watching the detectives-- er, watchmen
Mar. 9th, 2009 08:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
topazWatchmen: a damn fine piece of entertainment. I have never gone fanboy over the graphic novel, so it was never likely that I would be offended by the filmmakers' failure to capture the ineffable whatever -- on its own terms it was just pretty cool.
Whenever someone tells you that something, especially a comic book, is supposedly "unfilmable"? Yeah, me too.
Mostly I think![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
happyfunpaul nailed it in his review. His criticisms of the movie are well founded, but they didn't bother me as much as they did Paul.
In particular, I loved their use of Cohen's "Hallelujah" during the Silk Spectre/Nite Owl sex scene. I agree withcrouchback that it was deliberately ironic. Did no one else notice that instead of one of the endlessly imitated, ethereal covers of "Hallelujah", they used the unbearable, bombastic, gravelly Cohen original? That touch had me laughing out loud, and I don't think it was an accident. I really didn't have a problem with the music in the movie in general.
Jackie Earle Haley is spot on. I actually think he makes a better Rorschach than the one in the book. I never quite bought the baby-faced Walter Kovacs as the single-minded, psychotic antihero. Haley makes him believable.
Like Paul, I didn't buy Matthew Goode's Ozymandias so much. He spent most of the movie acting as if he'd been rudely awakened from a nap. I didn't get much of a sense that he was a guy who could build the world's dominant financial empire. Maybe in 1997, while the movie was in turnaround, someone wrote in the margins "Like Marc Andreessen!" and no one realized to fix it in time.
Actually, given Haley's link to Breaking Away, Goode's resemblance to Dennis Christopher is a little eerie. I kept expecting to see Daniel Stern pop out of the wings and offer some shave-and-a-haircut commentary.
mangosteen, lifecollage and I laughed out loud when Laurie took out the paper coffee cups on Archie, and I think anyone else who grew up in or spent significant time in New York will understand.
Anyway, I had buckets of fun but I wasn't taking the movie too seriously to begin with, and recommend that you don't either. It's a great ride.
Whenever someone tells you that something, especially a comic book, is supposedly "unfilmable"? Yeah, me too.
Mostly I think
happyfunpaul nailed it in his review. His criticisms of the movie are well founded, but they didn't bother me as much as they did Paul.In particular, I loved their use of Cohen's "Hallelujah" during the Silk Spectre/Nite Owl sex scene. I agree with
crouchback that it was deliberately ironic. Did no one else notice that instead of one of the endlessly imitated, ethereal covers of "Hallelujah", they used the unbearable, bombastic, gravelly Cohen original? That touch had me laughing out loud, and I don't think it was an accident. I really didn't have a problem with the music in the movie in general.Jackie Earle Haley is spot on. I actually think he makes a better Rorschach than the one in the book. I never quite bought the baby-faced Walter Kovacs as the single-minded, psychotic antihero. Haley makes him believable.
Like Paul, I didn't buy Matthew Goode's Ozymandias so much. He spent most of the movie acting as if he'd been rudely awakened from a nap. I didn't get much of a sense that he was a guy who could build the world's dominant financial empire. Maybe in 1997, while the movie was in turnaround, someone wrote in the margins "Like Marc Andreessen!" and no one realized to fix it in time.
Actually, given Haley's link to Breaking Away, Goode's resemblance to Dennis Christopher is a little eerie. I kept expecting to see Daniel Stern pop out of the wings and offer some shave-and-a-haircut commentary.
mangosteen, lifecollage and I laughed out loud when Laurie took out the paper coffee cups on Archie, and I think anyone else who grew up in or spent significant time in New York will understand.Anyway, I had buckets of fun but I wasn't taking the movie too seriously to begin with, and recommend that you don't either. It's a great ride.
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Date: 2009-03-09 01:20 pm (UTC)It's been way too long since I've seen Breaking Away; I love that movie.
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Date: 2009-03-09 05:03 pm (UTC)