Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut
by Eric Matthies, Jake Strider Hughes, Zack Snyder
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Actor: Billy Crudup, Carla Gugino, Jackie Earle Haley, Malin Akerman, Patrick WilsonDirector: Eric Matthies, Jake Strider Hughes, Zack Snyder
Brand: DC Comics
Writer: Alan Moore
Writer: Alex Tse
Writer: Dave Gibbons
Writer: David Hayter
Writer: Hans Rodionoff
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Box set, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Special Edition, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.77:1
Running Time: 215 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2009-11-10
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Model: 1000109986
Studio: Warner Home Video
Product features:
- Multi-disc set. Real-world super heroes must emerge from retirement to solve a murder of one of their own, in the shadow of nuclear armageddon. Directed by Zack Snyder (300). Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut is the version never seen in theaters, integrating the animated Tales from the Black Freighter into the Director s Cut of the film for a more in-depth experience, with 2 all-new commentaries by Zack
DVD Reviews of Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut
DVD Review: Perfect Adaptation
Summary: 5 Stars
Until March 6, 2009, it had been almost ten years since a good movie was last released.
I say 'good' movie, not 'movie I liked,' because I've seen a few movies I liked in the spaces between 2000 and 2008. The last 'good' movie that was released was Mary Harron's adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' "American Psycho," a movie that should have won an Oscar for best directing. But after that, I've been hard-pressed to see a movie that was truly 'good.' Post-9/11 movies seemed to tone down on story and crank up unnecessary special effects. Even the movies that won Oscars in the post-9/11 years weren't very 'good,' in the sense that they weren't memorable. I'll give you an example of a 'good' movie: The Godfather. The Godfather, whether you like it or not, is a good movie. There is no question that a high amount of care and love was put into that movie, and even if someone found it boring, or hated it, it is still a good movie, and nothing can change that. Regardless of what people may think, there is a very fine line between fact and opinion-- it is an opinion to dislike a film like The Godfather, but it is stone cold fact that The Godfather is a good movie, regardless of opinion. This brings me to the first good movie I've seen in the post-9/11 years...
Zack Snyder, best known for his adaptation of Frank Miller's "300," started directing late in life with his remake of George A. Romero's 'Dawn of the Dead,' now the Dawn of the Dead remake might not have been true to its source material, it may not have been a 'good' movie, but I enjoyed it, even more so than 300. But things started heating up in 2006, when Warner Bros announced a big-screen adaptation of Alan Moore's "Watchmen," a graphic novel that had been in the process of being made into a movie since 1988. The project went through several writers and directors, most noticeably writer Sam Hamm of 1989's "Batman" and director Terry Gilliam, who directed the movie 'Brazil.' Over the years the project was deemed 'unfilmable' by various directors, who all found themselves quitting the project. But finally, after a long uphill battle of writing and roundtable discussions, Zack Snyder was brought on board to do a rewrite of the script and direct the project. It was finished in 2007, but the film wasn't released until 2009, after a long lawsuit between Fox and Warner Bros, over who would get the distribution rights to the film. Thankfully, Warner Bros won the dispute, and Fox was cast back into the darkness, cut off from the Watchmen Franchise.
I saw the movie the day it opened, March 6, 2009. I'd read the graphic novel prior to seeing the movie, which made me a bit skeptic at the idea of adapting a project so massive and intricate, but after seeing the theatrical cut, I was blown away by the simple, yet complex film which told the story of the Watchmen in under three hours. It was, without question, one of the best book-to-movie adaptations I'd ever seen, and everything in the movie was done right (a lot of people dispute the slight ending change, but seriously-- a giant squid?) from start to finish. I've only seen maybe, one, other movie that was as true to its source material as Watchmen, it's called "The Godfather." All this I got from just the theatrical cut alone, which I saw in cinemas, twice. It had been ten years since I went to see a movie more than once in theaters, I enjoyed it that much. Since then a director's cut was released, but I did not buy it, because it was soon after announced that an 'ultimate cut' would be released, complete with the comic-within-the-comic as a cartoon, "The Tales Of The Black Freighter," sown back into it, making the film about three and a half hours long, the 'true,' version of Watchmen. Recently I ordered it, and am awaiting its delivery to my home. Watchmen is a shining example of both excellent writing and outstanding film-making. It's action-packed, thought-provoking, it has colorful characters and is set in a world of extraordinary circumstances. It's a good movie.
