Thursday, July 17, 2008

Alan Moore Slates Watchmen Movie and 300

Comic Legend and all round good guy Alan Moore recently was interviewed by EW. In it he slates Hollywood, DC, American Comics and reveals the Wire as a masterpiece and is a huge fan of comedy like Snuff Box, Mighty Boosh and South Park. For those not in know Moore is creator of From Hell, Leauge Of Extrodinary Gentleman, V For Vandetta, all which Hollywood butchered when adapted to big screen, his book the Killing Joke is one of the main inspirations for the forthcoming Dark Knight movie, he is also responsible for absolute masterpiece Watchmen which has also been adapted to the big screen by Zack Snyder in his upcoming take on Moore's classic without Moore's approval or consent.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Don't you have the slightest curiosity about what Watchmen director Zack Snyder is doing with your work?
ALAN MOORE
: I would rather not know.

He's supposed to be a very nice guy.
He may very well be, but the thing is that he's also the person who made 300. I've not seen any recent comic book films, but I didn't particularly like the book 300. I had a lot of problems with it, and everything I heard or saw about the film tended to increase [those problems] rather than reduce them: [that] it was racist, it was homophobic, and above all it was sublimely stupid. I know that that's not what people going in to see a film like 300 are thinking about but...I wasn't impressed with that.... I talked to [director] Terry Gilliam in the '80s, and he asked me how I would make Watchmen into a film. I said, ''Well actually, Terry, if anybody asked me, I would have said, 'I wouldn't.''' And I think that Terry [who aborted his attempted adaptation of the book] eventually came to agree with me. There are things that we did with Watchmen that could only work in a comic, and were indeed designed to show off things that other media can't.

Do you think that any good can come of comics movies?
I increasingly fear that nothing good can come of almost any adaptation, and obviously that's sweeping. There are a couple of adaptations that are perhaps as good or better than the original work. But the vast majority of them are pointless.

For full interview head to EW.

Alan was also recently interviewed on Irish radio which you can listen to here.