Blast - Comic-con 2008: All eyes watching “Watchmen”

Comic-con 2008: All eyes watching “Watchmen”

SAN DIEGO, Calif. — Many have called the comic book series “Watchmen” unfilmable. With the exclusive footage Comic-con attendees were shown at Friday’s event, director Zack Snyder (”300″) is proving otherwise.

Snyder said that when Warner Bros. approached him about making a “Watchmen” movie as he wrapped production on “300,” he was initially hesitant, but he realized that if he refused the movie, it would pass on to another director who might not create a good translation of the novel.

“If the movie for whatever reason didn’t turn out, it still would have been my fault,” Snyder said of his decision to make the film, which will be released March 6, 2009.

Previous tries by directors such as Terry Gilliam, Darren Aronofsky and Paul Greengrass came up empty as they tried to recreate the world of “Watchmen” in modern times using current political tensions, but Snyder tried to stay as true to the original as a two-and-a-half-hour movie can to a 416 page graphic novel.

“Making a movie about the war on terror and [modern politics] seemed really wrong in a lot of ways to me,” said Snyder. “It’s cooler if people go, ‘Oh hey, this makes me think,’ instead of me telling people what to think.”

“Watchmen” is the only graphic novel to be listed on Time Magazine’s 2005 list of “the 100 best English-language novels from 1923 to the present.” It tells the intertwined stories of a group of unwanted superheroes; Rorschach, The Comedian, Dr. Manhattan, Ozymandias, Silk Spectre I and II, and Night Owl II, from their numerous perspectives throughout various time periods. “Watchmen” dates itself as it is set in an alternative future where the United States won the Vietnam War (thanks to Dr. Manhattan), and Nixon is serving his fifth term as president.

Snyder acknowledged that while the movie will remain similar to the comic series in many ways, some aspects of the “Watchmen” world will have to be changed for the sake of length.

“You’re going to end up with some stuff that’s not in [the original story], but that’s just how it is,” Snyder said.

More important than the segments that might have been cut are the subtle parts of “Watchmen” that Snyder left in. While cavalier directors may have considered getting rid of character development for the sake of large action scenes, Snyder said that he left out a lot of the big blockbuster action attractions in order to have more of the story elements.

The four minute montage of clips that Snyder presented exclusively to the audience showed evidence of his attention to detail. The scene in which Rorschach discovers that the murdered Edward Blake was in fact the Comedian includes a brief shot of a photograph of Laurie Juspeczyk, a connection to later events in the Watchmen storyline. A light bulb flashes and Sally Jupiter rubs her eyes as she stands in her Silk Spectre outfit in a scene that matches frame for frame with the graphic novel. A Vietnamese woman slashes the Comedian’s face with a broken bottle in a scene that reveals just how cruel the Comedian had been in his life. All of these clips are of events small enough that they could have been cut, but significant enough to diehard fans like Snyder that they weren’t.

Even a shot of Dollar Bill lying dead after he got his cape caught in a revolving door surrounded by police was in the series of clips, and that was a scene that had only been mentioned in the supplemental material included in the novel compilation of the series.

Snyder said that he was especially proud of how his actors absorbed the mythology of “Watchmen” and how well they kept their characters consistent with the book.

The actor who had the most difficult time slipping into character was Billy Crudup (”The Good Shepherd”), who is playing the omniscient, blue, and completely computer generated Jon Osterman (superhero alias Dr. Manhattan). Instead of a costume, Crudup had to wear a skin-tight suit with motion sensors covering it so that a computer could capture his movements and make them Dr. Manhattan’s. He said that it took weeks before costar Malin Akerman (”27 Dresses”), who plays Manhattan’s love interest Laurie Juspeczyk (superhero alias Silk Spectre II) to look at him without bursting out laughing.

“I wasn’t the only one,” Akerman said in her defense.

“Dr. Manhattan is like nothing I have a frame of reference for,” said Crudup. “How do you play [Dr. Manhattan] while you’re a five-foot-nine, 40 year old jackass playing dress up?”

“Changing my molecules … that’s stuff they don’t teach you in drama school,” he said.