I recently ordered and received a copy of The Ultimate Cut of Zack Snyder's "Watchmen." Needless to say, it's fantastic. It weaves together the Director's Cut of the movie with the animated segments called 'The Tales of the Black Freighter,' completing the Watchmen experience, making it a nearly literal adaptation of Alan Moore's wonderful graphic novel. Whereas the theatrical cut gave us an abridged look at the Watchmen and their lives, the Director's cut expanded upon that, and The Ultimate Cut expands even further, with the movie-in-movie cartoon, which symbolizes the journey that the characters go through individually and the struggles they endure.
In reference to the title of this review, the film is a perfect adaptation; it uses anachronisms skillfully in order to slim down the overall weight of the book and like any adaptation, it adds certain elements that are either not in the source material, or are merely hinted at in said source material. The most noticeable in this movie would be the scene where, and yes, we're talking spoilers, where Doctor Manhattan kills Rorschach and Nite Owl sees it happen, which throws him into a fit of rage, making him beat up Adrian Veidt, who concocted the whole scheme to blow up several cities full of innocent people around the world in order to prevent nuclear war. But even if a Watchmen fan didn't like these little anachronisms, they were indeed necessary to the film's development, especially for modern audiences, who watch movies like "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen," which have little to no plot or engaging material whatsoever. But I digress. As said, it's a perfect adaptation.
One thing you should know is, and a lot of people have complained about this-- is the ending is tweaked significantly. Allow me to explain. In the book, Ozymandias' grand master scheme was to send a genetically engineered squid into Manhattan to kill people in a giant explosion, thus uniting the world against a common enemy-- an 'alien' threat, but of course it wasn't really an alien, it was something Ozzy had created, but he intended for everyone to believe it was an extraterrestrial. In the movie it's a far more believable plot device: Adrian frames Doctor Manhattan and unites the world against him in order to prevent nuclear holocaust. The book and movie both end the same way, however, with Rorschach's journal in the newsroom of The New Frontiersman, where Seymour (maybe) picks it up and publishes it for all the world to see, possibly dooming humanity once more. In conclusion, Watchmen is one of the best movies I've ever seen, it has everything you could want in a movie, action, violence, romance, sex, good music and it's incredibly thought-provoking. If you've never heard of Watchmen, I suggest going to your local comic-book store and picking up a copy, then seeing The Ultimate Cut.
It's an experience you'll never forget.
Description of Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut
The Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut is a new and final version of the blockbuster film from Zack Snyder. This version weaves Tales of the Black Freighter into the Watchmen Director?s Cut film that makes this the perfect gift for every die hard fan of the graphic novel.Everybody's favorite graphic novel comes to the screen (after years of rumors and false starts), less a roaring work of adaptation than a respectful and faithful take on a radical original. Watchmen is set in the mid-1980s, a time of increased nuclear tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, as Richard Nixon is enjoying his fifth term as president and the world's superheroes have been forcibly retired. (As you can probably tell, the mix of authentic history and alternate reality is heady.) Things begin with a bang: the mysterious high-rise murder of the Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), a masked hero with a checkered past, puts the rest of the retired superhero community on alert. The credits sequence, a series of tableaux that wittily catches us up on crime-fighting backstory, actually turns out to be the high point of the movie. Thereafter we meet the other caped and hooded avengers: the furious Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley), the inexplicably naked Dr. Manhattan (Billy Crudup, amidst much blue-skinned, genital-swinging digital work), Silk Spectre II (Malin Akerman), Nite Owl II (Patrick Wilson), and Ozymandias (Matthew Goode). The corkscrewing storytelling, which worked well in the comic book, gives the movie the strange sense of never quite getting in gear, even as some of the episodes are arresting. Director Zack Snyder (300) doesn't try to approximate the electric impact of the original (written by Alan Moore--who declined to be credited on the movie--and illustrated by Dave Gibbons) but retains careful fidelity to his source material. That doesn't feel right, even with the generally enjoyable roll-out of anecdotes. Even less forgivable is the blah acting, excepting Jeffrey Dean Morgan (lusty) and Patrick Wilson (mellow). Watchmen certainly fills the eyes, although less so the ears: the song choices are regrettable, especially during an embarrassing mid-air coupling between Nite Owl II and Silk Spectre II as they unite their--ah--Roman numerals. In the end it feels as though a huge work of transcription has been successfully completed, which isn't the same as making a full-blooded movie experience. --Robert Horton
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