Saturday, 13 February 2010

DVD: Watchmen (dir: Zack Snyder, 2009)


"There's no need for violence!"

Every frame of Watchmen the movie is lovingly crafted, from the detailed design to the frequently prowling camera and adventurous shots which draw in the viewer at every opportunity. The narrative structure uses the long running time to unfold in a consistently fascinating way, revealing insights and adding depth to an impressive range of story threads and characters. At turns, Watchmen is graphically visceral, poetic and challenging, staying within the confines of comic-book conventions without ever sacrificing a true filmic sensibility. The mythical alternate-timeline is carefully created through visual and sound concepts and sustained effectively throughout. The ensemble cast is superb, and even Matthew Goode's sightly underplayed Ozymandius does not detract from the film as a whole. A wonderfully eclectic soundtrack provides spot-on support and entertainment as the movie shifts through the decades. On DVD as in the cinema, the emotional tone of the movie is cool and technical, yet it retains the capacity to shock and surprise when required. Watchmen was never going to be a box-office blockbuster, so its moderate financial success is a great testament to its lack of compromise to the source material and its audience, and it seems a great shame that another movie venture into the world of Watchmen seems unlikely at this point.

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