comment #1

DarthCorleone says ...

Trust no one with any kind of deep-rooted, strongly Catholic investment in geek fanboy culture.

I'm sorry. That line made me laugh. I realize it's only in reference to opinions about Watchmen, but I can't help but think of it as some sage, somber warning against ever listening to me or my ilk. (And of course this geek fanboy couldn't help but think of X-Files with the "Trust no one" line in bold.)

comment #2

BurmaShave says ...

I can't get over how BATMAN & ROBIN those masks are. But what else could they do I guess.

comment #3

DeafBrownTrashPunk says ...

Burma, me too, I dislike those Batman and Robin masks, ugh, couldn't they have tried to make those masks a little more distinct???

comment #4

Circumvrent says ...

Drew and Harry's reviews don't feel like raves to me. I know that's how they read on the surface, but there's also plenty of words devoted to how the book's been compromised, certain changes were made, how it's a wholly separate entity from the book, etc. I'm sure these guys would be the first to admit that the HOLY SHIT THIS IS A FUCKING WATCHMEN MOVIE feeling hasn't yet faded.

The newest issue of WIRED has a Watchmen piece with reactions with Joss Whedon, Brian K. Vaughn, and John Hodgeman. Hodgeman had the best line: he said that the Watchmen movie won't succeed unless it finds some way to acknowledge that it has no real reason to exist. Vaughn has the runner-up quote, saying that creating a movie out of Watchmen is like making a stage play out of Citizen Kane.

comment #5

Kyle_D says ...

I've got to agree with the final Wells comment. I count Devin as one of the better film writers on the internet, but even he has been too invested in the comic's fandom to give what I'd consider a truly objective response. I'm sure his review is honest, and his reaction will probably be shared by many of the book's fans. Since it looks like that's primarily who Snyder was aiming to please, perhaps he's succeeded. For the rest of us, however? I just don't know. I read the graphic novel and respected it for what it was trying to do, but frankly, the narrative itself never grabbed me, nor did it grab any of my friends who read it after the fanboy quadrant hyped it up as the new Crime and Punishment.

Those Hodgeman and Vaughn quotes pretty much nail my attitude toward the movie: the graphic novel was, first and foremost, a commentary on the medium. Like Alan Moore, I'm afraid that commentary won't transfer over to film, and instead, all the melodrama and pseudo-philosophy that's barely tolerable on the page is just going to turn the thing into a giant snoozefest for anyone who doesn't already have a vested interest.

comment #6

Ghost072 says ...

"rancid, embargo-ignoring, anal-ecstasy fanboy piece"?

Really? Aren't we putting just a little too much into this? The graphic novel was good, overrated I think, because it was one of the first to stretch beyond the usual constraints of the form, but all the movie has to do is be a GOOD MOVIE. If anything, fanboys will be harder on this one than usual, so why shouldn't we listen to their opinions, along with everyone else's?

I love your site, Jeff, and I come here every day, but sometimes you take a very strange angle on things. Just relax and see the movie. There are a lot worse filmmakers than Zak Snyder in this world. Give the guy a chance.

comment #7

D.Z. says ...

"I know there are people out there that want an adapted work to play like a radical auteur take on existing material. That works for Batman, but not these characters."

You do know Watchmen's a "radical auteur" take on comics like Batman, right?

Jeff: "I say again that only non-vested straight-talkers who were never that into comic book geekdom can be trusted on this movie. It may be a great film, or a very good or deeply stirring one, but only the pure of heart and the culturally uncommitted can determine this. Trust no one with any kind of deep-rooted, strongly Catholic investment in geek fanboy culture."

Fortunately, I'm not a fan of the source material. So I'll either like it as a film, or I'll hate it as a TDK/300 cash-in.

comment #8

CleftClips says ...

On board with Wells' final comment in this post. Most of the early reviews and reporting on the movie lean towards some sort of defense of the idea of the movie and not the movie on it's own merits. Truly odd.

Probably the fate of the someday-in-the-future produced A Confederacy of Dunces movie.

comment #9

Devin Faraci says ...

Jeff, for the record, I've earned the eternal ire of the comic book fanboy community for my repeated editorials about the idiocy of Batman, the broken nature of the superhero and the impending death of monthly comics. While certainly one who speaks the language, I wouldn't count myself as someone who follows the religion.

