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Is Watchmen the Next Dark Knight?
Beyond that, Watchmen is no Iron Man. While that Marvel comic wasn’t familiar to every moviegoer, the film was an accessible origin myth introducing globe-trotting arms dealer Tony Stark, who was easy to embrace. That movie grossed $582 million worldwide because it was entertaining and emotionally rewarding fun. Plus, it had the enormously charismatic Robert Downey, Jr., and the eminently bankable Gwyneth Paltrow and Jeff Bridges.
Watchmen, on the other hand, stars a non-marquee-name cast in movie that lacks a traditional action through-line. It is set in a noirish ‘80s alternative universe where world history has been changed by the existence of superheroes. Big blue Dr. Manhattan (Billy Crudup) is the Watchmen’s only super-human being. He and the other vigilantes are flawed, even sociopathic or insane, and often engaged in outlaw activities. The US government led by Richard Nixon, still engaged in the Cold War with Russia, deploys Dr. Manhattan to win the Vietnam War. The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) is an amoral mercenary who assassinates John F. Kennedy and rapes Silk Spectre (Carla Gugino). Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley) is another lawless, ruthless killer. Are audiences ready, right now, for a dark movie that says that the only way for the world to get better is to destroy society and then rebuild it?
Finally, unlike the PG-13 Iron Man, Watchmen is R-rated, not only for its bone-crunching violence—extreme enough to repel most potential female viewers—but for Dr. Manhattan’s frontal nudity and hot sex scenes between Patrick Wilson’s Nite Owl (who can’t get an erection unless he’s wearing his costume) and Malin Akerman’s Silk Spectre II (she’s I’s daughter).
The truth is, Moore’s novel might have best been served by an HBO miniseries that would play at greater length and complexity to a sophisticated crowd inured to Sopranos-style violence and moral ambiguity.
For now, Watchman is tracking strongly—awareness and want-to-see is high, even if it skews older and male—and selling out many of its 1,600 midnight shows. Warners’ concern is that after a massive opening, Watchmen, lacking definite interest from both older women and younger males, will fall to earth on its second weekend. The proof will be in just who is watching the Watchmen.
Anne Thompson launched the daily ThompsononHollywood blog in March 2007, when she joined Variety as a columnist. Previously, she was deputy film editor of The Hollywood Reporter, where she wrote the weekly syndicated column Risky Business and the Riskybizblog. She has also served as West Coast editor of Premiere and Film Comment, and senior writer at Entertainment Weekly.
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Anne Thompson launched the daily ThompsononHollywood blog in March 2007, when she joined Variety as a columnist. Previously, she was deputy film editor of The Hollywood Reporter, where she wrote the weekly syndicated column "Risky Business" and the Riskybizblog. She has also served as west coast editor of Premiere and Film Comment, and senior writer at Entertainment Weekly.
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Anne Thompson launched the daily ThompsononHollywood blog in March 2007, when she joined Variety as a columnist. Previously, she was deputy film editor of The Hollywood Reporter, where she wrote the weekly syndicated column "Risky Business" and the Riskybizblog. She has also served as west coast editor of Premiere and Film Comment, and senior writer at Entertainment Weekly.
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Anne Thompson launched the daily ThompsononHollywood blog in March 2007, when she joined Variety as a columnist. Previously, she was deputy film editor of The Hollywood Reporter, where she wrote the weekly syndicated column "Risky Business" and the Riskybizblog. She has also served as west coast editor of Premiere and Film Comment, and senior writer at Entertainment Weekly.
Please. You can't be serious, right? No one really expects this movie to gross even a fraction of what the Dark Knight did. If they did, they wouldn't have dumped it in March. They are just hoping it will repeat 300, if they are lucky. It will almost certainly handily win the weekend box office results, but that isn't saying much. They are just hoping to make their oney back on this one and then hopefully do great on video...
Watch Speedracer on Blu-Ray and a capable screen and you won't diss it again.
What do you want, everything all the time?
Great piece Anne. Hope this means you'll be a regular coumnist for daily Beast
Watchmen is a fantastic, disturbing graphic novel. Perhaps there are more young people out there willing to be challenged to think that you know. They are the ones who will be watching this movie.
I was at one of those sold-out midnight showings... one of the best experiences I have ever had in a theater. Watchmen is unlike any movie to have hit the big screen-- it does have that same surreal feeling that 300 had, but the complexities of the characters run so deep, and the premise is staggeringly visionary. I just wish that IMAX hadn't been sold out a week in advance.
finderj, I am well versed in the graphic novel and plan to see the movie myself. But I stick by my prediction -- the movie won't do close to The Dark Knight, not even close... And frankly the main audience for the comics/later graphic novel are not that "young." nd if you added up 100 percent of the people who have actually read the Watchmen, it still wouldn't make for a "Dark Knight" sized audience.
