Steve Earle’s debt to cult singer-songwriter Townes Van Zandt is immeasurable. Van Zandt championed Earle during his struggling-artist years, and Earle even named one of his sons after the troubled troubadour (who drank and drugged himself to death when he was 52). In a way, Earle’s entire career has been a tribute to Van Zandt – from his plaintive storytelling to his turbulent personal history. But Townes is his first album-length tribute, a 15-track survey of Van Zandt’s finest compositions that starts with a low-key version of his best-known song, “Pancho and Lefty,” a country hit for Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard in the ’80s. Throughout Townes, Earle shifts between solo acoustic retellings and band-assisted electric fury, sticking pretty close to Van Zandt’s templates. He’s at his best – like on the meditative “No Place to Fall” and “To Live Is to Fly” – when Van Zandt is at his best. --Michael Gallucci
Like his label boss and musical compatriot James Murphy, Juan MacLean makes twitchy electro-pop intended more for groove-minded hipsters than your average club-hopper. On his second album, MacLean and his group of robo-soul pals (particularly Nancy Whang, whose voice guides most of these 10 songs) flutter through beat-driven cuts that aren’t as alienated – or as alienating – as they initially let on. Still, the Juan MacLean’s techno-disco thump isn’t as warm as Murphy’s work with LCD Soundsystem. The Future Will Come is at its best when it throws little bumps on the path to the dance floor, like the percussive backdrop of the title tune and the squiggly synths punctuating “Accusations.” But MacLean saves the best for last with “Happy House,” a 12-minute tour de force that’s as epic as twitchy electro-pop gets. -- Michael Gallucci
This 26-year-old Atlantan got her start strutting in Usher’s “Love in This Club” video and singing “The Way I Are,” the only good song on Timbaland’s last solo album. Hilson gets a superstar boost from Tim (and Lil Wayne, Keyshia Cole, Kanye, Ne-Yo and Akon) on her long-delayed debut. Yet she comes off fiercely independent on In a Perfect World …, throwing smackdowns left and right to undeserving guys (“Return the Favor” rides one of Tim’s electro-staccato beats) and dishing out go-girl support (on the handclap-driven “Get Your Money Up”). Hilson can’t keep up the momentum for a full hour, and too many of the club jams settle into the background. But she makes even generic slow cuts like “Energy” throb. Best of all, “Turnin Me On” features a typical Weezy-in-outer-space freestyle. -- Michael Gallucci
One of last year’s best films, and one of the best vampire movies of all time, comes to Blu-ray with a glistening elegance that heightens the blood-soaked ambiance. A lonely 12-year-old boy falls for a new neighbor – who just happens to be a vampire. Gracefully told and brimming with atmosphere, it’s unlike any horror film you’ve ever seen.
CD
BoDeans: Love & Hope & Sex & Dreams: Collector’s Edition
(Rhino)
This Wisconsin group – which became best known for singing Party of Five’s theme song – kick-started Midwest punks’ ventures into roots music. This revved-up debut from 1986 cribs its title from the Rolling Stones, but it’s an apt description of what the songs are about. The two-disc Collector’s Edition includes a B-side, demos and a DVD featuring a 1985 concert.
DVD
The Kids Are Alright
(Sanctuary/UME)
One of the greatest rockumentaries ever made takes a not-so-probing look at the Who – from their shaggy-haired early gigs to their guitar-smashing heyday. The 1979 movie – remastered and stuffed with interviews and other bonuses – features TV clips, concert footage and some excellent scenes of the band creating havoc across the globe.
VIDEOGAME
Major League Baseball 2K9
(2K Sports)
Just in time for baseball season, this annual favorite (for pretty much every console) gets more realistic with each outing. New features this year include an updated roster of players’ signature styles and more control of your batters’ swings. Best of all, the online mode compiles and ranks your gameplay, making it more intense than any fantasy league out there.
