Although I didn’t care much for V for Vendetta, I am, overall, a fan of Alan Moore. Indeed, this blog even has a link to an Alan Moore site. Watchmen is arguably his magnum opus, and the movie version of the book did not disappoint.
What I particularly enjoyed was the comic-book quality the director created through his cinematography. This was most evident in the opening scenes, particularly in the murder of the Comedian, but it was reinforced throughout the film—perhaps most memorably in the exaggerated, long-nosed, almost cartoon-like depiction of Richard Nixon.
Rorschach was by far the most intriguing of the Watchmen. The work done on his shifting mask adds enormous character to a superhero who has discarded moral relativism and sees the world in terms of a fairly stark dichotomy between good and evil. He is an uncompromising opponent of everything he perceives as wrong, and in this respect, he possesses a moral intensity that far exceeds that of the more detached and almost robotic Dr. Manhattan.
In true Alan Moore fashion, the story is filled with subplots and competing character arcs. Nite Owl faces his own personal struggles, Silk Spectre II undergoes a kind of coming-of-age process, and Rorschach must confront the demons that have shaped his personality. All of this unfolds against the backdrop of a Cold War spiraling toward the possibility of nuclear apocalypse.
The result is a film that continually moves in unexpected directions while maintaining a genuine sense of suspense.
Some conservatives have criticized Watchmen for its violence. That the movie is violent is beyond dispute. However, the violence takes place within an extraordinarily dark universe in which humanity is confronting some of its worst impulses. Much of the violence, therefore, serves the larger narrative rather than existing simply for its own sake.
I also found it interesting that Rorschach confronts violence and evil head-on rather than attempting to rationalize them away. His uncompromising worldview—and, I have to admit, his occasional rants against what he sees as leftist thinking—made some of his scenes particularly entertaining to me.
Ultimately, Watchmen succeeds because it is much more than a conventional superhero movie. It is a dark exploration of morality, power, politics, psychology, and the consequences of trying to impose one’s vision of justice on an imperfect world.
Definitely a must-see.
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