Will the Million-Dollar Marketing and PR Campaign for Watchmen Pay off this Weekend?

If the intensity of the marketing campaign for Warner Brothers’ Watchmen is any indication, then the studio is surely pouring all its publicity might into the superhero action film.

The question remains though: will it pay off? Reuters reporting that the studio has high hopes for the film, and expects it to yield a respectable $60 million over the weekend.

In terms of critical reviews, the movie has already gotten opening weekend blessings from the BBC, which labels the movie as untypical of superhero movies and lauds it as “very grown up”.

Joshua Rich of Entertainment Weekly predicts that the movie will inevitably sit at the number one spot, partly thanks to its status as one of the most long-awaited and formerly extremely elusive transition to the big screen, while pointing out that its 180 minute or so running time might actually do it a disservice. But if Steven Soderbergh’s Che biopic Guerilla conquered the world at four hours, surely Watchmen can too. It is about superheroes, after all.

MTV the ultimate hoarder of males 18-34 wrote a glittered review of the action film, written by the most serious journalist on its pop culture pundit roster, Mr. Kurt Loder. Weeks before the movie was featured on the network’s “Spoilers” episode, which of course was another marketing coup.

But by far, most agree that the biggest boost that the movie will get will no doubt from the zillion IMAX screens on which the movie will be shown.

Developing…