No. My wanting to sex up Catgirl and actually liking the movie are two seperate issues. Catgirl and The Penguin were two of the most boring villains I've seen in the Batman series. Of course, after The Joker they had a giant legacy to live up to. I'm afraid the next Batman movie might suffer the same fate. Heath raised the bar higher than Jack did.
i wish more self-doubt and anguish had been brought out in batman via the joker. the joker was almost sympathetic in this because the other characters are so moralistically wooden. only dent's response is satisfying imo. batman is supposed to be a tortured soul and a 'freak' like joker says. the closest we get to seeing this is the reunion with dent at the end, which is set up to be a GREAT scene, but ends with gordon's asinine exposition .
maybe it would've worked better if joker carried more sadistic acts to fruition. the lessons in cruelty and chaos weren't really highlighted in the cornball action sequences which surrounded his brilliant dialog (the fork between dawes and dent was a wonderful exception however, and really made the film imo). in alan moore's killing joke for example, joker murders gordon's daughter in front of gordon's face, while taunting him with wit and irony.
i think if the darkness was pushed a bit further and they upped it to an R rating to include some harder hitting acts of sadism and more scenes of moral ambiguity, ledger's performance would have been properly supported and the film would have been a classic. as it stands, there is a bit of a cop out to feel-good super hero, obvious good guys bad guys dichotomy.
i wish more self-doubt and anguish had been brought out in batman via the joker. the joker was almost sympathetic in this because the other characters are so moralistically wooden. only dent's response is satisfying imo. batman is supposed to be a tortured soul and a 'freak' like joker says. the closest we get to seeing this is the reunion with dent at the end, which is set up to be a GREAT scene, but ends with gordon's asinine exposition .
maybe it would've worked better if joker carried more sadistic acts to fruition. the lessons in cruelty and chaos weren't really highlighted in the cornball action sequences which surrounded his brilliant dialog (the fork between dawes and dent was a wonderful exception however, and really made the film imo). in alan moore's killing joke for example, joker murders gordon's daughter in front of gordon's face, while taunting him with wit and irony.
i think if the darkness was pushed a bit further and they upped it to an R rating to include some harder hitting acts of sadism and more scenes of moral ambiguity, ledger's performance would have been properly supported and the film would have been a classic. as it stands, there is a bit of a cop out to feel-good super hero, obvious good guys bad guys dichotomy.
i think if the darkness was pushed a bit further and they upped it to an R rating to include some harder hitting acts of sadism and more scenes of moral ambiguity, ledger's performance would have been properly supported and the film would have been a classic. as it stands, there is a bit of a cop out to feel-good super hero, obvious good guys bad guys dichotomy.
the joker needs no sympathy. he was doing what he loves. he was the happiest person in the movie and is the happiest person in existence. the joker is LOVE!
No. My wanting to sex up Catgirl and actually liking the movie are two seperate issues. Catgirl and The Penguin were two of the most boring villains I've seen in the Batman series.
Batman Begins had such a unique and tangible energy; the dark imagery and direction made for a fantastic movie experience. I thought that the producers of the sequel would have no problem in recreating the magic of Begins, and I went into the movie with high expectations.
it is difficult to take your critique seriously when you rank Batman Begins above the Dark Knight. at best, Batman Begins was moody and at worst it was emo. there was little to no magic in the first installment, and whatever magic conjured was bitch slapped by Katie Holmes's dreadful preformance. Ras Al-Ghul (the first villian) should have never made it on the silver screen, because he is a dull character. but not as dull as the character of Batman, who is played by universally mediocre actors, while thankfully Bale gives what he can for this film and gets away with it (most of the movie is Bruce Wayne or pre-Batman so Bale's acting can shine). no actor, no matter how good, can shine at the role Batman. he is wooden. the greatest thing about Batman Begins was probably the Scarecrow, who pulled off the role in an eery light.