The irony of your warning, though, is that your takedown mentality is just as zealous as the perceived fanboy reaction. You think the fanboys have an agenda - so do you. It's to see this movie be torn apart. I'm not quite sure why, but it's pretty obvious.

Ironically, the hardest core fanboys will be there right with you. Any change to their holy text is a cause for teeth gnashing and righteous indignation, so they hate this film just as much as you do, and they hate it just like you do without having seen it.

Here's why you should like it: The film is resolutely non-commercial. It makes no concessions to the audience. Tonight someone described it as Kubrickian to me, and I agree - the film, like the book, is very interested in ideas and themes ahead of all else. You should be getting behind this movie because it's not a film that bows down before the low thread count types, that doesn't walk them through it, that doesn't allow passive viewing. You have to be engaged, otherwise you'll drown in the sheer volume of information and ideas.

comment #10

LYT says ...

Fanboys are just as likely to be harsh to this as not.

I'm a huge fan of Moore's V for Vendetta...but I was NOT kind to the movie at all.

On the other hand, I enjoyed the hell out of Batman and Robin, taking it as an overblown version of the Adam West TV show rather than anything remotely resembling the current comic incarnation.

And Dark Knight was my favorite movie of last year. But I do agree that for someone like our host here, a non-geek rave is the only thing likely to persuade. And if I get to take a plus-one, I will do my best to ensure that person doesn't know the source, so I can get a clean-slate take to consider.

comment #11

EdHavens says ...

Questions to the peanut gallery: Is every net-based critic automatically a geek? Can some of us be trusted to give an honest appraisal of the film, even if we genuinely liked or loved it, or are we doomed simply because of the way we get our thoughts out?

comment #12

moorish says ...

Devin is dead right - Wells' desire to take Watchmen down (perhaps seeing it as emblematic of a genre he on the whole dislikes) is as obvious, and as zealous, as the fanboys who will post raves about it regardless of any problems it may have as a movie.

comment #13

Ray says ...

A question: Has Wells seen this movie yet? It seems to me that he hasn't, and has been merely posting the reactions of others. So while he has certainly been leaning toward negative reactions, I don't think it's entirely fair to pile on him .. he hasn't reviewed the film yet to my knowledge.

I do think this film looks to be divisive and polarizing, although perhaps in the opposite way that 300 was a few years back. That film mostly appealing to mouth-breathing video game junkies whose brains had been fried into crispy, air-filled pork rinds; it simply doesn't work as a FILM.

THE WATCHMEN seems to be appealing to the opposite end of the sme spectrum: thoughtful comic book people who are yearning for a deeper experience at the cinema ... basically the same demographic that made THE DARK KNIGHT the go-to movie experience last year and singlehandedly pushed it into Oscar consideration.

I must say, the reviews of Devin and Mori have me a bit more excited about this film than I had been previously.

comment #14

DavidF says ...

I think Ray kinda hit the nail on th head.
JEFF STILL HAS NOT SEEN THIS MOVIE

So, really, he does not KNOW if it's good or bad. He's just guessing and, worse, guessing based on what other people are saying rather than any first-hand observation beyond the trailers.

I don't see why a "fanboy"'s opinion is any less valid than Jeff's They both have their biases about comics and films - otherwise there would be only one critic, or none, right? Jeff's argument that Devin's opinion is suspect because he understands the source material seems a bit specious to me.

I'm seeing it early next week and I'm happy that, at the very least, there isn't a consistent sense that Snyder has blown this thing. It might not get nomianted for Best Picture but it doesn't sound like the complete fuck up it could have easily been so if people want to debate where it falls between those extremes, go for it - BUT SEE THE MOVIE FIRST.

comment #15

KC says ...

"anal-ecstasy," for fuck's sake why don't you just be straight about it and say "faggot-assed"

comment #16

storymark says ...

"The irony of your warning, though, is that your takedown mentality is just as zealous as the perceived fanboy reaction. You think the fanboys have an agenda - so do you. It's to see this movie be torn apart. I'm not quite sure why, but it's pretty obvious."

So very true. And the more Jeff protests, claiming he has no agenda, the more obvious it is.

comment #17

MovieBob says ...

