I didn't actually plan to go watch it. Well, I did at first, but then I found out that it was rated M18. So I complained about it a bit and resolved to buy the DVD. Then, I went out yesterday to meet up with Leonard and Jeremy, and we ended up watching The Watchmen.
The first thing about The Watchmen that really strikes you is how Dr. Manhattan doesn't like wearing stuff, and walks around naked for pretty much the entire film. There are these scenes where where you can see his glowing blue genitals clearly in the middle of the screen. Usually they're not in a position that says that you are intended to focus on them, but come on. You see the naked torso of a guy on the screen, what do you do? Check to see if he's really naked. After the first scene of that, you spend the rest of the movie wondering when the quantum phallus is going to appear again.
Also, imagine the guys on the CGI effects team who did Dr. Manhattan's glow. In order to have achieved a uniform glowing effect, they would have had to edit the scenes frame by frame, adding textures. Dr. Manhattan walks(and sometimes hovers) onto the scene fully unclothed for maybe a minute or two in the whole movie. Take 50 frames per second, that works out to... a lot of penis to edit.
I'm probably missing the point of the whole movie. I don't have a lot to say, except that it was awesome. I have only read four out of twelve of the graphic novels, so I can see that the beginning of the film was extremely faithful to the comic. Of course, everyone else says that. All the reviews include some comment about the film being too restricted to the graphic novel. I don't think that that's really an issue; would you have changed the plot of The Passion of the Christ?
The fight scenes were great. I really liked the way the slow-motion effects were implemented. I guess I'm still a sucker for bullet time. It also kinda reminded me of that first battle in 300.
If anyone wants the full plot, I have the graphic novel in digital form. It's really cool in the way that unlike regular superhero comics, there is no clear enemy. No supervillains with infinite supplies of henchmen or armies of giant killer robots. Instead, the whole thing is really about the struggle that humanity faced during the Cold War. Also other things, but I'm not that interested in literature, and I don't want to spoil the story for those who don't know of it yet.
Air hockey is awesome.
-Joe