly strong -- most notably, the pairing of Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach, and Patrick Wilson, as The Nite Owl."

"Other highlights include Jeffrey Dean Morgan as The Comedian, who brings sincere darkness to the role, and Billy Crudup as Doctor Manhattan."

"If there is one weakness in the cast, it’s the performance of Malin Akerman as Silk Spectre. Akerman’s performance sums up the entire movie -- great to look at, but hollow."

"Initially, I didn’t have a problem with its ending. Now, I’m starting to have a huge problem with it. Its ending doesn't carry the same kind of emotional weight or message as the book. It also seems forced. It’s less character-centric and more centered on creating big action."


Well. Okay. So I'm beginning to lower my expectations, that's fine! Listen. I know this movie will have problems. I just don't think I....care. Well, we'll see.

2. Courtesy of Io9 & Collider.com, six new clips featuring Sally Jupiter, a lot of the Comedian being a badass & parts of the Dr. Manhattan sequence I saw a couple months ago. Which, by the way, is gorgeous. Here they are for your viewing pleasure:













3. Courtesy of MTV, Zach Snyder explains why he is such a fan of slo-mo



So why does he like using slo-mo?

”[It] helps me to enjoy the face-smashing even more”


That's all for today, folks!

Are you nervous? Or do you not care and plan on enjoying it anyway?

5 comments:

Teddy Diefenbach said...

Cut to David referencing that Snyder "face-smashing" quote in the 36th comment of that "Hrmm.." thread.

david said...

but why reference it there when i can reference it HERE!!!

seriously snyder, poor yet characteristically disappointing form.

so here's another pretty negative reaction:
http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2009/02/that_whooshing.php

and now i'm just kind of bummed. as i said, i think this movie is an invitation for a lot of really interesting dialogue about pop art, and i have no interest in it being a total slog. believe you me, i don't take particular pleasure in pooping on the things that LQ loves, i just have a clinical inability to hide my true opinion / believe that acquiescing to a blind love of a property is like pop fundamentalism, and that the successes only mete out there true rewards after going through the grinder of sober analysis... the day i realized that bjork's most recent album wasn't really that great was among the darkest of my life... but that's another story for another time..* did i want to have serious beefs about the dark knight? no sir. do i want watchmen to rock socks so that LQ and i can dance in the kitchen betwixt our boxes of coraline (the happy middle ground of all things) merch that are strewn across our kitchen? yoouuuu betcha.

* seriously! she duetted with antony! TWICE! and still only okay. bah!

Teddy Diefenbach said...

It's debates like this that make me happy that I'm less emotionally invested in film than I am in games, or TV for that matter.

On a tangent, my wifey got me The 4400 full series on DVD for Valentine's (because she rocks), and I've been watching it. It's like Heroes before Heroes, and, so far, less disappointing than Heroes.

...Heroes.

david said...

uh... re: my earlier post, THEIR true words. geez.

and yeah, but if resident evil 5 disappoints me in any way it's gonna be chaos on this here blog.

also, why am i the worst street fighter IV player in all the land?

ALSO, my wife gave me... um... a new album to post about on this blog! ... annie clark is my wife, right?

right.

Teddy Diefenbach said...

You and I should have an "I'm worse than you at Street Fighter 4" competition. Smash Brothers has ruined all other fighters for me.