Devin:
"The irony of your warning, though, is that your takedown mentality is just as zealous as the perceived fanboy reaction. You think the fanboys have an agenda - so do you. It's to see this movie be torn apart. I'm not quite sure why, but it's pretty obvious."

Chalk it up to fear of aging, or the new, or irrelevancy. Wells is a sharp cultural observer, so I'm guessing he can see that the writing is on the wall i.e. that, as far as the cinema biz is concerned, the Geeks have inherited the Earth.

The last MAJOR upheaval in American (and, thus, WORLD) film was when the Movie Brat Generation (Coppola, Spielberg, et al) - the first gen of kids who'd gone to full-fledged Film School - came to prominence and "big movies" changed from what they had previously to the "new" concept of the Jaws/Star Wars/Godfather Blockbuster - i.e. big-budget versions of the kitschy stuff they'd loved as kids that made them want to be filmmakers in the first place. It was a big cultural shift, and A LOT of the old-guard critical press just couldn't get with it.

What's happening now is similar (Tarantino and Rodriguez were the 'first shots' - the Coppola and DePalma if you like): Tons of the edgiest, freshest indie kids coming out of Sundance and film school want to 'grow up' and make movies about elves or Iron Man. MICHEL GONDRY is doing Green Hornet for fuck's sake! And if your part of the current old-guard press who just doesn't LIKE these whole genres regardless of quality (or will never give them a chance) your realizing that you won't be able to escape them just by avoiding mainstream cash-in tentpoles: They're ALSO all over prestige flicks like Watchmen or LOTR, and in defining-moment smashes like TDK.

Ironically, given his political bent, I think Wells is very much a "Sarah Palin voter" when it comes to the "geek" genres on film: Resistant to change, terrified at the realization that the world is passing him by.

comment #18

DavidF says ...

Good point, Moviebbob. Your post reminds me a bit of an interesting thing Edward Norton talks about on the Fight Club commentary track.

He talks about how inspired he was reading a review of (IIRC) The Wild One, by Richard Schickel. The review talked about how great and important the movies was, even if the old folks didn't get.

Schickel (if that's who it was) slammed Fight Club and Norton was disappointed he had, without realizing it, become one of those old people who didn't understand when the next wave came.

I know this is an endless cycle but a lot of factors - blogs, the facination with pop culture etc - are really accentuating it this time. Jeff should be clever enough to see through it, but he hasn't yet.

comment #19

D.Z. says ...

LYT: Batman and Robin might have worked, even as a campy flick, if Schumacher wasn't so obsessed with turning it from an action movie into a costume party.

MovieBob: Comparing TDK to the stuff from the 70s is arrogant, since no filmmaker from that era would ever be spending that kind of money on that kind of a production in the first place. Hell, they'd probably view it as a bloated and culturally devoid object of scorn, much like Cleopatra and Barbarella, or, in present terms, Phantom Menace. And Tarantino and Rodriguez don't innovate; they just cut-and-paste whatever they saw on VHS or at a grindhouse. The real auteurs of that era were exploring different ideas in film, not just inserting in-jokes into every shot like Family Guy.

As for Gondry on Hornet, he probably got hired, because the studio didn't get the irony of "Be Kind, Rewind"; and it'll probably pay dearly for it when he starts believing his own hype. We're going to be getting another Catwoman and/or My Super-Ex Girlfriend, guaranteed.

comment #20

MovieBob says ...

DZ
"MovieBob: Comparing TDK to the stuff from the 70s is arrogant, since no filmmaker from that era would ever be spending that kind of money on that kind of a production in the first place."

...are you kidding?

The second the Movie Brats were able to command major budgets, that's EXACTLY the kind of productions they were spending it on. Lucas made a megabudget Flash Gordon successor. Spielberg made a monster movie. Coppola made a gangster flick (based on what was regarded as a mere pulp novel, btw) DePalma did a horror flick. Richard Donner closed-out the 70s spending MILLIONS on Superman.

comment #21

D.Z. says ...

Bob: Actually, those flicks were fairly cheap for their time. Superman's probably the only exception, and I'm betting a big chunk of its cost went to prior re-writes and re-casting sessions from the Salkinds.