In Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons's 1986 superhero comic
Watchmen, Laurie—alias the Silk Specter—is a profane, impatient, smart, and funny woman with conflicted feelings toward her past and her own altruism. As played by Malin Ackerman in this screen adaptation, she's a body in a slick latex suit, with no discernible personality. Director Zack Snyder (
300) races through the story, faithfully reproducing this bit of dialogue from Moore and that bit of imagery from Gibbons but never pausing to develop a vision of his own. The result is oddly hollow and disjointed; the actors moving stiffly from one overdetermined tableau to another. With Billy Crudup, Patrick Wilson, Jackie Earle Haley, and Carla Gugino. R, 163 min.
By
Noah Berlatsky