WATCHMEN Movie Thread: Directors Cut is out (updated: deleted scene)

[devildog1776]

this movie was hot.. I really liked the story of each character and how they had there own inner problems while trying to solve the worlds problems...


can i get some feedback from y'all , I wanna to hear some analogies from you guys

 

[lifeismorethankicks]

Interesting movie, I liked it buy yea it did drag at times which made some people hate it.

Somethings I don't get:
Dr. Manhattan could of easily just destroyed all the nukes on the planet or the US could told him to remove nukes for every other country. He as basically godlike in the movie but other countries ignored that?

There must of been an easier way to scare the world with out killing millions, Dr.Manhattan could of made a threat or something else.

So after Dr.Manhattan was created your telling me other people and countries wouldn't try to recreate the process?

They should of had a backstory on the Comedian so people could understand why he is so horrible.

 

[illmaticsoulchild]

Just came back from seeing the Watchmen a second time. Here's my somewhat in-depth review.

First off, I just want to make one thing clear. When I first saw the Watchmen, it was right after re-reading the graphic novel. With that said, I basicallytried to compare and nitpick everything I saw on screen with what was in print. This time around, I was free of any Watchmen hype and viewed the film from theperspective of a non-Graphic novel reader and just took the movie for what it was.

Positives
The utilization of the long intro to show the original Minutemen was well done. The first couple scenes were very good and the accompanying music was superb.Sound of Silence during Blake's funeral, The Times They Are A-Changin during the intro and Unforgettable during the Comedian's death scene werefantastic. Moving forward, basically every scene with Rorschach was top notch. The Comedian's life told through the memories of other Crimebusters was wellinterpreted from the graphic novel. IMO though, the story of Jon a.k.a. Dr. Manhattan was my favorite backstory. I always loved it in the graphic novel, butjust seeing everything on screen, hearing his voice narrate through time and the ominous music really made the scenes perfect.

Negatives
IMO Carla Gugino should have played Silk Spectre II instead of I. Malin looked really out of her element and though she looked good for the part, shedidn't pull off Laurie at all. One of the main issues I had with the ending was the fact Dr. Manhattan was used as the villain. I mean, if you turn thesituation around and had Dr. Manhattan working for the Soviet's, as an American, wouldn't you begrudge them for using him as an instrument of war tobegin with? I just thought it was relevant plot hole that was left untouched. Next are the totally unnecessarily long fight scenes, the ridiculous stop motionand the violent nature of the film. Obviously the prison scene violence was warranted, but the other scenes, like the alley scene with Laurie and Dan and theaction sequences in Karnak were just pointless.

Disappointments
As off base as it may seem, I really would have loved to see the history of Nite Owl I (Mason). In the graphic novel there is so much told about his origin,how he got the name Nite Owl, the assembling of the Minutemen, it would have been nice to incorporate all of it into his own backstory. I know it has nobusiness in this movie, but there was so much source material for it, that I couldn't help think about it's absence. Another major disappointment I hadwas the lack of a final conversation between Manhattan and Ozy. Having Laurie deliver Jon's final lines was cheap and a disgrace IMO.

The Tales of the Black Freighter
Even though it was such a great part of the graphic novel, I am somewhat glad it didn't make it to the final cut. IMO, the entire story gave great insightto each part of the actual Watchmen story that it was mirrored by, but I really didn't see how Snyder could have pulled it off. I guess we'll see howit looks in a couple months...

Final Verdict
Just because you use the graphic novel as a storyboard and mimic everything to a tee, it doesn't mean things will translate on the big screen. IMO,different mediums require a different audience and mindset. When reading the graphic novel, I read one issue a day, sometimes two, really examining what wasgoing on as well as covering the "supplementary" pages after each issue. In contrast, the film is meant to be digested in one sitting where thingsare much more simplified and less dense. In the film you really can't get a feel of the magnitude of the fear from nuclear war, whereas in the graphicnovel, there is more and more buildup with each issue.

To be fair, I felt that Snyder did a solid job with the film. Could another director do better? Maybe. But without a doubt, no piece of film will ever stand upto the graphic novel. It's not a slight at the film industry, it's just stating the simple fact that books are meant to be processed differently thanfilms.