CD
Radiohead reissues
(Capitol/EMI)
The recent box and greatest-hits sets didn’t offer much. These three-disc (two CDs, one DVD) reissues of Radiohead’s first three albums finally get it right. Demos and live versions put Pablo Honey in perspective. Better are The Bends and OK Computer, which include ’90s EPs featuring faves like “Killer Cars,” “Talk Show Host” and “Polyethylene.” --Michael Gallucci
Ida Maria is 24-year-old Norwegian Ida Maria Børli Sivertsen, and she really likes to drink. Like, a lot. On her terrific debut, Fortress Round My Heart, Ida Maria falls down, gets up and falls back down again. More often than not, the cycle has something to do with the fact that she hits the bottle from dawn to dusk every day. “Whiskey, please/I need some whiskey, please,” she sings on “Queen of the World.” “I bump into things/
I spin around in circles.” Many of her drunken escapades culminate in her picking up some guy at a bar, bringing him home and shrugging “I Like You So Much Better When You’re Naked.” Ida Maria and her band tear through 10 songs in a little more than 30 minutes, playing spitfire punk fueled by heart, youth and, of course, lots of booze. -- Michael Gallucci
These three Scottish lads like to drink, get high, chase girls, and sit around the house doing nothing. It’s not all that different from how lots of other bands spend their day. And the music on 1990s’ second album isn’t a whole lot different either. There are plenty of pub-style sing-alongs, chunky-riff guitar rockers, and quick blasts of classic punk on Kicks. They even take a detour for a bit of hooky falsetto swing on “59.” But most of the album is stuffed with the sort of Britpop that made a buzz a decade ago. You know, back in the 1990s. --Michael Gallucci
It’s never too early to start making Top 10 lists. That’s what being a music critic is all about. So as we say goodbye to the first quarter of 2009, we look back on five albums that rocked our January, February and March.
ANIMAL COLLECTIVE -- Merriweather Post Pavilion
WHAT’S THE BUZZ? The members have names like Panda Bear and Avey Tare. They make songs designed for daylong freak-outs. And they couldn’t give a damn about song structures. Yep, hipsters love ’em.
BELIEVE THE HYPE? Pavilion frolics in the clouds, skimming the surface of Beach Boys-style harmonies and contemporary psychedelia. It’s a total mindfuck enamored with the sounds it makes – from long, drawn-out tribal jams to Philip Glass-like bursts of repetitive minimalism.
CHANCES IT’LL MAKE IT ON YEAR-END TOP 10 LISTS: 95 percent. Even before our New Year’s Eve buzz wore off, critics were calling this the year’s best album. The only reason we’re not going 100 percent on this one is because there’s a small chance 10 other hipster-lauded groups no one else cares about will release even better records by the end of 2009.
KELLY CLARKSON -- All I Ever Wanted
WHAT’S THE BUZZ? After pissing off her record company and alienating fans with 2007’s gloomy but underrated My December, Clarkson’s new album is a return to crunchy, sugar-coated pop.
BELIEVE THE HYPE? Clarkson balances independence with vulnerability, pop with rock, compromise with integrity -- making it the 26-year-old singer’s most Kelly-like album. She’s also a great singer who’s shed the American Idol tag. Remember? She won the first season.
CHANCES IT’LL MAKE IT ON YEAR-END TOP 10 LISTS: 20 percent. EverybodyBreakaway – didn’t get nearly as much love. Same thing here. “My Life Would Suck Without You” and “I Do Not Hook Up” are great songs, but come December, nobody will remember any other cuts. loved “Since U Been Gone,” but the album it came from –
THE-DREAM --Love vs. Money
WHAT’S THE BUZZ? He’s the dude who wrote Rihanna’s “Umbrella” and Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies.” He’s also penned some great songs for himself about booties and strippers.
BELIEVE THE HYPE? The-Dream (real name: Terius Nash) is kinda like R. Kelly, without the whole peeing-on-underage-girls thing. He makes bedroom music for people who like smart pop hooks and space-age beats. And unlike most R&B singers, his songs stick with you.
CHANCES IT’LL MAKE IT ON YEAR-END TOP 10 LISTS: 35 percent. Right now, Love vs. Money is the best R&B album of the year. But even if it holds on to that title for the next nine months (and it has a very good chance of doing so), R&B albums typically don’t fare too well on year-end lists. Unless you’re Kanye.
