227LikesHe must not have gotten his usual free press screening. :POriginally Posted by jerseydevil
LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
Anyone else here think that this might be the opinion of quite a few people? I mean Ra's-al-Ghul coming back (allegedly), the Resurrection Pool, Bane, Catwoman, etc. I mean this is an awful lot to pack into one movie. On top of the success of the second one with Ledger's Joker how could Nolan top that to be honest??
I, for one, am going in with an open mind and hoping I like it like all the others.
I'm already too deep. Best movie of the year!!!
http://collider.com/the-dark-knight-...review/182086/
Call me old-fashioned, but I like my Batman movies to have Batman in them. Writer-director Christopher Nolan has always had a peculiar relationship with the Dark Knight. His approach was to set the character in a “realistic” world, or at least a world as real as one can get with a man in a rubber suit fighting crime. Despite a seriously flawed third act, Batman Begins brought an interesting new take on the character by introducing an exploration of fear with regards to how it molded Bruce Wayne’s personality and became a weapon he used against his enemies. However, The Dark Knight started to shift away from Batman, and instead placed the emphasis on the supporting cast, namely The Joker, Harvey Dent, and James Gordon. The template felt bigger, the stakes were higher, and canvas was grander, and yet Batman felt like he was competing to be a lead character in his own movie. With The Dark Knight Rises, Nolan has closed out his Batman trilogy with an intense, epic, grand conclusion filled with terrific performances, exhilarating action, thoughtful ideas, and almost no room for the caped crusader.Is that why I dislike Nolan's take on Batman? Because he is hardly a part of the movies? Food for thought.Nolan’s talent is making us feel that the film is complex, and that we’re looking at a vast, grandiose vision of a superhero’s triumph over evil. There is not a second in The Dark Knight Rises where I felt bored. I was captivated, confused, scared, energized, disturbed, uplifted, annoyed, amused, and disappointed at various points throughout the picture, but I was never bored. I can’t overstate how important IMAX was to the experience, and I worry that the picture suffers without it. For a movie where the villain is a physically imposing monster devising a plan to bring down an entire city, the IMAX format feels essential.
But more than any canvas, film format, villain, or social subtext, Batman is what should truly be essential. Much like it pretends at a depicting a complicated Gotham City, The Dark Knight Rises pretends that this is the culmination of a hero’s journey. Except how important can this journey be if it’s being pushed aside for Bane’s rousing speeches, widespread destruction, and rise of the common policeman against the common mercenary? Nolan admirably tries to bring the element of fear back into Bruce Wayne’s journey, but there’s no weight to the element because it’s divorced from every other aspect of the story. Fear is not a theme, but a character trait, and one that was only brought up in the first movie. There’s not enough time to truly let the subtext grow because there’s not enough time for Batman to grow.
By blowing loads of time on introducing too many characters and their complicated plans, The Dark Knight Rises has to rush its way through a shockingly weak finish where Nolan indulges on fan-service, half-hearted payoffs, and an attempt to find a heart that the movie never really had (there’s a lot about the ending that bugs me, but I won’t go into spoilers). There are some teary monologues from Alfred (Michael Caine) in the first act, but there aren’t a lot of strong emotional moments. Without Batman, without a hero, there’s no soul to the picture. The Dark Knight Rises uses Batman as a way to get to a big villain, a big war, a big statement on class conflict, and a big damn spectacle. Batman is a means to an end, which means he’s not a hero or a legend. He’s just a function.
Rating: C
It's an interesting idea. When you think about it, he's really used Batman the superhero very little in the movies outside of climatic set pieces. For the most part it's been about the baddies and the city and Bruce Wayne dealing with his crazy. I've always dug that part. . .but I can understand why others might not.
When you're doing a realistic take on the character, don't you HAVE to focus on Bruce Wayne?
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
jerseydevil