The movie should do great this weekend because it is the only thing remotely like it out in the most boring season for movie releases. That's exactly why they put it here. But they also know that if they have a real blockbuster on their hands, you put it in summer when people are bored and have time on their hands and go to see movies over and over. That's how you get a Dark Knight-level hit. Only "Titanic" among the top grossing movies was not a summer hit.
Just saw it last night. Never read the graphic novel, but this movie was incredible nonetheless. I'm betting it will make 100 mil this weekend
March is the appropriate time to release Watchmen because the content is too just dark for a summer release. Dark Knight was also dark, but the bad guys went down, and the viewer didn't have to question who the bad guys were. Watchmen isn't so simple.
I also don't know that I would call it's following "cult". Batman has instant name recognition because he's been around for so long and in so many productions (comics, tv, movies, cartoons, etc). Just because something is off the radar of the average suburban mom, doesn't classify it as cult.
Anne, you may be right about the film versions of FROM HELL and LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN, but I wasn't alone in thinking that V FOR VENDETTA was superb, whatever it grossed.
Also, as much as I like them, when did Paltrow and Bridges become "eminently bankable"?
Asking if Watchmen is the next Dark Knight is an idiotic question, one which indicates that this writer has only passing familiarity with such films. One comic book film is not the same as the other. We're dealing with two radically different concepts with Watchmen and the Dark Knight. Watchmen isn't so much about heroes and heroism as it is about questioning heroes and heroism. With Dark Knight, you know you who the good guy is, who the bad guy is, and why it's important to thwart his plans. Watchmen isn't so clear. It's a difficult movie, one that isn't suited to the frivolity of summer releases.
In more conventional terms, you could say that, comparatively, Dark Knight is the Godfather of comic book movies, while Watchmen is the Charlie Kaufman library of comic book movies.
Saw in in IMAX last night. Really liked it, though the desire to be so loyal to the source made it a little longer than necessary. I agree it will do great opening weekend and should have the box office to itself for a while but it still won't be in Dark Knight $500 million domestic box office league...
Dark Knight sucked.
They have yet to find anyone that can even come close to Mark Hamill's brilliant portrayal of the Joker in the animated Batman series.
They should have called it "Batman moves to Gotham".
Whew. I do believe you sat in that movie theater for nearly three hours and managed to completely miss the point.
@sonofloud - Mark Hamill and the rest of the cast of TAS were amazing, but as an even darker translation to the silver screen Heath Ledger acted the character perfectly. It was the Joker from the darker iterations of the comic personified. If they had wanted the joker from TAS, Mark Hamill still would have been a great choice.
I dunno. Watchmen probably won't outgross Dark Knight, but that may not be a result of content, but rather of marketing and marketability. Rather cynical, but had Ledger not died, Dark Knight might not have grossed what it did. The fact that it is an excellently well-made film, with stellar performances and effects, is irrelevant to the fact that one of its stars died, in a shocking and terribly publicized manner. Many people cannot resist rubbernecking. Human nature. watchmen has no such lurid publicity.
@ finderji By that logic, The Crow should have been huge I mean, Brandon Lee died DURING filming. But, The Crow wasn't huge, Lee wasn't nominated for an Oscar, and The Crow remains a cult film.
After seeing Ledger in the role of The Joker, I'm confident that he would have been nominated whether he had died or not, The Dark Knight would have been huge whether he had died or not. He was nothing short of genius in the role.
Is Watchmen the next Blade Runner?
yuck. horrible movie. saw it last night. Anyone looking for a quality movie with character development and an intriguing plot or anyone looking for a decent action movie will be very sorely disappointed.
It's a rambling empty 3 hours of babbling with about three original concepts that aren't pulled off very well...
Well, the Crow was a bad movie. regardless of who died during its making. Dark Knoght was a superior movie. Wacthmen is, too. Well-made films, one with the extra kick of unfortunate but huge publicity? Guess which one will gross more.
I do agree - Ledger should have gotten the Oscar regardless of his untimely death. I have rarely seen such an incredible acting job.
Watchmen sucks. I got ripped off for 7.50 and I want my money back.
eminently bankable in an ensemble....they are both big fat respectable names if not marquee draws
Mid-50-mill open weekend. A little softer than expected and definitely not in the same galaxy of The Dark Knight.. Nothing against it personally, just pointing out the facts...
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