FRANZ FERDINAND -- Tonight: Franz Ferdinand
WHAT’S THE BUZZ? The first record was a hit, but nobody cared about Album Two. This third outing is sexy, snotty and filled with the sort of dance-punk grooves that got these guys noticed in the first place.
BELIEVE THE HYPE? The album basically plays like a night in the life of a club-hopping, girl-macking a-hole (“Kiss me where your eye won’t meet me,” singer Alex Kapranos tells one conquest). It’s got all the ups and downs and crushing disappointments of a typical night out.
CHANCES IT’LL MAKE IT ON YEAR-END TOP 10 LISTS: 40 percent. The group’s jagged rhythms and indifference toward everybody and everything connects with jaded music critics. But these dapper Scots come off like the coolest guys in the room. In other words, they’re not at all like most music critics. So they lose points there.
U2 -- No Line on the Horizon
WHAT’S THE BUZZ? U2’s last album, 2004’s How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, was forgettable, despite all of the classic band elements that were plugged into it. It’s more inspired this time around.
BELIEVE THE HYPE? Horizon reaches back to 1984’s moody The Unforgettable Fire for motivation, with longtime producers Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois and Steve Lillywhite layering tons of atmospheric texture over and under the songs.
CHANCES IT’LL MAKE IT ON YEAR-END TOP 10 LISTS: 65 percent. U2 are the planet’s last big rock stars and perennial faves when it comes to handing out end-of-the-year honors. But for all its familiarity, No Line on the Horizon doesn’t have a “With or Without You” or “One” or even a “Pride (In the Name of Love)” to anchor it. -- Michael Gallucci
The debut album by these two N.Y.C. girls sounds a lot like TV on the Radio. That’s not much of a surprise, seeing that TVOTR’s Dave Sitek produced it. There’s plenty of electronic buzzing and whirring going on in the background of these nine songs, always distracting from the action happening up front. Good thing, since Telepathe’s Melissa Livaudais and Busy Gangnes really can’t sing, and there ain’t a whole lot else keeping the record together. At least Sitek builds Dance Mother on layers and layers of his trademark noise textures, constructing glorious aural architecture out of the surroundings. A couple songs – “Chrome’s On It” and “Can’t Stand It” -- manage to wrestle part of the spotlight away from Sitek’s machines, but it’s obvious who the real star is here. -- Michael Gallucci
It’s gotten to the point where animators have run out of talking animals to put on the big screen. Cats, giraffes, turtles, bears and even fish took turns in the CGI spotlight. But there are only so many situations you can wedge a chatty penguin into (put him on a surfboard! Or in an airplane!) before it becomes boring. That’s why many animated movies these days replace the talking raccoons and hippos with talking cars and robots.
But even with a new breed of gabby objects onscreen, the storytelling usually doesn’t stray far from the formula. There’s always a lesson to be learned -- usually something about staying true to yourself and your friends. There’s always an obstacle to overcome. And there are always tons of pop-culture references that often go over the heads of the films’ pint-sized audiences.
Even though Monsters vs. Aliens incorporates new characters to the talking-animal genre (actually, Pixar got there first eight years ago with the otherworldly creatures of Monsters, Inc.), it’s still the same mix of elements -- from sticking by your friends to believing in yourself. Plus, the pop-culture references are piled on thick for fans of Oprah, Dr. Strangelove and B-movies from the ’50s.
The opening scenes set up the plight of Susan (voiced by Reese Witherspoon), a bride hit by a piece of falling space junk on her wedding day. She soon begins glowing and growing, busting out of her dress and the church. The government tosses her into a holding cell with other imprisoned oddities: Dr. Cockroach, an oversized, lab coat-wearing roach (Hugh Laurie); a fish-man called the Missing Link (Will Arnett); Insectosaurus, a ginormous bug; and B.O.B., a jumbo blob of blue Jell-O that sounds like Seth Rogen. When a four-eyed, tentacled alien attacks Earth with a giant robot, the monsters are recruited to save the planet from the imminent invasion.