Standing by what I wrote in a previous post, I would have to give this film the same rating, somewhere between a 7.5 and an 8.

 

[that guy]

I'm reading the novel right now its pretty good so far

 

[eagle 0n]

^ I like Malin Akerman as eye candy, but I really can't stand her acting

 

[dabuddhawitjays]

They should have turned it into a porno with all those sex scenes.

I didn't like the movie. I didn't read the novel, but I shouldn't have to just to enjoy the movie.

 

[throwedindagame]

Originally Posted by RFX45

I wouldn't say it is complicated, especially the last part, but it isn't exactly laid out for you.
Bad guy is such a complicated term for this movie.
There's a bad guy in all of us? Who knows whats good or evil?

Pretty much. IMO, there were no bad guys in this film. Every character had their good and evil. The film flew over a lot of peoples heads. Aside from theobvious deconstruction of the traditional superhero, the other themes including society conflicts, human nature, definition of humanity, morality, etc. are alldone very well in this movie. A lot of parallelisms and symbolism. I love these types of movies and honestly this is not what I expected. I honestly prefer themovie ending to the graphic novel ending. Different means tot the same end, but I prefer how the movie arrived at that conclusion.

It's a shame that people were leaving early simply because there was "too much talking between fight scenes".

 

[barack 0drama]

Yo, Go see Watchmen again this weekend:

[h2]http://www.toplessrobot.com/2009/03/watchmen_is_in_trouble.php[/h2]

[h2]Watchmen Is In Trouble[/h2] [h2]Posted at 3:05 PM Mar 11, 2009[/h2] [table][tr][td] [/td] [/tr][/table]You probably don't care. Whether you loved the movie or hated it, it's out and it's done, and there's nothing anybody can do about it. Although the film grossed $55 million its opening weekend (a lot of money, but well short of the $70 mil Warner Bros. was hoping for) and looks to have a dramatic drop this coming weekend and afterwards, it shouldn't affect anything directly Watchmen related. Even if it's considered a financial flop, the only way Warner will be able to make the $150 mil spent on the movie (plus $50 mil for marketing [plus however much it owes Fox thanks to that lawsuit]) will be by hoping the nerd audience buys the expensive Director's Cut DVDs and the Black Freighter and all that junk.

So why should you care? Because Watchmen isn't about Watchmen anymore. Whether you liked the film or not, as I said on Monday, Snyder made a film directly for nerds and fans, and made it true to the source material as possible. If Watchmen tanks, that is the end of the very short-era of authentic comic books flicks, and likely adult ones as well. But don't take my word for it -- take David Hayter's, one of Watchmen's screenwriters (and voice of Solid Snake, randomly), word for it in an open letter to nerd he wrote on Hardcore Nerdity:

This is a movie made by fans, for fans. Hundreds of people put in years of their lives to make this movie happen, and every one of them was insanely committed to retaining the integrity of this amazing, epic tale. This is a rare success story, bordering on the impossible, and every studio in town is watching to see if it will work. Hell, most of them own a piece of the movie.

So look, this is a note to the fanboys and fangirls. The true believers. Dedicated for life.

If the film made you think. Or argue with your friends. If it inspired a debate about the nature of man, or vigilante justice, or the horror of Nixon abolishing term limits. If you laughed at Bowie hanging with Adrian at Studio 54, or the Silhouette kissing that nurse.

Please go see the movie again next weekend.

You have to understand, everyone is watching to see how the film will do in its second week. If you care about movies that have a brain, or balls, (and this film's got both, literally), or true adaptations -- And if you're thinking of seeing it again anyway, please go back this weekend, Friday or Saturday night. Demonstrate the power of the fans, because it'll help let the people who pay for these movies know what we'd like to see. Because if it drops off the radar after the first weekend, they will never allow a film like this to be made again.

