Films You Have Watched (2018)

[teddymeow]

There's just something mesmerising about a good movie being shown on tv...

I've done the same thing a number of times too =D

I especially like it now when there are scenes with gunfire or flashing lights and the image has been suitably darkened / slowed down.

[randombs]

Downsizing

Starring Matt Damon as Paul and Christoph Waltz as his upstairs neighbour, D’Fwan.

A scientist develops a method to shrink humans and animals. It is discovered that ‘downsizing’ is a good way to increase quality of life for people with limited means. Paul is one of these people - he wants to buy a house for him and his wife but he can’t secure a mortgage with his $150,000 and dodgy credit history. However, as little people that $150,000 would be the equivalent of $15m(e.g. diamond rings cost less than $100, houses are really cheap because they’re like dolls houses).

The film revolves around Paul wanting to make a big difference despite his size, and his adventures along the way.

It’s not Darling I Shrunk The Children so don’t expect any giant ant attacks or such things. It’s a great film which discusses some serious human issues.

[Zaki]

Mandy....seriously, why is this getting such high praise?!

[Atticus]

Mandy....seriously, why is this getting such high praise?!

I suppose whether you loved or hated it it's pretty damn original. And Bill Duke's in it

I thought it was ace ... almost a new sub genre of horror/fantasy/other stuff. Cage was tremendous too, and I'm not normally a fan.

[QualityChimp]

"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" - Roman poet Juvenal
"Who watches the watchmen?"

Me!

I watched Watchmen again for the first time since the cinema, which is 9 years ago!

I had a real urge to rewatch it because I was thinking about Rorschach and his absolute refusal to bow down, even in the face of armageddon or his own certain death.

One of the subtle things I love in the comic is that his voice is normal as Walter Kovacs and in the early years as Rorschach, but after the kidnapping and murder of a little girl, something snaps and the mask becomes his real face.

Before:


After:


The film doesn't really capitalise on this subtle change, but goes for a gruff "I'm Batman" voice throughout.

Other than that, I still really like the film and how authentic to the source material it is.
Yeah, yeah, the ending is sliiightly different (and I would have loved to have seen the final pages of the comic appear on screen), but it probably works better, if I'm honest and it was a nice twist for fans of the comic so at least something was new.

So many little details were in there, it's like they used the comic as storyboards as much as possible. Even down to the hat the psychiatrist wears.

It's quite a long film, but it still zipped along (although I skipped the awkward sex scenes!). I particularly enjoyed the fight scenes (choreographed by Damon Caro), with the prison scenes being particularly brutal.

Yes, it was nice to go back to after such a long time.

[randombs]

I'm a sucker for Zack Snyder.

I saw Watchmen in the cinema and have seen the director's cut a bunch of times since then. The 3+ hours really fly by. It's gorgeous and I love it. I usually put it on in the background but find I can't take my eyes off it from the moment it starts until the end. I don't mind about the different ending as they both have the same goal(to make people put aside their differences and unite against a common enemy) and, really, I can just fire up my iPad and read the comic if I want the giant squid.

I've also seen Batman vs Superman three times(once in the cinema, then the ultimate edition with some mates, then the theatrical version again on Netflix). As with Watchmen, the time flies by.

I also enjoyed Sucker Punch, although I've only seen that once.

[Dogg Thang]

The problem is that the end makes no sense. As you say, it’s to unite against a common enemy but, in the movie, that common enemy is a weapon for the US so should achieve the exact opposite aim, plunging everyone into a war with the US.

[QualityChimp]

I'm a sucker for Zack Snyder.

Loved Dawn of the Dead. It did a good job of bringing life back to a dead genre (see what I did there?)
Sucker Punch was OK, but I guess I didn't like the ending and it made the preceding action pointless.
Batman Vs. Superman wasn't a bad film, but didn't thrill me, which is pretty criminal. Maybe it needs a rewatch, but matching Mum names was a weak resolution.

The problem is that the end makes no sense. As you say, it’s to unite against a common enemy but, in the movie, that common enemy is a weapon for the US so should achieve the exact opposite aim, plunging everyone into a war with the US.