Monsters vs. Aliens certainly makes good on its promise of the titular creatures. And it looks great (be sure to see it in 3D -- the sci-fi spectacle leaps off the screen, especially the ol’ paddleball gag). But there isn’t much of a story here, just a series of spectacularly staged battles and occasionally funny visual gags: Susan wielding two cars like roller skates, Dr. Cockroach cracking an alien’s super-secret lock as a game of Dance Dance Revolution, B.O.B. hitting on a plate of Jell-O.
There’s a not-so-hidden message about not judging people (in this case, friendly world-saving monsters) by the way they look. There’s also some girl-power cheerleading, as Susan literally grows into herself. But Monsters vs. Aliens is mostly about monsters, aliens and a mountainous mass of goo sounding stoned out of its gelatinous mind. -- Michael Gallucci
You’d never guess Thunderheist are from Canada. For one thing, there are only two of them – at least a dozen members short of Broken Social Scene’s and Arcade Fire’s numbers. Plus, they make Detroit-style techno for dance floors, not clever indie-pop for nodding hipsters. But that doesn’t mean the songs on their self-titled debut album are distinctive or even all that interesting, especially since Grahm Zilla and Isis dispense the two best songs -- “Sweet 16” and “Jerk It” – right off the bat. Part of the problem is Zilla’s beats; they’re stuck on repeat. The other problem is Isis, who comes off more machine than singer. Thunderheist is designed for sparkly club kids who find commands like “Dust it off and jerk it” an amusing throwback to better, and more coked-up, days. -- Michael Gallucci
Two years ago, Peter Bjorn and John replaced Andrew Bird as hipsters’ favorite whistlers when “Young Folks” puckered up and blew its way onto an AT&T commercial, into movie trailers and all over iTunes. The fifth album by the Swedish trio doesn’t include any whistling, but it’s stuffed with the sort of breezy indie-pop that made Writer’s Block a hit. It’s also filled with the gurgling synths, ersatz handclaps and detached vocals that made so much of Block anonymous. Living Thing works best when PB&J keep things melodically and lyrically simple. “Just the Past” glides fluently over spare drops of noise, while “Lay It Down” balances its lo-fi beats with a sing-along “Shut the fuck up, boy/You are starting to piss me off” chorus. Who knew these cheery whistlers could get so angry? -- Michael Gallucci
Gus Van Zant’s Oscar-winning biopic, about gay politician Harvey Milk, was one of 2008’s best movies. The Blu-ray release includes plenty of background and behind-the-scenes info, as well as some deleted scenes. Best: Sean Penn’s award-snagging performance as the slain activist -- his deepest role. It’s a long way from Spicoli.
VIDEOGAME
Killzone 2
(Sony)
This kick-ass shooter for the PlayStation 3 plays an awful lot like other great first-person shooters, from Halo to Gears of War. But it’s still a bloody good time, as you take on the role of a battle-scarred soldier blasting baddies on another planet. The game looks great, and the multiplayer mode (allowing up to 32 gamers) is one of the PS3’s best.
CD
Motörhead reissues
(Sanctuary/UME)
Before they started churning out the same record every year, Motörhead were one the best (and loudest) bands to come out of the U.K. in the late ’70s. After a soggy 1977 debut, they released four solid metal-meets-punk albums: Overkill, Bomber, Ace of Spades and Iron Fist. These reissues tag on an extra disc’s worth of B-sides, outtakes and live versions to each.
VIDEO
Raging Bull
(MGM)
The best boxing movie ever made comes to Blu-ray in an elegant disc that enriches Martin Scorsese’s black-and-white masterpiece. Robert De Niro famously put on pounds for his role as Jake LaMotta, a 1940s fighter and an all-around prick. Joe Pesci also shines as LaMotta’s equally hotheaded brother. Director’s commentary and making-of docs highlight the extras.