I believe Hayter to be 100% correct. And unfortunately, most studio execs agree, From big sis Nikki Finke's analysis of the problem on Deadline Hollywood Daily:

Once the pic opened, "either you were familiar with the source material, or you had trouble following the bouncing ball," one studio marketing exec analyzed for me. Exit polling showed that the audience didn't really like the movie (as shown by a Cinemascore of only "B"). "Alan Moore always said that Watchmen the graphic novel couldn't be successfully made into a movie. Maybe he was right. Because, at the end of the day, Zack Snyder's slavish attention to detail in making Watchmen such a literal translation is what ultimately doomed the film. He cared more about the appeasement of the fanboys than in a cohesive, coherent movie meant for everyone."
...
Inside Hollywood, some studio execs blamed the Warner Bros brass for -- get this -- being too hands-off because Snyder had given the studio such an incredible success with 300 and the moguls just figured he knew what he was doing with Watchmen. "This may have been one of those times when you second guess," a Hollywood bigwig opines. "What distinguishes a great studio exec from every other studio exec is that they manage these filmmaker egos without letting them know they're being managed. But," the bigwig adds, "not everyone is Chris Nolan."

If Watchmen fails, but that mean we'll never get a good comic book movie again? No. But it will be virtually impossible to get a mature comic book movie made in the future. Worse, studio execs will feel they're justified in changing whatever they want from the source material in their attempt to "broaden the appeal." Which means the Deadpool Debacle all over again, or worse.

For all the talk of adapting Watchmen -- whether it be to modern times, the war on terror, or simplifying the story more -- I don't think any of it would have actually brought in more non-nerds. Mass audiences didn't know these characters, and they didn't know the comic. If they came in, they were expecting Batman or Spider-man, and instead got an incredibly complex tale of morality (which is why so many audiences seem to be walking out -- seriously).

We're really at a crisis point, people. If you want Watchmen to be a success, go see it again. and probably again after that. If you don't... well, understand that means you don't want any mature or authentic superhero stories being told in the movies in the future. I'm sorry that's the choice you've been given, but there it is. There's only one question that matters now: "Who Watches the Watchmen?"

 

[kidufc]

the ULTIMATE watchmen review

 

[devildog1776]

I slept in on it and I came with the conclusion was that Dr. Manhattan stood for the "GOD" thats society created...... He was man made , able to doevery and any thing had no featues of a specific race but was prevoiusly white (frame of mind) .... He said that" Im not GOD because Iam notomnipresent" ,

Rorshack was the good guy we all would love to be... had the dope jacket with the physicology mask, etc.... he had a mindset to get things done the right waylike most cats can relate to .....

I got to go get the book and see this flick again... I had all whole essay in my mind on this last night I might smoke a blunt and go check this out againtonite

 

[sdfbheat]

<------------------------ is that dude

 

[steppedoutadream]

V was better. Too much blue man nudity, it was distracting... I kept thinking of the blue man group.

 

[j671]

NEED TO WATCH ASAP

 

[chino905]

I went to watch it last night with my girl. I thought the movie was interesting. At first, I was confused because I didn't understand what was going on inthe intro, but it got better and better as the film went on. I definitely need to watch it again. My girl didn't like the film at all (not surprisingly).It was also sad to see that during the movie, a lot of people left. It went from a packed theater to half packed when it was over.

 

[cragmatic]

Saw again today for the 2nd time... wanted to catch it in Imax.... movie was much better on a second viewing.

I never thought I'd say this.... but for a near 3 hour film... it felt kinda rushed

Can't wait for the Director's cut

 

[long beach vincey]

Originally Posted by LifeisMoreThanKicks

Interesting movie, I liked it buy yea it did drag at times which made some people hate it.

Somethings I don't get:
Dr. Manhattan could of easily just destroyed all the nukes on the planet or the US could told him to remove nukes for every other country. He as basically god like in the movie but other countries ignored that?

There must of been an easier way to scare the world with out killing millions, Dr.Manhattan could of made a threat or something else.

So after Dr.Manhattan was created your telling me other people and countries wouldn't try to recreate the process?

They should of had a backstory on the Comedian so people could understand why he is so horrible.

Yeah I had a lot of similar questions relating to Dr. Manhattan after leaving the theater. I still enjoyed it immensely and was happy to know thatthere's a sliver of hope that comic books can be turned into a movie without having too much water mixed in. However with such a powerful character itannoyed me to come up with all of these little questions about his limits or if he had any at all. If he didn't have any limits, why couldn't he havejust destroyed all of their bombs before they could launch them?

