I hate it when people backtrack and apologize. If he was going to be an asshole about it, he should've just kept being an asshole, and said "you don't like my joke? Fuck you."
Yeah, that pissed me off. He sounds like a world-class douche.
I thought the movie failed to really tell that storyline well, half because Zack Snyder wanted a kick-ass rape scene and half because they didn't tell the story with actresses who could carry it off.
Seeing as how the comic book was in part a satire of the "kick-ass" orthodoxy of Zack Snyder type comic fans, the movie does end up examining Moore's themes, just not how they think.
Bets on whether Moore actually watches the movie, like, ever. I can just see Dave Gibbons showing up at his house with a DVD and Moore shutting the door in his face.
I think Moore will watch it eventually, maybe on fast forward but he's too intellectually curious not to do verify his disdain.
Edited at 2009-03-16 02:26 pm (UTC)
True. I can only imagine what he must think, looking at the funhouse mirror through which these arrested-development adolescents put his work through (which, I mean, he's no fucking Shakespeare, but he deserves better adaptors than these clowns)
"Bets on whether Moore actually watches the movie, like, ever."
I'll take that action, at approximately seventeen squintillion to one against, rising every day Moore approaches death.
Must. Write. Insurance. Contract. Against. Moore. Being. Kidnapped. {By Small Army} And. Shown. Movie. Against. His. Will.
I think if there is one writer on Earth who's capable of not seeing the movie derived from his work, it's Alan Moore.
I also wouldn't worry about the small army of fanboys. I'm pretty sure he can defeat them through a combat of single combat and arcane deathtraps.
Still have to go see the movie, but that scene was probably the one that concerned me most, going from book to screen.
But, thanks, Hayter, for saying that rape survivors really wanted it all along! XOXO, Misogyny.
To be fair, the writer isn't the entire movie. I have yet to see the actual work and if it gets the point better than some asshole who worked on it, I can live with that.
I hope Hayter is fibbing about how big a role he had in the production. He's certainly made the argument for why his draft wasn't the final one.
Edited at 2009-03-16 03:09 pm (UTC)
Excellente point. I am also willing to watch the scene squeamishly, through my fingers.
But, thanks, Hayter, for saying that rape survivors really wanted it all along!
Thanks for not just responding to a bad joke with awful implications, but flat-out putting new, worse words into the jokers mouth. That helps.
It's beyond a bad joke. How else is one supposed to interpret "You'll come back, eventually. Just like Sally."?
I don't think you really have to interpret it beyond the intent of the idiot who said it. He thought he was being edgy and funny, he was not. *Really* not - as you say, it's beyond a bad joke. I don't see where responding in anger and assuming the guy actually thinks rape victims want it does any good, though.
My response was less in anger and more in, "Hey! That's fucked up." Which it is, and I think we all agree on that point.
He is joking about rape survivors wanting it, or at least not minding it, or changing their minds later. My exaggeration of his comment is relatively harmless, IMO.
My response was less in anger and more in, "Hey! That's fucked up."
Going back and reading your response, I think I read something into that wasn't there, so I apologize for the severity of *my* response. And I'm really not interested in defending the guy, so...doubly sorry.
I heard that he had less of a hand in writing it than he wants us to believe (this may not be true), but I'm still torn between my love of Watchmen and the disgust I felt when reading that. The latter is winning.
To be fair, the writer isn't the entire movie. I have yet to see the actual work and if it gets the point better than some asshole who worked on it, I can live with that.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/72677471/568983) | From: ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=91.6) jood
2009-03-16 04:38 pm (UTC)
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I somehow failed to read Moore's original (I KNOW), but I've been filled in from a couple of different fronts, so I think I have a teeny bit of background from which to make a few assumptions.
From a second viewing of the film, what I took away from it was that Sally flirted with a sociopath and paid a price for not anticipating his ridiculously violent over-reaction to a gentle, teasing rebuff. Sally came off as a woman who couldn't make up her mind and was punished for that sin.
I was pretty much appalled at the treatment of all three major female characters in the film treatment: Sally as the injured tease (payment for her acting as a gay man's beard?), Laurie as the long-lashed latex commodity, and Silhouette as the object lesson. I don't know if that's how it played out in the original.
That said, the finely-tuned criticism of conservative morality wasn't exactly subtle, and all three 2nd generation Watchmen came off as morally compromised to some extent. The actor playing Daniel did a great job of handling the small compromise/large win rationale; the actor playing Comedian gave him a kind of manic, sadistic glee that evolved into resignation and eventually terror and remorse. I thought he was terrific. (Scary but fascinating.)
The actor playing Rorschach was absolutely incredible. He was chilling, terrifying, and brilliantly scrupled in a way only a psychopath really can be. He really played a great opposite to Daniel, with his need to be morally correct in the moment (whatever that means inside his messed-up head), and fuck the consequences. I was floored by his performance.
Hayter's kind of a chump, and his version of the script was noteable for not being as awful as the Hamm script, but still somewhat stupid and departing from the story in major ways. He put the sequence in where Nite Owl kills Veidt at the end Snyder had to fight to take out, first thing, for instance.
I just wonder at what point he thought this was a good idea. If he was paying attention to the book, he'd realize the point is it's not.
It's not a joke as much as those "how edgy and rebellious I am can you take it?" poses, as well as trying to pass off a sincere boast about his art using the faux humility of "dark" humor. "My movie rapes the audience but they like it. Kidding! Except not because I'm that extreme. Do I offend you? You like it!"
Hayter should shut the fuck up and learn something about provocation from the Dadaists or at least Vice magazine.