VIDEOGAME
Street Fighter IV
(Capcom)
The old-school arcade classic gets a facelift for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and the battlegrounds have never more awesome. The game still plays the same, as you square off against ’roided-up opponents in a series of fisticuffs. The 3D backgrounds, and some cool new button-mashing moves, make this the best-ever Street Fighter. -- Michael Gallucci
Proggy smartypants the Decemberists have always made a big deal about their proggy smartypants ways. Frontman Colin Meloy rattles off multi-syllabic words while the rest of the group pieces together 15-minute epics about seafaring waifs on violins, cellos, banjos, and whatever else they find in the studio. The band’s fifth album, The Hazards of Love, is its most ambitious and bloated. But it’s also the kind of record you won’t mind listening to a couple more times just so you can figure out what’s going on with the story (something about a woman who’s raped by a forest creature) and in the grooves (the hour-long opus features instruments usually reserved for symphonic orchestras – try to name them all!). It even starts with a “Prelude” that takes its entire three minutes to build to an audible level. After that, it’s acoustic guitars, organ solos, and a four-part title suite sprinkled over 17 songs. It’s just like one of those albums Genesis used to make, back when Peter Gabriel was leading them dressed like a flower. But Meloy’s indie-rock cred lets him get away with the cryptic verses, overstuffed arrangements, and general self-importance that weighed down ’70s prog-rock. But that doesn’t make The Hazards of Love any less laborious. Still, the sweeping grandeur of “The Hazards of Love (Wager All)” and “The Wanting Comes in Waves/Repaid”’s mid-song style shifts at least keep all that pretension sorta interesting.--Michael Gallucci
Kelly Clarkson will always be the world’s greatest American Idol. Not only because she was the first, but also because she navigated an unproven career path years before all the spotlight-hogging Jennifers and Davids crassly manipulated it. Plus, she totally rocks. Clarkson’s follow-up to 2007’s unfairly maligned My December makes things right with her record company (execs were pissed about the album’s dark and too-personal tone), preserving much of the spunk that made 2004’s Breakaway – and its breakthrough single, “Since U Been Gone” – such a blast. All I Ever Wanted is sugar-coated pop with enough crunch to keep everyone (pop fans, hipsters, Idol junkies) happy. And it kicks off with a double dose of classic Clarkson: “My Life Would Suck Without You” and “I Do Not Hook Up,” which juggle the 26-year-old’s dichotomy of being an independent woman with a needy streak. The ballads go over the top, but that’s expected from any Idol alum. The difference is that Clarkson is truly a great singer – check out her worn-in rasp on “Don’t Let Me Stop You” – with integrity to match. --Michael Gallucci
Little surprise that Irish romantics Bell X1 are a hit with the Grey’s Anatomy crowd. The lovelorn lyrics and sweet melodies on their fourth album, Blue Lights on the Runway, suit Big TV Moments as much as they’re capable of drifting into the background of just about any environment. The trio relies more on synths than most of their soft-spoken peers, but don’t let the waves of harmonious programmed sounds fool you. These guys used to play in a band with Damien Rice, so they bring bite to several of the songs. Opener “The Ribs of a Broken Umbrella” skips along to a springy tune that nearly disguises Paul Noonan’s sad tale about an old Polish immigrant who spent most of his life futilely looking for his childhood crush. And “Blow Ins” is all about how tiny we humans are in the grand scheme of things. Still, Bell X1 know how to have a good time once in awhile: “The Great Defector” sounds exactly like a Talking Heads song, after David Byrne dropped the art-school pretensions. --Michael Gallucci
One of the greatest mindfucks of all time finally comes to Blu-ray, and the details are stunning. The disc includes both the theatrical and director’s cuts of the movie. Go for the latter -- the whole time-travel thing makes a little more sense with the additional 20 minutes. Director Richard Kelly’s commentary also helps sort it all out.
VIDEO
Gandhi
(Sony Pictures)
Richard Attenborough’s Oscar-hogging biopic still ranks as one of the greatest, with Ben Kingsley slimming down for his best role as the Indian peacemaker. The new Blu-ray release absorbs the vast setting for a disc that looks downright spectacular. Extras include newsreel footage of the real Gandhi plus an incisive chronicle of the man’s legacy.
VIDEOGAME
Halo Wars
(Microsoft)
The latest outing in the celebrated series for the Xbox 360 isn’t the usual sci-fi shooter. It’s more like an RPG, as gamers build and maneuver armies to defeat the evil Covenant. But unlike most RPGs, which are major snoozes, Halo Wars is actually fun to play – especially when you start sending in big-ass vehicles to wipe out tiny enemies.
