That’s right, I went to see Watchmen tonight.

Now, Alan Moore is apparently really pissed off about this film… Pretty much for the exact same reason that he’s pissed off about the movie adaptions of all this other films. I’m going to be honest here, I haven’t actually read all of Watchmen yet. I started reading it, and half way through book two, heard there was a movie coming out. I thought to myself “Moore always complains about the film adaptions of his books, so this time, I’m going to see the movie first, so what’s a good movie in its own right won’t actually be ruined by the book”. The logic being that if I read the book second, the superior printed form makes me appreciate the movie and the book all the… moore. I will now go out and buy the “absolute edition”. I recommend you do the same. Apparently it contains Moore’s rebuttal to the flick.

Back on topic. What was the big change?

The ending, but other than that… the size of Dr Manhattan’s dick.

See, apparently, in the series, Dr Manhattan has this tiny, inneffctual penis, like Michaelangelo’s David. This is to make some grandiose statement of how amazingly emasculated and ineffectual he is as a human being, even though he’s got all these godlike powers. I don’t know, he managed to pull some tail that looks like Lucy Lawless, only much younger and hotter, and then have a foursome with her entirely on his own. That seems pretty effective as a male to me. But no, apparently the giant dick, circumcised dick, he now sports for the majority of the film undermines all of this, because no he’s fully omnipotent… Which I can’t show you either, because there seems to be some kind of internet conspiracy where not only can I not find his dick in the movie, most of the shots of it from the comic are censored by the bloody Smiley button. This is in juxtaposition to the Nightowl who can’t even get it up unless the chick he’s with has just beaten someone senseless and is wearing latex and CFM high heels.

I actually question how different that is from most guys that watch internet porn in the first place actually.

Either way though, this is what has Moore afroth. Gee man, if you hate Hollywood so much, stop fucking selling them your scripts. You bitched about 300, and complained about how Tarantino was the only person that understood your vision for Sin City. Eisner’s probably glad he’s dead so he doesn’t have to listen you bitching about what they did with his stuff… Not that you’re reading this, but hey.

Seriously, anyone could have told you that this film wasn’t going to be sticking to the original script with 100% faithfulness the moment the advertising team thought it would be a good idea to give out big blue condoms in matchstick packets as a promotion. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that maybe the creation is no longer the sole work of the original creator at this point.

The fact of the matter is that this is a good movie in its own right. Sure, it doesn’t stick 100% to the source material, but you know what? It’s not fucking terrible. It’s actually pretty fucking good. This is nowhere near the kind of textual and theatrical rape that was Michael Bay’s first foray into Transformers (thank the Matrix that the second film is looking half decent).

Fact of the matter is that some films actually are on par with their source material, whilst being radically different. StarShip Troopers comes to mind. The original was Heinlein’s crackpot views on civil service and a citizen’s franchise. The film was an action packed masterpiece on the futility of war with an enemy you refuse to understand. Some movies are even better than their source material, like Blade Runner and Total Recall.

And some movies simply stand up as good movies in their own right, and people would fucking love them if they didn’t say they were based on something, like Super Mario Bros.

Even so, what I believe to be the main point of the novels was still present. That even in heroes, there is no absolute good, and still great capacity for evil. Most of them are amazingly fucked up characters. Rorschach hits the nail on the head when breaking into Dr Manhattan’s joint when he queries why so few of them are mentally balanced and still alive. The greatest hero of them all decides that the best way to save a world is to kill millions, and the only true superhero decides that he has no place and to just leave. Admittedly, if I were suddenly a supreme being, I doubt I’d have enough left in common to sympathise with my fellow man, but the premise thatVoidt brings, that Rorschach can’t deal with, is that what is Just and what is Right can be, and often are, two totally separate things.

Rorschach dies for this because he cannot live in a world that isn’t just. Dr Manhattan leaves (in the film) because he cannot continue to do what is right.

The point is that no adaption will ever be like the source material! The director and D.O.P don’t really know what’s going on in the head of the author, even if they authored a comic that kind of gives a shot for shot run down of how it should go. The film version of Adaptation is proof enough of that.  So long as the core argument or ideology of the original text remains, what does it matter if there are details that are changed? The characters and sequence of events are merely devices for conveying an idea, not the idea itself.

There are some things that it’s not worth getting worked up about when you’re the one that let it happen in the first place by selling away the rights.

A giant blue cock really isn’t one of them.

Will Eisner is arguably one of the most genius comic creators of our time, with a wicked sense of humour and irony. So who better to create a movie based on one of his most famous pulp serials, than another comic creator with a wicked sense of irony and the artistic, right?
Well, wrong actually.

Check the trailer here

The Spirit is a good movie, but whether it’s like the original comic that spawned it is up for a very long debate. The problem here is that it is, through to its spirit, a Frank Miller film. Perhaps not quite as stylised as Miller’s comics, and his cinematic take on Sin City
Problematically, Miller basically takes over the franchise in this manner, with slick CGI visuals that are amazingly ‘noire’. Fake environmental effects, fake lightning effects, a tie that could go head to head in a fight with Spawn’s cape from his own film… Well, you get the picture.
The casting was a bit odd too. Whilst the characters manage to pull off the amazingly hammy acting required of film-noire, they themselves don’t seem to fit the roles.
Samuel Jackson as “The Octopus” really doesn’t work for me, even though he does manage to act decently enough. I suppose it’s because I expect him to conclude that what was inside Marcellus Wallace’s briefcase was Jason’s Golden Fleece (That’ll make sense when you watch the movie). But where it really doesn’t work, and starts stepping into Tarantino Territory is when Miller actually casts himself in a cameo role.
Sorry Frank, you’re no Tarantino. You’re a great cartoonist, but Tarantino actually makes films that look different from each other. The only thing that stopped 300 from falling into this trap was that you forgot to add the iPod colour filter.
I realise I’m being negative here, but this is because this is one film that really didn’t live up to its source material. Hellboy managed this with a fair degree of aplomb. Maybe you should start doing some projects with Mignola to get reeled back in.

So I’m not really sure whether I recommend this movie or not.
Let’s put it this way: Did you like the film adaptation of Dick Tracey or The Shadow?

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