Review: 'Watchmen' Spellbinding, Complex

'Watchmen' (R):(out of four)

For those devotees who have been waiting with baited breath for "Watchmen" to make it to the big screen, the days of dreaming are over.

Ultimately known as the "War and Peace" of comic books and further proof that the genre really is art, it has been a long road to get "Watchmen" to the screen. After more than two decades in development, the graphic tome has finally made it, and what an epic it is.

The long-awaited adaptation was taken on by Zack Snyder, who directed "300," which was no easy feat either. Many believed that "Watchmen" was, well, unfilmable. In addition to writer Alan Moore's refusal to participate in the creation of his work being made into a motion picture (his name actually does not appear in association with the film, and all interests were turned over to the comic book co-creator and illustrator Dave Gibbons), director Terry Gilliam said he couldn't make the complex film in under a five-hour running time and Paul Greengrass (the "Bourne" films) was also willing to make a go of it, but ended up ditching the idea.

So what makes the movie such a Herculean feat to put from page to screen? Perhaps it is the challenge to keep the material entirely faithful to the 12 comic books-turned-graphic novel. The book is so revered it made Time magazine's list of one of the best 100 English-language novels from 1923 to present day, and there are fans spanned across the globe. But the screenwriters and Snyder pledged themselves to sticking as close to the book as possible and in the end that is what filmgoers get.

The multi-layered mystery adventure is set in an alternate 1985 America in which costumed superheroes are part of the make-up of everyday society. The Doomsday Clock is ticking and is charting tension between the United States of America and the Soviet Union, with nuclear war an imminent threat.

President Richard M. Nixon is still in the White House with cronies like Henry Kissinger calling the shots, and ready to push the button at any time.

"Watchmen" unfolds in a world at the brink of war, in which costumed superheroes, called Masks, have been outlawed, driven underground by a society that once revered them but then grew to fear and despise them. Now someone is killing the former crime-fighters.

Outlawed masked vigilante Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley) is determined to discover who killed one of his former Watchmen and blow the lid off of a plot to kill and discredit superheroes both past and present.

The death reunites Rorschach and the other masked marvels together again-- Silk Spectre II (Malin Akerman), Night Owl II (Patrick Wilson), Ozymandias (Matthew Goode), and Doctor Manhattan (Billy Crudup), the only one in the group who truly possesses superpowers.

As the 167-minute film unspools we realize that these superheroes perhaps are more human than we've come to expect from others we've been introduced to in the past. They are more flesh and blood. Even the blue giant Doctor Manhattan deals with personal issues, suffers from neuroses, failed relationships, and human pathos, each representing a different kind of power.

The actors, from kid star Haley as the cold-blooded Rorschach to Crudup as Dr. Manhattan, the brilliant physicist whose life is forever changed after a nuclear accident, bring an even deeper dimension to the characters that were so profoundly drawn in the book. Jeffrey Dean Morgan also plays a prominent role as the rogue Watchmen member The Comedian.

As the first unfilmable novel that has made it to the screen, "Watchmen" sets the bar high staying faithful to the labyrinth created in the original story. The film is destined to become as classic as the original "Watchmen," and introduce a whole new legion of fans to this legendary deconstructivist tale.