It's not a joke as much as those "how edgy and rebellious I am can you take it?" poses, as well as trying to pass off a sincere boast about his art using the faux humility of "dark" humor. "My movie rapes the audience but they like it. Kidding! Except not because I'm that extreme. Do I offend you? You like it!"
Yeah. Like Harry Knowles "reviewing" a movie by describing it performing cunnlingus on him, apparently unaware of just how horrifying in ways he didn't intend the metaphor would be. Never mind the thought of him having a vagina.
Dude, that review was the rhetorical equivalent of Lemon Party, and now I'm reliving it in my mind. My mmmmiiiiiinnnnnndddddd.
I'm honestly sorry. I try to live my life like I never read that thing. I don't know what possessed me to mention it when it came to mind, apt as the comparison might have been. I wish I'd run to the kitchen and filled my ears with bleach, instead.
men are weird.
women are no less weird.
but still.
Mmm. Reading that makes me want to hate the movie. I saw it last night (despite the earlier discussion here of whether we wanted to see a movie that was a repeat of the book with the good parts left out), and I thought it was good but flawed.
Now ... ewwww. Whatever impact that guy had, there seem to be many levels on which he seriously did not get it.
It just goes to show you can't be too careful!
I was wondering about that too - not just the rape, but what eventually happens in the victim's relationship with her rapist (which I thought Moore also handled very well and which I think is a prime example of how you don't have to rely on violence or a character's degradation to achieve controversy).
I think the problem is that so many people read "Watchmen" not as "Taking a sub-genre known for simple morality tales and applying ethical complexity and contemporary socio-political issues to it" but as "Superheroes behaving badly." Which is a shame, but not really surprising.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/1749386/568983) | From: jood
2009-03-16 05:19 pm (UTC)
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I have to go back and read it now. But please elucidate -- what did happen between Sally and Eddie after the rape? The film doesn't really elaborate.
what did happen between Sally and Eddie after the rape?
The novel actually doesn't go into detail, and when it does not until near the very end, but...
SPOILER
Sally has conflicted feelings over Eddie and at some point, many years after the rape, has consensual sex with him, which results in her pregnancy with Laurie (we never receive any details of what happened and why). Still, she lets Laurie think someone else was her biological father and actively stops Laurie from spending any time alone with Eddie.
I haven't seen the movie, so I can't really compare its treatment there (if it's there at all) to how it's handled in the novel.
Edited at 2009-03-16 05:31 pm (UTC)
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2009-03-16 05:37 pm (UTC)
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Okay, that's spot-on with the movie, then.
I was thinking this morning about the film and how it dealt with women. I thought the movie was okay (didn't like the violence or two key performances), but Ackerman's terrible performance (and Gugino's too, for that matter) was really distracting. The only thing that Laurie, in the film, had going for her was that she was hot. She had no depth, and you don't really care if she leaves Dr. Manhattan or if she and Nite Owl get together. And they only seem interested in her sexiness, too. Of course, the source material satirizes that background.
So what I was thinking about is that I was pretty quick to blame Ackerman for the flatness of Laurie, and found myself wondering if maybe bad writing for that character played an important part in how poorly she translated to the screen. I'm not letting Ackerman off the hook (every line reading and emotion was the same) but she also wasn't given much to do besides be sexy and shallow.
Reading this just reinforces my thinking.
| From: jood
2009-03-16 05:17 pm (UTC)
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I think her eyelashes did some terrific work.
I kinda thought the rape scene was handled well as far as rape scenes go. It was violent and not sexy and I didn't find the camera leered as I so often do in such scenes. it was harsh and violent as rapes often are. the writeup was gross.
I'm pleased to hear you say this; the rape scene (and some of how it was handled afterwards) is what has been making me put off seeing the movie.
there is some glee on behalf of the comedian but I find that appropriate in a monster. he was only concerned with what he wanted.
The female characters are flat and props toward male character development. When ss1 sees comedian with her daughter she freaks out proper and protects her, there's that.
I am sick of the whole whore rape stuff thrown at women all the time. I think alot of that theme of moore's re the grotesque treatment toward women is lost.
It is a faithful movie but it isn't a thoughtful movie. The more I think of it the more I hate it. !! themes and subtlty are lost, however flash and dashery are there. It is an engaging film despite everything but it isn't memorable in a nice way. It leaves a bad aftertaste.
I question my own judgement because maybe I am grateful for crumbs re the rape scene. At least it wasn't sexy, at least it didnt linger with a tongue hanging out over a broken woman... at least there was over-powerment and bashing about to quiet down. I wish a rape scene to gut the people watching rather than excite them, y'know. But maybe that takes too many chances on the soul of the viewer considering the target audience.
However, that scene was what made me nervous and I survived, it is brief.
unlike this post haha
The story is based on Hayter's experience of attending high school in Japan. "It's about an American kid who goes to one of these schools in Belgium, but it brings my own horrible experiences of school to life," he told Variety.
Well, at least he has the sense to change locations so it will be palatable xenophobia rather than the brazenly racist kind.
Reading his letter and his analogy to Sally felt like I'd been socked in the gut.
I already thought they didn't get rape in the comic book anyway and could have handled it a lot better (she kept saying: "I couldn't stay mad," which simplified and misunderstand what most of my friends have experienced from rape by an acquaintance. It left out: horrified, repulsed, terrified, and destroyed), and this letter just sort of seals it for me.
Haven't seen the movie, yet. Still plan to, especially considering your update. But I'm not terribly looking forward to it, in this context.
Yeah, that plus the fact that the rape scene reportedly provoked laughs in lots of theaters seems to me like proof that people who want to interpret the movie's version of the scene as non-misogynistic are wrong.
My jaw actually literally dropped.
I can't even form words. | 
