After a great deal of hype and a legal battle that threatened to derail it entirely, the movie adaptation of Alan Moore's Watchmen finally hit theaters this weekend. Although if you weren't aware of the original comic, you wouldn't know it was Alan Moore's Watchmen, because Moore refused to take any money for the adaptation, nor did he allow his name to be attached to the film.Considering the quality of the movie, it seems a bit odd that Moore would distance himself so intently from it, but I suppose that's his prerogative. The script proves very faithful--sometimes even too faithful--to the original material, even including frame-by-frame reproductions of parts of the comic.
The weaknesses regarding the story's women are still there, though the ending, which came off as a bit ridiculous in the graphic novel, has been tweaked to fit much more smoothly into the feel of the rest of the story.
The weakest part of the movie is, conversely, the strongest part of the comic. While Dr. Manhattan's ruminations on his "all times are the same" mental processes in the comic are masterfully rendered, in the movie they're somewhat confusing and slow down an otherwise fast-paced film.
Performance-wise, Watchmen is a bit weak. The strongest showing comes from Jeffrey Dean Morgan, as the amoral Comedian, who carries those parts of the film in which he appears. A close second is Billy Crudup as Dr. Manhattan.
