Watchmen, not your usual superheroes

Image: Letterboxd

It’s 1985. In the United States, Richard Nixon has settled into his fifth term as President. Globally, the Cold War is about to reach its climax as the US and the USSR are at a standoff, their nuclear weapons ready and aimed to annihilate each other. The US, of course, has a secret weapon – Dr Manhattan, a superhero who can control matter and may possibly be able to stop the USSR’s nuclear missile attack and save the US from destruction.

Other superheroes have retired – some too old or dead; some living ordinary lives; some living their last days in asylums. Crime fills the streets and homes of ordinary people – especially one that has ex-superhero Rorschach’s hackles up. For, this crime is the murder of Edward Blake – the erstwhile superhero known as the Comedian, a member of a group of six superheroes who used to be called the Watchmen.

But very few people know that. So, Rorschach smells a rat and starts his own investigation of the Comedian’s murder, dropping in on his old cronies (both ex-superheroes and villains), and recording his progress in a journal. Watchmen – British writer Alan Moore’s 1986 graphic novel turned into film by American director Zack Snyder in 2009 – tells the story of Rorschach’s investigation of the Comedian’s murder from this journal, travelling across the globe, across timelines and even to outer space.

Unlike most Superman, Spider Man or X-Men films, Watchmen is not a film for adolescent/teenage boys and girls. The film’s content is definitely for adult viewership, with scenes of strong graphic violence and, in instances, sex (parts of it were censored for Indian audiences). However, the film is impressive, with great cinematography and special effects; and some great 1970’s music (Bob Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel, Jimmy Hendrix, and others).

And, of course, the tension of the investigation continues until the very end: Who killed the Comedian? Why was he killed? What happens now? What happens after?

But most importantly, Watchmen shows us the dark side of superheroes; their pasts and their penchant for vigilantism. Watchmen portrays our superheroes as far from being the perfect human beings we hero-worship. Rather, they are troubled characters, full of flaws, trying to redeem themselves and improve the world they (and we all) live in. In Watchmen, Rorschach is a wonderful embodiment of this dark superhero… and my favourite.

A few things did bother me about the film. First, at two and a half hours, Watchmen tended to be long. Second, the plot, and its switching back and forth through flashbacks, was a little confusing at times. And third, the characterisation of the superheroes – the Comedian, Rorschach, Dr Manhattan, Nite Owl II, Silk Spectre II and Ozymandias – was somewhat weak. Still, in my mind, these failings weren’t enough to stop Watchmen from achieving epic status.

Watchmen is directed by Zack Snyder and stars Jeffrey Dean Morgan (the Comedian), Jackie Earle Haley (Rorschach), Billy Crudup (Dr Manhattan), Patrick Wilson (Nite Owl II), Malin Akerman (Silk Spectre II) and Matthew Goode (Ozymandias).

15 Park Avenue: fragmented narrative

Image: Media India Group

The fictional landscape in a fragmented narrative has been an experiment with post-modern writers and filmmakers for many years. The European school with writers like Umberto Eco and Italo Calvino, as well as filmmakers like Jacques Rivette of the French New Wave and, later, David Lynch from the US, are all masters of this narrative technique.

In the fragmented narrative, mastering the interplay between reality and dream, weaving the plot around the characters, is not an easy task and requires a special virtuosity. Since the presentation of the fictional landscape is a subjective one, often directly connected to the mind of the characters in the story/film, many of the stories/scripts deal with situations where the characters themselves create the fictional landscape. David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive (see my previous post) is a perfect example of this where the plot shifts seamlessly between dream and reality.

Indian filmmaker Aparna Sen had used this technique in her film 15 Park Avenue – an exploration of schizophrenia in a young woman. I found the film quite insightful (and informative) as it dealt not only with a schizophrenic person, with the usual interplay of dream and reality happening all around her, but the film also presented the emotions and reactions of the onlookers – the schizophrenic person’s family and friends – which was another version of the reality. The question of which version is the reality and which version is the dream was masterfully handled by Aparna Sen… right until the end.

Of course, some confusion remains.