I hadn't thought of it that way, but the way I saw it was that he'd gone rogue for a couple of weeks and the absolute fear of all the leaders seeing him return and attack again was enough to unite them in this common enemy. He was no longer an American agent.

[Dogg Thang]

He had been a US weapon for decades and would be seen as such by every other nation. If US nukes bombed a bunch of cities, you can be sure the reaction would happen in spite of any US claim that they’d gone rogue and it was all a mistake.

[QualityChimp]

I was quite happy with the different ending until you piped up.

[randombs]

https://www.reddit.com/r/comicbooks/comments/333lln/spoilers_why_the_squid_ending_of_watchmen_is/

I like this summary.

Someone else pointed out that the squid would require much more exposition and also that the squid was Moore taking a shot at ridiculous comic book villains and tropes.

Anyway, we got what we got and it’s not difficult to mentally replace Dr. Manhattan with a squid - or a giant enemy crab - while watching.

[Dogg Thang]

Yeah that post is my exact issue with it. Ridiculous though it may look, the point of the squid was that it was designed to be an external threat. An enemy that all nations could get behind. That's impossible when the threat is so closely linked to one nation and we have seen it razing hell in previous wars for that side. As it is, Manhattan would be the source of a huge amount of international fear and resentment and it would all be directed at the US.

For me, I wasn't so much attached to the squid. I have no issue with adaptation. But the solution here just didn't make sense to me.

[randombs]

On the other hand, America’s always saving the day in films so if we consider the Hollywood trope of the entire world getting behind America, I feel like an ‘all is forgiven; let’s kick some atomic ass!’ conclusion isn’t too far-fetched!

[randombs]

Double post!

[QualityChimp]

It worked for me because it was a good reason for Dr. Manhattan to leave Earth.

I guess, now we're overanalysing it, Ozymandias took a bit of a risk thinking Dr. M would be fine with being made World Target No.1.
He was a bit mentally unstable after he made him think he'd given cancer to his first love, his best friend and his colleagues.
He'd practically given up on humanity, only talking on Mars to Miss. Jupiter made him change his mind.
He really could have become The Big Bad and started killing everybody off!

Did you know that the script was co-written by David Hayter? That's right - Solid chuffin' Snake and The goshdarn Guyver, people!

Did you also know there was a version of Watchmen that was being worked on by Producer Joel Silver and Director Terry Gilliam that had yet another different ending from the Space Squid?

https://screenrant.com/watchmen-movie-original-script-draft-details/

Joel Silver: "What Terry had done, and it was a Sam Hamm script--who had written a script that everybody loved for the first "Batman"--and then he brought in a guy who'd worked for him to do work on it [Charles McKeown, co-writer of "Brazil"]. What he did was he told the story as-is, but instead of the whole notion of the intergalactic thing which was too hard and too silly, what he did was he maintained that the existence of Doctor Manhattan had changed the whole balance of the world economy, the world political structure. He felt that THAT character really altered the way reality had been. He had the Ozymandias character convince, essentially, the Doctor Manhattan character to go back and stop himself from being created, so there never would be a Doctor Manhattan character. He was the only character with real supernatural powers, he went back and prevented himself from being turned into Doctor Manhattan, and in the vortex that was created after that occurred these characters from "Watchmen" only became characters in a comic book."

Silver elaborated further on the fates of Rorschach, Nite Owl, and Silk Spectre - and how the rest of the world would perceive them (following Dr. Manhattan's reality-bending change):
"So the three characters, I think it was Rorschach and Nite Owl and Silk Spectre, they're all of the sudden in Times Square and there's a kid reading a comic book. They become like the people in Times Square dressing up like characters as opposed to really BEING those characters. There's a kid reading the comic book and he's like, "Hey, you're just like in my comic book." It was very smart, it was very articulate, and it really gave a very satisfying resolution to the story, but it just didn't happen. Lost to time [...] But I did like the [2009] movie, very much. Zack did great stuff in it!"