Dave Gibbons On the Forthcoming Watchmen Movie 181
An anonymous reader writes "Den Of Geek has been talking to comics legend Dave Gibbons about the upcoming transition of the Watchmen from the comic book to the silver screen. 'There are hardcore fans out there who'll be satisfied with nothing less than a word-for-word, line-for-line, scene-for-scene recreation of the comic book. I didn't believe that was ever going to happen.'" It's a rather short interview, but Gibbons addresses some interesting elements of both the movie and comic-book worlds.
Conversions (Score:4, Insightful)
Keep in mind, there wasn't a whole, whole lot of action in Watchmen, & a lot of the intricacies of the "superheroes" relationships will probably be glossed over.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Movie Adaptations (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not that it's impossible but it's just not necessary or preferable. If a movie gets the spirit of its source material, captures something of its style, and brings something new to it that could only be accomplished cinematically then it's probably a successful adaptation.
Re:Alan Moore doesn't do well on screen (Score:4, Insightful)
Appparently, he agrees.
Uh oh.
Re:Alan Moore doesn't do well on screen (Score:4, Insightful)
hear hear. (Score:5, Insightful)
hear hear.
Watchmen is a classic. It is my favorite classic. I still get it down and read it every now and then and it still makes me shiver.
My instinctive reaction to the film is "Noooooo!", but on reflection I then think of the "V for Vendetta" movie and I remember that it is possible to make a damn good film out of a graphic novel without following it exactly. I know "Sin City" is more or less a scene for scene clone of the book, likewise "300" - but it does not have to be like that. Vendetta showed us that.
Re:hear hear. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm glad to see that the first re-creation of the novel is attempting to recreate it as close to the intention as possible. I would also be happy if, in the future, someone took it as inspiration to create interpretations, but I really want to see the graphic novel itself on screen first.
Re:Conversions (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see how I, Robot is "garbage." Other than a large action scene that Asimov wouldn't've written in his books, the plot is entirely an Asimovian robotic mystery: the three laws (or four laws, as Asimov had in his later books) are completely integral to the plot; the clues are related to robotics and are visible to the viewer, instead of being hidden and revealed after the fact; and the societal impact of the technology is examined.
Even the actress they had playing Susan Calvin was the right age, and there was no romance between her and the main character.
It was a shockingly good science fiction movie.
Re:Conversions (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:I predict this will bomb. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Conversions (Score:4, Insightful)
I therefore judge it a pretty good movie by Hollywood blockbuster standards. I wonder if Hollywood will ever make a movie that is actually based on I, Robot.
Re:hear hear. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Conversions (Score:3, Insightful)
No, the plot is "Frankenstein". Asimov's whole motivation for inventing "The Three Laws" was to avoid falling into that literary rut, which was well-traversed back when he started writing and which is a bottomless canyon today.
I don't think the movie was garbage (hey, there's a reason Frankenstein was such a classic), but calling it "I, Robot" was just false advertising, even if the script subverted an Asimov idea while borrowing a couple character names.
Re:Alan Moore doesn't do well on screen (Score:2, Insightful)
Original: "There is no flesh beneath this mask, there is only an idea"
Movie : "There is more than flesh beneath this mask, there is an idea"
Yup. Expect it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Hollywood will glitz up the story, and gloss over the personal details. IMHO, it's the personal relationships that make the Watchmen such a good story. At its core it is a story about people, not action.
It'll be a shame to watch that take a back seat to special effects.
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Can't Fit in 90 Minutes (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, I nominate for deletion the entire novel-within-the-novel of the shipwrecked castaway. Every time that came up, I found myself flipping forward, looking for the main story to pick up again. In fact, it seemed all the extra characters who we saw passing by the newsstand in New York were just "whales" (q.v. Douglas Adams).
I would be very disappointed if Rorschach's backstory as told to the psychologist were cut. Some amazingly powerful and resonant stuff in there. "Looked at sky through smoke heavy with human fat and God was not there. The cold, suffocating dark goes on forever and we are alone. Live our lives, lacking anything better to do. Devise reason later."
Really, really good.
Schwab
Are you kidding? (Score:4, Insightful)
The only way to do include any of this sort of material be to do it on the cheap and raise independent funding. If you accept Hollywood's fat cash, you accept that they're going to make your movie as inoffensive and audience-pleasing as possible. Those are the strings attached.
Re:Conversions (Score:3, Insightful)
There's plenty of Heinlein to parody, from his need to put spanking in virtually every single story (including this one), to his literary lust for girls (not women) and multiple partners sex. Both would have pandered well to the movie watching audience, while giving Heinlein readers something to laugh at if it's done in an over-the-top manner.
Re:Conversions (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I predict this will bomb. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Alan Moore doesn't do well on screen (Score:4, Insightful)
The Justice League Unlimited episode based on his Superman story "For the Man Who Has Everything," was also excellent, partly because it excised a sort of pointless subplot.
Alan Moore is a good writer, but he also uses other people's characters and ideas, and tosses anything that doesn't suit what he's trying to tell. He's as guilty as anyone of screwing with originals to adapt them to his own taste.
Watchmen was based on old Charlton characters (Blue Beetle = Nite-Owl, the Question = Rorschach, etc.); V for Vendetta was strongly influenced by 1984; Supreme was based on Superman -- and he tossed the character's history to make his own version); Tom Strong is based on various pulp heroes; League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was based on various literary characters, and is not the first such pastiche by far (and it was an awful book); and Lost Girls was a pervy take on fairy tales. Even Top 10, probably my favourite thing he's done, makes innumerable references to other works, and I'm not sure how much it was influenced by Astro City.
Moore really is good, and Watchmen is his most important work, so I hope it's adapted well. (It really came along at the right moment; the world was ready in the 1980s for a serious deconstruction of superheroes.) I've only seen stills so far but they really seem to capture the right mood and look. But his work is not flawless, and it's practically as derivative as the movies it inspired.
Re:Alan Moore doesn't do well on screen (Score:3, Insightful)
In the book, he ends up forming another gang, but grows tired of it, as he's growing up and wants a better life. It leaves me with a sense of the redeem-ability of even the worst humans.
In neither book or film does he really learn anything up to the deconditioning. Only in the book does he understand that he ultimately wants life to be different. Granted, that movie was made a while ago. If someone tried to make it today, they'd probably turn it into a romantic comedy with Tom Cruise, Kristin Dunst, and Eugene Levy.