Solitude_within said:
I kept waiting for The Dark Knight to really accelerate, but that never happened. While the work of Heath Ledger (and the other cast, to some extent) was excellent, the rest of the film was largely meandering and unfocused. Sadly the movie lacks even in the action department, as poorly executed action and fight scenes are aplenty. Considering today's high standard for quality-shot action, it's hard to believe the makers missed this crucial point. All of this together makes for a sluggish progression of the storyline, and an anticlimactic "climax" and conclusion..
it's nice that you want your movies to fall into "beginning/climax/conclusion" sort of formula, but I do not. I want originality, and Christopher Nolan most definitely delivers on that. however, he usually does not deliver on action. if you are looking for non-stop action why don't you just rent Terminator 2 or something? like I said in my first assessment of the Dark Knight, the wondrous character development allowed me to hardly notice the lacking action scenes.
see, this is where i differ in views from my comic book geek brother, axl. i dig the action and fights. i think they're very suitable and effective. they highlight his supreme physical prowess but without overtly exaggerated movements, wire-fu or any other nonsensical system of abilities. this guy gets hit and powers on.
untouchable fighters are boring, and those who shrug off massive blows are just insulting to watch. (except in a comedic context like "kung fu hussle" )
Additionaly, the quick fights allow much more time be spent on the best element of these two films: the story.
both bb and tdk are the two best superhero films ever (by far) imo.
I liked this movie, but I don't think Ledgers performance was anything special. Sure, he was creepy and funny...but Oscar-deserving? I dunno...Maybe I viewed it with too much of the hype in mind.
Just my opinion, before you all tear shreds off me.
see, this is where i differ in views from my comic book geek brother, axl. i dig the action and fights. i think they're very suitable and effective. they highlight his supreme physical prowess but without overtly exaggerated movements, wire-fu or any other nonsensical system of abilities. this guy gets hit and powers on.
untouchable fighters are boring, and those who shrug off massive blows are just insulting to watch. (except in a comedic context like "kung fu hussle" )
Additionaly, the quick fights allow much more time be spent on the best element of these two films: the story.
both bb and tdk are the two best superhero films ever (by far) imo.
One of the first things I took massive notice of right at the beginning of the film was Batman being slammed into a pylon and falling from the side of the van he was grabbing on to. And then being mauled by a dog. I thought it was great how Batman wasn't some unstoppable force. He took hits and he got hurt.
This is supposed to be one of the biggest appeals of Batman over a lot of other super heroes. And I think it was handled perfectly in Begins and Dark Knight.
axl blaze said:
Ras Al-Ghul (the first villian) should have never made it on the silver screen, because he is a dull character. but not as dull as the character of Batman, who is played by universally mediocre actors, while thankfully Bale gives what he can for this film and gets away with it (most of the movie is Bruce Wayne or pre-Batman so Bale's acting can shine). no actor, no matter how good, can shine at the role Batman.
Originally Posted by Solitude_within
I kept waiting for The Dark Knight to really accelerate, but that never happened. While the work of Heath Ledger (and the other cast, to some extent) was excellent, the rest of the film was largely meandering and unfocused. Sadly the movie lacks even in the action department, as poorly executed action and fight scenes are aplenty. Considering today's high standard for quality-shot action, it's hard to believe the makers missed this crucial point. All of this together makes for a sluggish progression of the storyline, and an anticlimactic "climax" and conclusion..
Let me start off saying that Christian Bale is a terrible actor. He's OK as Batman, I guess, but how hard is it to talk in a raspy voice. As Bruce Wayne, however, he sucks.
Two scenes made up my mind about this. First is when him and Natasha are eating dinner with Harvey Dent and Rachel Dawes. The second was when he does his speeach at the Dent fundraiser. The dialog was written to spoken by someone who is being a dickhead but said with such elegant charm that the insultee just doesn't quite catch it.
I've seen this scene executed well before. Cary Grant was a master at nailing scenes like this. Clark Gable had a few in Gone With The Wind.
Christian Bale, however, is completely devoid of charm. In these scenes, the result is completely failure. He just comes off as sour grapes and I get the feeling that the dialog was not written to be such.
Heath Ledger played an excellent psychopath. Wether he played a great Joker is up for debate. Personally, I would prefer a Joker that was if not camp, at least an effeminant dandy.