CD
Beth Orton: Trailer Park: Legacy Edition
(Arista/Legacy)
Orton’s 1996 debut gets the deluxe treatment on this two-disc set, which includes B-sides, live cuts, early takes and instrumentals. But it’s the British singer-songwriter’s still-mesmerizing record – basically folk songs spiked with liberal doses of trip-hop – that’s the big deal here. Name another folkie who’s recorded with the Chemical Brothers and Four Tet.
CD
Volcano Suns reissues
(Merge)
After Boston post-punks Mission of Burma split up, drummer Peter Prescott formed Volcano Suns. They released a few albums, which most people never heard. These reissues expand 1985’s debut, The Bright Orange Years, and the following year’s All Night Lotus Party. They’re filled with buzzing guitars and proto-indie-rock vocals, plus a live version of Prince’s “1999.”
By 1971, Isaac Hayes was one of Stax Records’ most valuable songwriters, penning R&B classics like “Soul Man” for soul men like Sam & Dave. That summer, Hayes reached No. 1 with the Shaft soundtrack, which included the timeless title theme, a wah-wah-soaked hall-of-famer that still sounds as urgent and as funky as anything recorded over the past four decades. Four months later, Hayes released Black Moses, a two-record set that fortified his persona as the Great Liberator for a nation of people still fighting for civil rights. Here was a colossal black man with a shaved head, a room-rattling voice, and 40 pounds of gold hanging around his neck. And here were 14 songs spread out over 90-plus minutes on an album whose cover unfolded in the shape of a cross. But Hayes (who died last year), with his outstretched arms and skyward gaze, wasn’t playing martyr. Black Moses is his break-up album, a song cycle including originals, contemporary favorites, and a four-part “Ike’s Rap.” Hayes slows most of these songs to a crawl, stripping away whatever shred of hope the songwriters injected into “Never Can Say Goodbye,” “(They Long to Be) Close to You,” and “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again.” It’s all very sticky, murky, and buried beneath tons of horns, strings, and extra-thick funk. The remastered reissue underlines the album’s airlessness – a conceptual device reflecting Hayes’ own emotional chaos. At times, it’s not a very fun listen – this is relationship exorcism at its most passive – but it’s not meant to be. It’s a crafty and occasionally hollow follow-up to Shaft that stands as Hayes’ most personal work. Less personal, less somber, and less interesting, Juicy Fruit (Disco Freak) was released in 1976, just as many other ’60s and ’70s R&B stars were finding career boosts in disco. In a little more than a year, Hayes had released four disco albums; Juicy Fruit was the last of them. His longtime band helps gel the grooves, but most tracks are just that – grooves with little direction. Songs like “Music to Make Love By” follow the same horndog template used by Chef, the smooth-talking cafeteria worker Hayes voiced on SouthPark. But “Chocolate Salty Balls” has way more substance. --Michael Gallucci
Like Jenny Lewis, indie-rock’s other redheaded pinup, Neko Case never seems to have as much fun on her own albums as she does on the ones she makes with her part-time band. Lewis’ two solo records are mostly joyless, airless listens. She saves her spunk for Rilo Kiley. Likewise, Case lets her hair down for the New Pornographers but ties it in a tight, proper knot for her solo albums. On Middle Cyclone, her fifth studio CD, she finally has some fun. She’s still moody, conjuring ghostly spirits and crafting torch-country and splintered pop tunes. But the album’s earthy tone mingles nicely with Case’s big, open-prairie voice. She plays Mother Nature here, becoming a 65-mile-wide twister on the opening “This Tornado Loves You,” an instinctive creature on “I’m an Animal,” and the hippie messenger who warns “Never Turn Your Back on Mother Earth.” And when she claims “I’m a man eater” on “People Got a Lotta Nerve,” she’s not a love-’em-and-leave-’em vamp; she’s a whale. Swelling strings, acoustic guitars, overlapping pianos, and thick slabs of reverb all figure into Middle Cyclone’s busy but never cluttered mix. The record’s theme of tornadoes, twisters, cyclones, or whatever you want to call them is sucked into this vortex of sound. Case, meanwhile, holds on for dear life and emerges with the best album of her career. --Michael Gallucci
Watchmen just might be the most anticipated movie of all time. Fans have been salivating over – and lining up to skewer – the inevitable film adaptation ever since the comic-book series wrapped its year-long run in 1987. Can you blame them? When writer Alan Moore and illustrator Dave Gibbons published the first issue of Watchmen in September 1986, it looked like no other comic book before it. And there haven’t been a whole lot of comics that look like it since.