Could he multiply himself infinity times.. meaning he could just have an army of himself so that could replace military/police/firemen etc.?

So many more questions about Manhattan but I can't remember right now.

[table][tr][td]illmaticsoulchild[/td] [td]
[/td] [/tr][/table]

Just came back from seeing the Watchmen a second time. Here's my somewhat in-depth review.

First off, I just want to make one thing clear. When I first saw the Watchmen, it was right after re-reading the graphic novel. With that said, I basically tried to compare and nitpick everything I saw on screen with what was in print. This time around, I was free of any Watchmen hype and viewed the film from the perspective of a non-Graphic novel reader and just took the movie for what it was.

Positives
The utilization of the long intro to show the original Minutemen was well done. The first couple scenes were very good and the accompanying music was superb. Sound of Silence during Blake's funeral, The Times They Are A-Changin during the intro and Unforgettable during the Comedian's death scene were fantastic. Moving forward, basically every scene with Rorschach was top notch. The Comedian's life told through the memories of other Crimebusters was well interpreted from the graphic novel. IMO though, the story of Jon a.k.a. Dr. Manhattan was my favorite backstory. I always loved it in the graphic novel, but just seeing everything on screen, hearing his voice narrate through time and the ominous music really made the scenes perfect.

Negatives
IMO Carla Gugino should have played Silk Spectre II instead of I. Malin looked really out of her element and though she looked good for the part, she didn't pull off Laurie at all. One of the main issues I had with the ending was the fact Dr. Manhattan was used as the villain. I mean, if you turn the situation around and had Dr. Manhattan working for the Soviet's, as an American, wouldn't you begrudge them for using him as an instrument of war to begin with? I just thought it was relevant plot hole that was left untouched. Next are the totally unnecessarily long fight scenes, the ridiculous stop motion and the violent nature of the film. Obviously the prison scene violence was warranted, but the other scenes, like the alley scene with Laurie and Dan and the action sequences in Karnak were just pointless.

Disappointments
As off base as it may seem, I really would have loved to see the history of Nite Owl I (Mason). In the graphic novel there is so much told about his origin, how he got the name Nite Owl, the assembling of the Minutemen, it would have been nice to incorporate all of it into his own backstory. I know it has no business in this movie, but there was so much source material for it, that I couldn't help think about it's absence. Another major disappointment I had was the lack of a final conversation between Manhattan and Ozy. Having Laurie deliver Jon's final lines was cheap and a disgrace IMO.

The Tales of the Black Freighter
Even though it was such a great part of the graphic novel, I am somewhat glad it didn't make it to the final cut. IMO, the entire story gave great insight to each part of the actual Watchmen story that it was mirrored by, but I really didn't see how Snyder could have pulled it off. I guess we'll see how it looks in a couple months...

Final Verdict
Just because you use the graphic novel as a storyboard and mimic everything to a tee, it doesn't mean things will translate on the big screen. IMO, different mediums require a different audience and mindset. When reading the graphic novel, I read one issue a day, sometimes two, really examining what was going on as well as covering the "supplementary" pages after each issue. In contrast, the film is meant to be digested in one sitting where things are much more simplified and less dense. In the film you really can't get a feel of the magnitude of the fear from nuclear war, whereas in the graphic novel, there is more and more buildup with each issue.

To be fair, I felt that Snyder did a solid job with the film. Could another director do better? Maybe. But without a doubt, no piece of film will ever stand up to the graphic novel. It's not a slight at the film industry, it's just stating the simple fact that books are meant to be processed differently than films.

Standing by what I wrote in a previous post, I would have to give this film the same rating, somewhere between a 7.5 and an 8.


That's a great post.

 

[cragmatic]

So I gotta throw this out there... what do you prefer... Watchmen or The Dark Knight... one of my good friends said he liked this better and my g/f preferedthis over TDK as well....

I enjoyed Watchmen, but IMO its no where near what TDK was. What do you guys think?

 

[kidufc]

Originally Posted by Cragmatic

So I gotta throw this out there... what do you prefer... Watchmen or The Dark Knight... one of my good friends said he liked this better and my g/f prefered this over TDK as well....

