Watchmen

If The Dark Knight is "The Godfather" of the superhero movies, then maybe Watchmen is the Apocalypse Now. (Or One From the Heart?) It’s uncompromising and audacious, paying the source novel the sincerest reverence while determined to dazzle and entertain. Though it’s been a while since I’ve read it, word is the filmmakers adhered strictly to the book’s plot. So the protracted running time makes it gangly, but never dull.

The best moments are when the movie strays from the still frames of comics and uses cinematic tools: music, montage, and action to breathe in some life. Superhero action is sparse, but when it comes (in a brutal prison sequence, for instance) it’s visceral and satisfying. The filmmakers relish in the the punches and kicks, the SNAPS and CRUNCHES of bones, and the hair-raising texture of broken glass. The cast has the most fun in these moments, too. Jackie Earle Haley plunges into Rorschach’s mania -- growling, kicking and screaming in the part he was born to play. The lovely Malin Akerman, divine in gravity-defying spandex, genuinely consumes the Silk Spectre, her majestic hair somehow reacting to cataclysms seconds before the rest of her.

The alternate reality is fun, too, and poignant. Nixon as president, Kennedy assassination, and ground zero references all make this a far-fetched cautionary parable -- rubbing-in the things we could have prevented so horribly misguided super-villains don’t always have to teach the world tough-love lessons.

You can’t really criticize this movie. What would be the point? It’s so specific, so specialized, to condemn it would be to immediately compare apples to oranges. It is what it must be: respectfully bloated, hyper-real, and at times when the big, blue, naked dude is on screen, downright eccentric. But it’s cool -- and totally unique.