But, ah well, that's what you get when you get a smackhead to portray a villain who is clearly an uppers guy. Although whenever he talked, he had the classic cokehead habit of re-watting his tongue after every few words which was a nice touch.
I haven't read any review but I'm sure I'm not the only one who has picked up the enormous anti-Christian alagory going on in this movie. Stay with me.
You got Harvey Dent. He's the Christ-figure. Got it. Batman is John The Baptist.
Batman is always going on about:
-"The people have been waiting for years for a hero" (ie, a messiah) as the Jewish people were in New Testament times. The hero in question is supposed to rid Gotham of crime. Deliver us from evil. Bring about the new Jerusalem.
- "A lot of people think I'm that hero (ie messiah) but I'm not. It's this guy over here Harvey Dent (Jesus)" John The Baptist was thought by many to be the Messiah but proclaimed the real one was Jesus.
Rachel Dawes is Mary Magdelin. She is the Christ-figure's weak spot. She represents the Christ-figures' earthly desires, and his distraction from fulfilling the prophesies of ridding Gotham of crime.
Obviously, the Joker is the devil.
*****************Huge Spoilers From Here On********************
NSFW:
That was the point of having the explosive on two boats was to turn innocent people into killers. Joker had no financial gain to be had from it. And yet there was a point.
Now, the devil's main goal is not to kill good but to corrupt it. He could have killed Dent a zillion times over. What he tries to do is bring people down to his level.
So to get to the Christ-figure, he plays to his worldly desires. Which in turn works. Dent becomes a baddy. As the Joker is dangling by the rope he says "I wanted to show that even the best of us can fall".
Up to that point, I thought I might have been reading to much into the whole Christian analogy. But "fall" is kind of an interesting choice of words. As wikipedia defines it, "In Christian doctrine, the Fall of Man, or simply the Fall, refers to the transition of the first humans from a state of innocent obedience to God, to a state of guilty disobedience to God."
Now, the Christ-figure dies. But his followers, in full knowledge of his true nature conspire to perpetuate a myth of Dent as a Christ-figure as an all-good person that they know jolly-well he was not. But they do it to give people hope, something to believe in, and blah blah blah.
As I write this I start realizing that Batman might also represent Judas. In some post-modern interpretations of Judas-as-tragic-hero (a la Last Temptation Of Christ), Judas kills Jesus on purpose but only because it is necesary to do so in order to fulfill the scriptures. But he knows that the price of doing so means he will be villified for centuries for centuries to come. It's a dirty job but someone has to do it.
Sorry, don't know who Commisioner Gordon is. kind of the weak spot in my theory. At first I thought he was St. Peter cause he takes up the messiah's job after he's gone. But St. Peter was always more down with Jesus than J the B. Or he could be Lazarus in the he comes back from the dead. Except that he has a greater role in the movie than Lazarus did in the NT.
This movie sucks. Seriously. So far, as I post this, I'm only 1/3 through and I don't have enough beer left to get drunk to build up the patience to finish it tonight.
It's all talk. No plot. Just political crap. Reminds me of Babylon 5. I enjoyed the batman immediatley precening this POS. It was much better. Don't waste your money on this. Dont' even waste your bandwidth downloading it.
OK, that's IT!!!! bruce wayne just got on his sport bike and now theres a bag-pipe parade not theres a gratutitious funeral speech. Turing this shit off. It will probalby take me a week to get through it.
^you sound far too inebriated to know what's going on. frustrated? if you wanna just watch explosions and fx go see a michael bay "film" or perhaps a toothpaste commercial.
I really liked it. I saw Batman Begins the day before I went to see this and I enjoyed that too... I never liked the other Batman movies much. I like the darkness and moral complexities of this storyline... I thought this was one of the best movies I've seen this year, and I love Heath and shitdamn I'm going to miss seeing his performances.
Oh and I saw it late, I don't like blockbusters are there's too many people... had no real expectations.
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![:\](https://bluelight.org/xf/BL_Images/Orig_Emoji/wrygrin.gif "wry grin :\")