I enjoyed Watchmen, but IMO its no where near what TDK was. What do you guys think?

iron man > ALL

 

[cragmatic]

Originally Posted by kidUFC

Originally Posted by Cragmatic

So I gotta throw this out there... what do you prefer... Watchmen or The Dark Knight... one of my good friends said he liked this better and my g/f prefered this over TDK as well....

I enjoyed Watchmen, but IMO its no where near what TDK was. What do you guys think?

iron man > ALL

Really? I get bored watching Iron man after seeing it once

 

[kidufc]

Originally Posted by Cragmatic

Originally Posted by kidUFC

Originally Posted by Cragmatic

So I gotta throw this out there... what do you prefer... Watchmen or The Dark Knight... one of my good friends said he liked this better and my g/f prefered this over TDK as well....

I enjoyed Watchmen, but IMO its no where near what TDK was. What do you guys think?

iron man > ALL

Really? I get bored watching Iron man after seeing it once

really? it was better action, storyline.. and actors.. and plus iron man first movie > batman begins.. so it can only get better through thenext. ..but i guess to each his own..

let me add that, #+@# christian bale and that #!*+!#% stupid batman voice that he does.. its annoying.. still, batman is my top 5 favorite superhero movie

 

[rfx45]

TDK was good but like stated before, it's hard to be unbiased when it comes to Watchmen because of the book.
Also, Joker/Ledger lead the TDK with a great performance. If the Watchmen were a Rorschach movie, it might have been as good or better.
So for me, TDK > Watchmen, jsut because TDK is original in it's movie form while Watchmen wasn't.
Watchmen Novel > TDK Movie.

 

[impalaballa187]

Saw it a few hours ago. Movie was heat rock

 

[illmaticsoulchild]

Some bad news, the movie really tailed off in its' second week. Already down 60+% from the opening weekend sales. I really hope the lines of grit and sheerviolence can be seen by movie execs.. The Watchmen is a gritty story, but the additional extreme violence and nudity pushed it to an R rating. People make sucha big deal about comic book movies not pushing the envelope, but what's the point? The Watchmen is a great story by itself. Take away the gratuitousviolence and nudity and it's still a great story. I think many people think that for a movie to be "real," there needs to be some shock value init. But like I asked, "what's the point?" The only real warranted violence in the Watchmen were in the Rorschach scenes, and even then, toning itdown wouldn't have made that big a difference in the film. The Nolan Batman franchise is said to be a gritty and "real-world" view of the capedcrusader, but there's nothing grotesque about the films. It's unfortunate because Snyder was in a no-win situation. Sure, he could have went the Nolanroute and updated the story, made it more realistic and relateable, but then die-hard fans would have had his head for not staying true to the source material.Going this route, the fan-boys were definately pleased, but many non-graphic novel movie viewers were turned off by the film and felt detached from what wasgoing on. I mean, bringing up Vietnam and the Cold War had much different reactions from 1985 to 2009. I just hope movie execs. don't look at the Watchmenand think, "well, that didn't work, back to wholesome action hero movies."

Also, since someone asked,
Watchmen graphic novel > The Dark Knight story
The Dark Knight movie > Watchmen the movie

 

[long beach vincey]

Can't really compare TDK to Watchmen.

 

[crazy ebw]

Originally Posted by kidUFC

Originally Posted by Cragmatic

Originally Posted by kidUFC

Originally Posted by Cragmatic

So I gotta throw this out there... what do you prefer... Watchmen or The Dark Knight... one of my good friends said he liked this better and my g/f prefered this over TDK as well....

I enjoyed Watchmen, but IMO its no where near what TDK was. What do you guys think?

iron man > ALL

Really? I get bored watching Iron man after seeing it once

really? it was better action, storyline.. and actors.. and plus iron man first movie > batman begins.. so it can only get better through the next. ..but i guess to each his own..

let me add that, #+@# christian bale and that #!*+!#% stupid batman voice that he does.. its annoying.. still, batman is my top 5 favorite superhero movie

Iron Man did NOT have better actors than TDK as a whole. That's just a FACT.

Iron Man's story was decent, but you can argue about story between the two all day long.