Set in 1985 in an alternate United States, where costume-clad heroes used to be as common as the threat of nuclear war that hangs over the world, Watchmen tells the story of a group of banned and retired crimefighters who reluctantly reunite after one of their colleagues – the Comedian, whose blood-stained smiley-face button serves as the story’s iconic linchpin -- is killed.
By the time the 12-issue series, and Zack Snyder’s two-and-a-half-hour-plus movie, comes to end, a conspiracy has been uncovered, a hero dies and the planet is nearly demolished. Watchmen easily earns its title of the Best Comic Book of All Time. Everything you know about superheroes – from their sense of honor to their superpowers -- is deconstructed in Moore’s story (the temperamental writer, by the way, has distanced himself from the movie).
Now that the film is finally here – after more than two decades of delays, false starts and lawsuits – fans are in for a dizzying thrill. Snyder – whose other movies, 2004’s Dawn of the Dead and 2006’s 300, are stylized visual feasts – treats the work with all the reverence of a stammering geek. Last year, The Dark Knight forever changed the comic-book movie. Watchmen isn’t that good, but Snyder’s faithful adaptation captures the essence of Moore’s existential masterpiece.
But there lies part of the movie’s problem. Panels from the book are flawlessly replicated – to the point where extras walking down the street mirror frames taken directly from the comic. Snyder didn’t need to storyboard his movie, since the graphic novel pretty much serves that purpose. And there’s a reason Dawn of the Dead’s zombies sprinted and 300 was stuffed with crimson-colored action sequences: Snyder can’t stage static scenes. A huge chunk of Watchmen is character-driven, and Snyder simply doesn’t connect with Moore’s creations. The movie often comes off cold and stilted – and it’s not very much fun at times.
Then again, the book took more than 20 years to get to the big screen because it just isn’t a very filmable piece. The story is narrated by one of the outlawed heroes, Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley in the film’s best performance), in a clipped, hard-bitten noir style that leaps off the page. Onscreen, however, it comes off as a heavy-handed device that keeps the plot moving (there are crisscrossing stories, backstories and a love story here) and fills the holes (Snyder trimmed the comic to keep the massive tale at less than three hours).
But Snyder knows action. The opening set piece – where the Comedian is tossed to his death from his high-rise apartment – brings one of the book’s most memorable scenes to vivid life. Told with quick cuts, slow-motion 3D pans and tons of other camera and CGItricks, it’s a stunning visual delight. Likewise, Doctor Manhattan – the only superhero with actual superpowers -- looks like a towering and glowing blue god (Big Fish's Billy Crudup somewhere beneath all the LED lights).
Just like he did in 300, Snyder turns Watchmen’s biggest moments into intricately stylized and choreographed blood ballets. Even the title sequence – which manages to wrap up a huge chunk of the 20th century (including V-J Day, Kennedy’s assassination and the Vietnam War) in the time it takes Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’” to play out – is dazzling. And just like in 300, actors don’t matter much here (thankfully, there are no big stars to get in the way to the tale). The focus is on the storytelling.
Watchmen’s heroes don’t look much like Batman or Spider-Man. Some of them may sport capes and masks, but just as many of them are balding, paunchy and pissed off at the way things turned out for them (the Comedian and Doctor Manhattan were both used as government weapons during Vietnam). At one point, one retired hero asks another, “Why did we do it?” There’s no definite answer to the question. But Snyder, in his reverential treatment of the material, finds a little bit of hope in all the hopelessness. -- Michael Gallucci
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