Jackie Earle Haley (”Semi-Pro”), playing Walter Kovacs (superhero alias Rorschach), said that he learned the most about his character not from the comic book but from the blogs where fans discussed Rorschach’s intricate and nihilistic character.

“I felt like stepping into my costume and sticking a cigar into my mouth definitely helped in getting me in the mood to kill people,” said Jeffrey Dean Morgan (”P.S. I Love You”) with a laugh. Morgan plays Edward Blake (superhero alias The Comedian), the epitome of the antihero.

Matthew Goode (”Brideshead Revisited”) not only became mentally involved in his character, he made up an in-depth backstory for Adrian Veidt (superhero alias Ozymandias) as well.

“Regardless of what’s in front of you, you still have to flesh the character out,” said Goode of getting into the mindset of his character.

Veidt’s backstory was only slightly delved into in the “Watchmen” graphic novel, but Goode took what was given and expanded it so that his Veidt’s parents were Nazis and that Veidt is pursuing the American dream as an adult. That is why Goode uses two separate accents in his portrayal of Veidt; an all-American accent for his public persona and a hint of German in his private one.

Instead of having to get in shape for his superhero, Patrick Wilson (”Little Children”) had to sit on his sofa and eat the fattiest foods he could find in order to take on the role of the flabby, depressed, but most likeable character of the “Watchmen” superheroes; Dan Dreiberg (superhero alias Night Owl II).

“You always pull for Dan,” said Wilson. “Dan’s down, but he has this light in him. He’s all these really negative words, but when you look at the first few frames [of the novel]; it’s a whole different level when you see the artwork.”

As a surprise appearance, Dave Gibbons, the artist who created “Watchmen” with writer Alan Moore, spoke at the Comic-con panel about his visit to the set in Vancouver, Canada.

“It’s the stuff of dreams, really, to have something step out of your head and become real,” said Gibbons.

He spoke of the surreal aspect of being able to smell The Comedian’s cigars and see him showing off his guns; actions that Gibbons himself had originally created.

What Gibbons really appreciated he said was the amount of graffiti splattered across the set. Graffiti played a pivotal role in the art of the novel, and featured the first appearance of the now famous quote, “Who watches the Watchmen?”

Gibbons has a signature mark; a ‘G’ with a square around it, that the set makers plastered all over the walls with the other graffiti.

“When I see the movie, it’s like it’s got my signature on it,” Gibbons said.

Unlike Snyder’s 2006 hit “300″, “Watchmen” will be using relatively little CGI backgrounds. The only scene where the actors had to perform against a green screen was when they were filming Mars.

“It’s kind of expensive to shoot [on Mars],” said Crudup.

One of the major reasons why “Watchmen” hasn’t been turned into a movie since its creation, beyond its alleged “infilmability,” is the story itself. It does not have relatable characters; in fact, it does not necessarily even have ‘heroes’ and ‘villains,’ because all of its characters are morally ambiguous in some way.

The ending of “Watchmen” is controversial in the fact that the terrible act which occurs is left unresolved. Snyder has admitted in previous interviews that he has not deviated from the original ending.

“What is darkness in a movie?” Snyder asked the audience. “We never really thought about the overall ‘Oh my god this movie is so dark!’ You have these overall optimistic characters in the book [who are] a reflection of all of us. There is no real answer. It becomes up to you. Is it a metaphor or is it real? I think that’s the question of ‘Watchmen’.”

Snyder said that he expects to see a change in trend of the type of superhero movies that are created after the release of “The Dark Knight” and then March’s “Watchmen.”

“Superhero movies, comic book movies; they don’t exist just as summer popcorn blockbuster movies,” said Snyder. “Serious directors and serious actors are making serious movies. I think that there is a new wave of superhero movies coming. … We made a movie that had to be self-aware and yet not acknowledge that it is.”

Writer Alan Moore has taken his name from the film adaptation of “Watchmen”, which he has done previously in the adaptations of his works “From Hell”, “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen”, and “V for Vendetta.”

“I really wish he hadn’t had such a bad experience in the past,” said Gibbons, “because I’m having a great experience right now.

Terri Schwartz is the entertainment editor of Blast Magazine.

In Comic-con 2008, Entertainment, Features, Movies on July 26, 2008 at 18:04