Storytellers Unplugged for March

[truepenny]

Post here.

It's about the movie of Watchmen, which we just got back from seeing. There aren't any spoilers.

There is a spoiler here, though.


The movie made several changes, most--although not all--of them for the better (at least in terms of meeting the storytelling needs of its particular medium). But the one that just filled me with glee is that when Laurie accidentally activates Archie's flamethrower, she's not down in Dan's basement cleaning. She's snooping. [ETA: buymeaclue, a more alert reader than I, points out that Laurie's snooping in the book, too. Mea culpa!] And she doesn't press the button for the flamethrower because she thinks it's the cigarette lighter. She presses the button for the flamethrower because she wants to know what it does. My inner twelve-year-old tomboy is so vindicated.

Also, while all the casting is eerily perfect and the performances likewise, Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach is solid-state awesome.

Comments

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

I like the snooping, but...they used to fight crime together, no? She's been in Archie before. She knows there's a flamethrower. So she really ought not be surprised that pressing a button-with-flame-on-it in a closed space is not the best idea she's ever had in her life.

ETA: Actually, just had a look back at the comic; she's snooping there, too.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Actually, it's not at all clear that they did fight crime together. Adrian's attempt to revive the Minutemen was a dismal failure, and insofar as we see Laurie with anyone else in flashback, it's Jon. And we see Dan with Rorschach and the Comedian. I don't think, in either the book or the movie, that there's any indication Laurie's been in Archie before or that she has any reason to know there's a flamethrower.

You're right, though. She wasn't cleaning; I'd remembered that wrong--I think because of the weird white apron-thing she's wearing and the emphasis on the dust.

[lurker-lost.livejournal.com]

Not sure if you've seen this but. This is the most brain-breaking parody ever (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDDHHrt6l4w&eurl=http://lj-toys.com/?journalid=4015101&moduleid=3&preview=&auth_token=sessionless:1236488400:embedcontentiurl=http://i2.ytimg.com/vi/YDDHHrt6l4w/hqdefault.jpg) XDDD

[liveavatar.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, is that ever deliciously painful.

(can't shut out those images of Rorschach)

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

SO DISTURBING. SO WRONG. OMG. SCARRED FOR LIFE.

[jazzfish]

OH DEAR GOD MAKE IT STOP

[neutronjockey.livejournal.com]

An aside here: saw Watchmen this afternoon with the fiance... big theatre screen, maybe 10 people. But I watched a couple come in with their 8-10 year old daughter and I'm like, WTF?! I'm not about censorship, but seriously, Watchmen is not a movie or graphic novel for kids...most adults won't get the social/political commentary.

What I did really like about the movie was the overlying message about human depravity --- deep into Am. Lit these days all I could think of is how the movie plays heavily to early Puritan/Calvinist sentiments...

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Moore has a strong Puritanical streak. (The human depravity motif is even stronger in the book than movie, iirc.) And of course the only characters whose heads we get inside to any serious degree are Dr. Manhattan and Rorschach, one of whom is a big disapproving blue god (or, you know, crippled by PTSD and disassociation, depending on your interpretation of him) and the other of whom is so deeply fucked up on the subject of sex--among other things--that it makes it impossible to get a clear view.

One of the things that makes Watchmen a dystopia is that Rorschach, who clearly is way out there on the lunatic fringe, is more right than wrong.

[neutronjockey.livejournal.com]

I was severely dissapointed by the lack of concrete development of Silk Spectre II's psychology on screen. I don't really feel they played to her motivations very well, they painted a picture of her emotional needs...but not so much her struggle with mother dearest.

I think they did a pretty fair job of painting Rorschach as someone who sees in B&W without making him an emotionally unreachable sociopath. He was redeemable, and in the end really his inability to compromise was admirable. The PTSD and disassociation can go hand-in-hand.

[themagdalen.livejournal.com]

a big disapproving blue god (or, you know, crippled by PTSD and disassociation, depending on your interpretation of him)

<3 <3 <3.

(for you and for Dr. Manhattan, both)

[cassiphone.livejournal.com]

I had blocked out the cleaning part obviously. I didn't remember that at all, so didn't register it as a change. But yay for snooping.

Hee I totally read that scene as not her wanting to know what the button does, but her already knowing and DOING IT ANYWAY.

I do love that Laurie has so much more agency in the film, and that we get to see her joy of being a superhero as well as her original motivation of doing it to please her mother.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

As buymeaclue points out above, I was wrong about the cleaning. It's been a long time since I read the book. I apologize.

Laurie DOES have more agency in the movie, and I also enjoyed that very much, but I think Moore and Gibbons were actually trying to make a point about how much being a superhero wasn't Laurie's choice or her desire, that she was forced into it by her mother, and that that damaged her.

In general, I found that where the movie failed to be true to the book was in its failure (or refusal) to deconstruct superheroes. The scene where Nite Owl and Silk Spectre take out all those rioting prisoners (a.) isn't in the book and (b.) is unabashed superhero porn. And Nite Owl has a swirly fluttery superhero cape, of exactly the type that gets Dollar Bill killed. (I kept hoping they'd have a scene where a bad guy grabs the cape and it just detaches, but if they did, I missed it.) The sense of irony is missing. I don't think this makes it a failure as a movie, but it is one place where the book's subtlety and complexity were left behind on the page.

[lee-in-limbo.livejournal.com]

I'm hoping not to be too disappointed with the truncated subtlety when I go to see it with my wife. I've been a bit of a Moore acolyte for some time now, but I haven't felt as poorly about most of the movie adaptations of his work to date (except LXG; that truly was horrible. Not even Sean could save that train wreck) as he has, even though I've been very aware of the liberties various movie makers have taken with his stories. From Hell and V For Vendetta mostly work, for my money. I'll be content if they managed to achieve the same sense of cohesion and attention to detail with Watchmen as those other films enjoyed. It may not be hailed as the second coming, but so far, I've found (most of) the Alan Moore adaptations to still be the best comic book adaptations of the lot.

Lee.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I didn't think Watchmen was quite as good as V, but it was infinitely better than From Hell. (And it was obviously throughout that they were very aware of the parts of the book they had to leave out; this movie was clearly made by people who love the novel very much.)

Let us not speak of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

[onewiththequill.livejournal.com]

I haven't read the graphic novel (though I will as soon as I can get my hands on it), but I adored the movie. Rorschach is the new love of my life, and his friendship with Nite Owl made me all melty inside.

[sovay]

Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach is solid-state awesome.

I do keep hearing this.

[britmandelo.livejournal.com]

I agree about Haley as Rorschach--gives you the chills sometimes, in that good way.