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The OFFICIAL The Dark Knight thread


Beowulf

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So, I have a question, not having seen the movie yet. Is it distracting having a different actress play Rachel Dawes? Which is the better Rachel?

It's one of the few cases where an actor is replaced for the better. Maggie Gylenhaal is a much better actor, and she sounds a lot like Katie Holmes.

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I actually found the movie to be a little underwhelming given the hype. I like it more than Begins, but I liked Begins more on first impression. It is a fine film, but its far from a masterpiece. Ledger's performance is worthy of all the praise, characters are wonderfully well rounded and there are two wonderful sequences in the film. However, the film also suffers from uneven pacing, some odd editing and a torrid score. Nolan still proves utterly inept in staging and all out action sequence. All the action bits had hardly any visual logic to them. That said, this movie met my expectations by being slightly superior to Batman Begins (mainly due to the strength of Ledger's performance alone) but fell far short of my hopes that it would be the genre's Goodfellas to The Godfather of Superman: The Movie. Even within its own subgenre of a 'serious' philosophical comic book adaptation, it is trumped by the better made V for Vendetta.

V for Vendetta better than Dark Knight? You're entitled to your opinion, but I'm going to have to disagree with you on this one. I liked V a lot when it first came out, but I've lost a lot of interest in the film since. While with Dark Knight, the film is so layered that it will take a lot for me to lose my interest.

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The people who are criticising the movie are just trying to prove they're different than the people who liked it. There is very little to dislike about this movie. It's got great acting, pacing, story, characters, even the music (which I tore apart in the first online review) worked well in the film. This film totally engrossed you, unless you like to nitpick about random things. Even the action was great (and I thouht the action was poorly done in Batman Begins). It was a non-stop thrills and wonderful character development.

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What was your favorite Joker moment Vaderbait? Mine was when he was

trying to blow up the hospital and the detonator jammed

.

Either that or the

pencil trick

.

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Holy shat. Dark Knight is sitting in the #1 Imdb film ranking spot. The score will dip down a bit over the next few days but it's weighted average is still very high...

The movie was damn good, but...

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Holy shat. Dark Knight is sitting in the #1 Imdb film ranking spot. The score will dip down a bit over the next few days but it's weighted average is still very high...

The movie was damn good, but...

It'll go down. The Top 250 is basically a popularity contest, just because TDK is in the number one spot doesn't make it better than The Godfather or The Shawshank Redemption.

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Yeah, I hate that damn list too. So many great films denied their places because of an easily manipulated system that grants films of modern day a free pass to a supposed high level of quality.

Never got that into Fargo. Love The Prestige, though.

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I'll say it again. The Prestige will never be better than Fargo.

Also, the fact that you don't even know what Yojimbo is, is sad, considering it is one of the best movies ever made by one of the best directors ever, and it inspired so many other fantastic films.

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The people who are criticising the movie are just trying to prove they're different than the people who liked it. There is very little to dislike about this movie. It's got great acting, pacing, story, characters, even the music (which I tore apart in the first online review) worked well in the film. This film totally engrossed you, unless you like to nitpick about random things. Even the action was great (and I thouht the action was poorly done in Batman Begins). It was a non-stop thrills and wonderful character development.

I loved the film, but to say it's flawless is a huge stretch.

For one, it was too long, certain scenes could have been cut down (both the actions scenes and the non-action scenes).

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The Joker's "theme" was something straight out of a horror movie!

I actually thought it was put to good use in the film.

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Alright, well I finally saw this flick. I didn't want to settle for anything less than IMAX, given they shot certain scenes with 65mm.

First off, watching the IMAX version was a bit . . . odd. A lot of the large establishing shots were shot on 65mm, as well as some action scenes and some smaller scenes. The way it kept switching between the two was kinda disorienting. Nothing to completely draw you out of the flick, but noticeable.

About the film, I think I let some of the hype get to me. Everyone I've spoken to (internet aside) has loved the film to death, wants to see it again, etc. I suppose I was expecting the movie to floor me but instead it was pretty much exactly what I thought it would be. To get the negative out of the way, the movie was pretty long, it didn't focus on Bruce Wayne as much as I would have wanted to (more of an ensemble piece), the score was just kinda "there" and the end of the flick, starting with the two ferries, was predictable.

All that aside, it was an excellent movie.

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The Joker's "theme" was something straight out of a horror movie!

I actually thought it was put to good use in the film.

I wasn't saying it as a bad thing. The theme was fantastic for the character in this film. The Joker was so evil and terrifying.

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I wasn't saying it as a bad thing.

Oh, I know. I wouldn't call it a good piece of music, but it was certainly effective in the movie.

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I wasn't saying it as a bad thing.

Oh, I know. I wouldn't call it a good piece of music, but it was certainly effective in the movie.

And thats what film music is supposed to do.

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There are parts of "Why So Serious?" that I enjoy, and other parts are really nothing more than noise. But as a whole I like it.

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Like I said before, the music is functional. Terrible to listen to on its own, and it's nothing like a Jaws theme.

But as generic, interchangeable, atmospheric music it worked well.

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It's exactly like the Jaws theme in terms of it's purpose and effectiveness. Don't think I'm comparing quality though.

It's exactly like Jaws in what they attempted, but it didn't work. It was just atmospheric "uh oh" music, I don't think many people associated it with the Joker himself.

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A suspended note has been used a billion times just to add tension to a scene, the audience isn't going to know that this time it's intended to be a theme. I wouldn't have known had I not read earlier that it was a one note theme.

