Comments on: DVD Review: “Watchmen: Director’s Cut”

By: Business process automation

Business process automation — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 09:20:43 +0000

Thanks a lot for great thoughts!!

By: StevenErnest

StevenErnest — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:40:59 +0000

I thought Zack Snyder’s adaptation was wonderful. Of course there are a couple small things I could nitpick. The people who say it is too slavish a version, are the same people who would’ve complained if too many changes were made. I actually prefer the altered Squid ending.

I mainly miss the two Bernies. I read Snyder say that he filmed small in’s and out’s with them, to integrate with the Black Freighter footage. I miss the little touch of their discovering that they have the same names, and Bernie giving Bernie his cap.

This was a fantastic adaptation.

By: stewie

stewie — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 22:28:37 +0000

I watched the movies first. and as simply a movies i loved it. very surreal, violent and thought provoking. like Harry Potter one has to seperate the book from the movie and enjoy each for it own sake.

By: Rob

Rob — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 22:43:08 +0000

I loved the movie, but that is because the whole time I was reading the comic in my head and losing it over how each scene that wasn’t cut was as close to a moving version of the comic as possible.
The super-super slow-mo recreations of the old, faded 1940s superhero photos in the credits blew my mind, but may have been a metaphor about transposing still images into film. Visually stunning, but slow.
Yes, in the extendo-cut, The Black Freighter should be shuffled into place. It’s already been made, the extendo-cut has been made. It would be idiotic not to just put the whole kaboodle together for the fanboys like me. Fanboys don’t mind a 5 hour DVD movie.

By: kev

kev — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:27:05 +0000

Yeah, it’s funny how LOST basically built its whole format on what Watchmen was doing in the mid 80′s. A straight-up adaptation in 12 parts would have solved so many pacing problems that bogged the movie down.

By: staticblog

staticblog — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 18:40:43 +0000

I guess that makes me feel better about the whole exercise, but still — do it right the first time instead of these obvious half-baked releases for fun and profit.

I still wish this had been an HBO mini.

By: kev

kev — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 18:37:09 +0000

Here’s the link to details on the Ultimate 5 disc set:

http://bit.ly/19FYP6

I guess there’s a coupon so that people that buy the current director’s cut get $10 off the purchase of the Ultimate Set. So it’s not as egregious a double dip as some dvds have been in the past.

By: kev

kev — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 18:30:01 +0000

I read somewhere that at Christmas a multi-disc set will be released that contains the director’s cut with the Black Freighter footage integrated into the movie, plus the full animated comic that was sold on iTunes. So they’re double dipping here.

I’m looking forward to checking out the director’s cut. I’m sure it will be an improvement, but I can’t see how it could undo the problems I had with the film, namely its awkward music choices and the overall sense that Snyder couldn’t see the forest for the trees when it came to the major themes of the story. And that god-awful love scene.

It’s a weird thing. Snyder probably made the best movie adaptation of Watchmen that could have been made (barring a 12-part pay-cable series), but like you pointed out, his attention to detail almost serves to highlight the areas he got completely wrong.

Still, though, I stand by my original review that a flawed movie can never ruin a book, and the movie was worth it just for the conversations (and arguments) about its relative merits and weaknesses.