MICHELLE JUERGEN | editor-in-chief
Who watches the watchmen?
I watch the watchmen. Or rather, I watched Watchmen this Saturday and came away thinking, I think I really liked this movie, but I’m not sure.
After letting that thought marinate for 24 hours, and looking at the word “watchmen” so long it felt like it was spelled wrong, I’ve decided I love the movie—with one reservation.
I’ve been anticipating this fi m for a while. Every time I saw the preview and heard Muse’s “Take a Bow,” I wanted to pee my pants (I didn’t). I read the graphic novel and was completely enthralled with it. I was ready.
Watchmen is the only graphic novel to be named among Time magazine’s “100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present” or to win the prestigious Hugo award. It is considered to be the greatest graphic novel of all time.
Written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons, it was originally published by DC Comics as a 12-comic book series between 1986 and 1987 before being collected into a trade paperback, according to Warner Brothers, the production company for the film.
Watchmen opened in theaters on Thursday, March 5. It had made $55.7 million in ticket sales as of March 8 and currently claims the top spot at the box offi ce, making it the biggest opening fi lm of 2009 so far.
According to Chairman and President of IMAX Filmed Entertainment Greg Foster, Watchmen sold out on all 124 IMAX screens it was playing on during the opening weekend and was the second largest opening in company history behind The Dark Knight. This marks another huge success for Watchmen director Zack Snyder. His previous film 300, based on the graphic novel written and illustrated by Frank Miller, grossed $70 million in 2007.
I wasn’t prepared for how depressing the movie translation of the novel would be. It’s not like destruction, violence, and America on the brink of war are happy things if they’re on paper and drawn in bright colors, but there was something about the translation of the graphic novel into a film that made the subject matter much darker.
Fans were worried Snyder wouldn’t be able to successfully transform the novel into a movie. Snyder, however, stuck closely to the
novel, with a few changes here and there. His consistency with the original story impressed me.
The differing ending seemed to work well for the film version, and the stellar performances of Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach/Walter Kovacs and Billy Crudup as Dr. Manhattan/Jon Osterman brought the comic to life.
There is a feeling of nihilism that runs through the film—these heroes are trying to establish and keep order in the chaos of humanity, but in the end, life seems meaningless and undirected to most of them.
The characters all have different worldviews: Rorschach has black-and-white values, believes humans are savage by nature and that truth prevails, even if it disturbs peace; Dr. Manhattan embodies a dark side of science (“A live body and a dead body contain the same number of particles…Life and death as unquantifi able abstracts. Why should I be concerned?”); Ozymandias/Adrian Veidt is supposed to be one of the smartest men on the planet, but he scorns humanity and justifi es the destruction he inflicts with the end result of peace between nations, seeing himself as their savior.
Jeff McLaughlin, author of Comics as Philosophy, believes the Watchmen heroes all seek to answer the ultimate question: If there is no God, who will save us? According to McLaughlin, the characters are heroes because they embrace the nihilism while nonetheless seeking a path beyond it.
Overall, Watchmen plays up the wretchedness of human beings at the expense of human greatness.
“The times they are a-changin” sings Bob Dylan over the opening credits, perfectly encapsulating the establishment of the backstory of the watchmen.
Changing they were. The graphic novel combines real elements of the ’70s and ’80s—political and societal—with the superhero story. Watching actors portray the hopelessness associated with these changes left me feeling burdened.
I think the film itself, the graphics, cinematography, philosophy behind the story and acting, was amazing. It left me feeling conflicted though—awestruck, but depressed.
Who watches the watchmen? Who can save the saviors? Does Watchmen offer an answer to this? I’m still asking.