When people here the Jaws theme, they KNOW the shark is coming. When they here the Joker's theme, they feel tension, they don't know what's coming. It could be Two-Face, it could be Joker, it could be a false alarm (like when the man was about to blow up the other boat, there was one long suspended note), it could be something totally different. All they know is that the composer intends for you to feel worried about something.

Having said that, I sort of enjoy the Joker's theme. But it's nowhere near as effective as the theme from Jaws.

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When you hear Joker's theme, you KNOW he's going to do something brutal. You feel tension, and prepare because you don't know what's going to happen. Tell me, how is that different from the shark?

You hear the shark theme kick in, you get a little tense, you know the shark is coming and you anticipate an event.

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I wouldn't have known the Joker was coming had I not known before hand that HZ wrote a one note theme for him.

Furthermore, in Jaws, the theme is only used when the shark is actually there. When the kids are faking it, the theme is absent. So it is only present when the shark is coming.

In TDK, there is a moment before the man is about to pull the detonator, and a long suspended note is played. The Joker is not coming, nothing disastrous is actually going to happen. So the theme for the Joker is not a signal that he is coming, like Jaws is.

I'm not trying to say one theme is better or worse than the other, but they are not the same thing at all.

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Read the rest of my post, I edited it.

But the fact is that a long suspended note has been used billions of time in films just to add tension. Why would anybody think that it's being put to a different use in TDK?

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Saw the film. In short, it's excellent. There were little problems: pacing issues, slightly shallow characterizations (not quite enough Bruce Wayne), frustratingly photographed action sequences... Overall, however, it was quite a success. All the performances were very solid, especially Ledger's. Not Oscar worthy, but still awesome. The suspense and terror was really well done. But I did not like the score. It was similar to the Batman Begins score and took the film down a notch in every scene.

Except for the final confrontation with Two-Face. I really liked that music. Probably a Howard moment.

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I'd give it a solid 3 stars out of 4. It's a very dense movie and it never gives you a chance to sit back and appreciate the film. It's always moving. It's not dull, it's great looking with wonderful actors, but when it was over I was glad it was over. I really didn't want more.

I'm bothered that

Harvey Dent was introduced and killed in the same film. It would have been nice to set up the character in this movie only to have him become Two Face down the line.

Ledger was good, but I really think all of this Oscar talk is ridiculous and only happening because of his death. If he was still with us, this performance would have been appreciated but not to the extent that people are raving about it. I also could have done with a little less talking from the guy. My impression is that every time he's in a scene he has a monologue. I remember thinking "shut up" a few times during the film.

Caine and Freeman were underutilized and were more interesting in the last film. Oldman had an expanded part and he's very good.

I liked seeing Batman doing detective work and I appreciate that this was very much a crime story. A lot of the ideas presented are good and you will be glued to the screen. It needs some downtime though to make the next set-piece stand out and I never got that watching it.

I like it, I'm far from loving it.

Neil

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Ledger was good, but I really think all of this Oscar talk is ridiculous and only happening because of his death. If he was still with us, this performance would have been appreciated but not to the extent that people are raving about it.

As we were leaving the theater, my friend brought up the Oscar nod talk for Ledger and I basically said what Neil here said. We made a wager on whether or not Heath will land a nom for this role, the loser treats the winner to a pair of movie tickets. I'm looking forward to my free movie tickets come January.

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I mostly agree with Neil, except I do think Ledger's performance is Oscar worthy. But I also thought Nicholson's Joker performance was Oscar worthy.

I do no think that Ledger's Joker is better than Jacks, just different, and wonderfully so.

Also is Ledger's performance is indeed Oscar worthy, then so is Eckharts. He is wonderful as Harvey Dent, but if it turns out he's not dead, though I believe he is, then the ending is a cheat and the set up for the next Batman is not fair.

All in all this is a 3 out of 4 star film. It features a really horrid score by Zimmer, I refuse to believe that JNH even truly participated. The movie would have gotten a further 1/2 star with a good to great score. I want to come out of the movie able to hum the music, and couldn't, I can't recall any of the music, and while that serves as a functional score, it adds nothing to the movie.

The film is too long, somebody forgot to edit the movie, and my opinion hasn't changed on two items. One, Bale is good as Wayne, and not as Batman, overall Michael Keaton remains the best Batman/Wayne. Two, Nolan still has no clue how to direct an action sequence, though he's learning.

If Dent or the Joker are not on screen the film lost energy.

The cinematography was terrific, especially the Hong Kong sequence.

Sorry Vaderbait this isn't a perfect film, not at all, its not a masterpiece, and it didn't live up to the hype, except for Ledger. Eckhart is the surprise here, he exceeds any hype, not that much was sent his way.

I watched Batman this weekend as well, and I must say that Nolan's Dark Knight takes place almost in the real world, while Burton's is more of a comic book movie. Both are fine but flawed films.

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Sorry Vaderbait this isn't a perfect film, not at all, its not a masterpiece, and it didn't live up to the hype, except for Ledger. Eckhart is the surprise here, he exceeds any hype, not that much was sent his way.

I don't think I said it was perfect, and if I did, I certainly didn't mean to imply it's perfect in every way. No film has ever been perfect. I'm sorry, but for as good as the Godfather is it suffers horribly from pacing issues. It doesn't take a perfect movie to be one of the best ever made. And, taking in all the flaws that exist in the Dark Knight doesn't put it behind any of the "classics" which have an enormous set of flaws themselves.

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I haven't said anything that can't be seen elsewhere

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