Give this R rated movie 3.5/4 stars. Looks like a good one for clearplay...
"Ask any comic geek for their pick of the greatest graphic novel of all time, and most of them will tell you it's Watchmen. Written nearly 25 years ago, the groundbreaking story would later earn writer Alan Moore and illustrator Dave Gibbons a Hugo Award (the highest honor in sci-fi literature). Name your favorite literary classic—Watchmen is considered the equivalent among graphic novels, a masterpiece influencing everything from Pixar's The Incredibles to television's Lost.
It's also long been considered un-filmable—too dense and complicated by layers of flashbacks and interludes to shoehorn into two hours. There's also the matter of its unusual setting: an alternate reality version of 1985's New York City in which Richard Nixon is serving his third term as President (after removing term limits) and the world is on the brink of annihilation during the height of the Cold War. Can all this really work together into a comprehensive film still relevant to today's general audiences?
Surprisingly, yes. Watchmen holds together rather well, thanks to careful handling by director Zack Snyder. He's come up with a remarkably faithful adaptation that retains the story's core while trimming the elements that would have made a movie adaptation impossible—all contained within a long yet certainly watchable 2 hour and 45 minute running time.
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