I have probably been as exited about this movie as anyone else, and I wondered what the difference between all the spoiled material I had seen and the actual movie was going to be.
I saw the movie on Thursday night Friday morning at 12.01 on IMAX with a geek army blending in conspicuously with my Watchmen tee shirt I had gotten earlier as a birthday present from my brother. I had my Australian licorice and teriyaki beef jerky smuggled in with my 6$ soda set to discourage the teenybopper on my left from invading MY arm rest. For nearly three hours I jammed out in nostalgia to classic period music(Blake's funeral was sweet), laughed at the subversive dialogue when it came to state a particularly crisp thesis("Everything will be fine as long as everyone thinks Jon is still up there watching us."), Came to tears at the poignant(Jon confronted by his ex-girlfriend dying of cancer), stretched a wide smile at the glorious translations of the GN("I'm not locked up in here with you.", *scuffle*, "YOURE LOCKED UP IN HERE WITH ME!"), and uncomfortably absorbed the disturbing("No spelled Y-E-S.").
This movie was not as easy to watch as I thought it might be from what I'd seen in spoiler videos. As a movie it distorts the medium from what you expect in a movie. Because of following so closely the GN it is deep in it's time spent on the characters and their backgrounds, so much so that the overarching plot becomes secondary. The use of music in the movie is overwhelming, it is not only there to enhance the scene each song is paired with, but as part of the subject itself. The special effects at least as I saw them on IMAX often appeared stylized to the point of sacrificing realism. Not to the point something like Sin City used it, but very noticeably(Glass fortress on Mars, Bubastis, and young Kovacs eating jock face). All of these elements throw the viewer off, and can be interpreted negatively if one doesn't take a deeper look at their utility. The character focus as in the GN are more of the plot than the climax and investigating, this isn't a bad thing it's just a thing, and in this case is done beautifully, and really has you relating to the characters as though you know them personally. As someone who is very nostalgic about the music pieces used, and understanding their context they work fantastically for me, much like music in a Tarantino film. Finally the special effects work for me well by the end, and I think on a second viewing will become as natural as anything else in the masterpiece. I think just like when Pulp Fiction came out at first a lot of people didn't get it, but eventually it became universally accepted as a seed change moment in film, and a great film regardless.
On actors reviews I think a lot of reviewers are combining their feelings about the role played, the scenes that role got, and the actual execution of the acting, I'll just be reviewing how well i though each of the actors of the main characters acted their part. Trying to put together a list the more I think about it is just impossible, and confuses what I really think about the performances. The truth is that I think everyone did a bang up job, in particular I found criticisms of Silk Specter 2 idiotic. I really think people are just reading into her character more than her performance, she was written in the 80's, and women hadn't won the level of footing they have today, so playing the part accurately might have her come off very girlish. I thought she was great along with everyone else.
I predict that as the months go by after the movies release slowly most of the people who think it's bad now will come around to understand it's a huge achievement. I give it 5/5, 10/10, 99/100, 992/1000. It's that good, very few movies compare.