Jump to content

The Dark Knight Rises SPOILERS ALLOWED Discussion Thread


Jay

Recommended Posts

TDKR is far better than the Avengers.but that doesn't change the fact that this is Nolan's weakest film.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I LOVED Inception, very entertaining. And yes, DiCaprio is one of my favorite actors.

ok KK, you may have talked me into giving this movie another chance. (TDKR)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It has Leo trying to act serious and moody right?

It is a heist flick but it also has Leo trying to act serious and moody.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mostly a

It has Leo trying to act serious and moody right?

It is a heist flick but it also has Leo trying to act serious and moody.

But it's mostly fun. Leo is just a typical Nolan protagonist. Same as Leonard Shelby, inspector Domer, Angier, Borden, or indeed Bruce Wayne.

They have all something in common: obession. And they are all somewhat moody.

Karol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think Leo's Romeo is absolutely outstanding..... one of the best he's done. And I understand what you're saying about 'serious and moody'. The moody bit is grating.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, but Inception is not a drama. It's a Bond vs. Mission: Impossible kind of action film with some moodiness in between. And it's an ensemble cast as well. Hardy, Gordon Joseph-Levitt and Marilon Cotillard are in it too.

Karol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mostly a

It has Leo trying to act serious and moody right?

It is a heist flick but it also has Leo trying to act serious and moody.

But it's mostly fun. Leo is just a typical Nolan protagonist. Same as Leonard Shelby, inspector Domer, Angier, Borden, or indeed Bruce Wayne.

They have all something in common: obession. And they are all somewhat moody.

Karol

That's quite true. I personally don't like DiCaprio who has about as much charisma as a washboard.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I like the cast of Inception for Hardy and Cotillard as well

To me he is still the kid from Growing Pains!

What do directors like Scorsese, Eastwoood, Nolan see in him?

$$

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Memento was poorly done, that Al Pacino one was average, didn't bother with Inception.

Not a Nolan fan I take it? I thought Memento was brilliant. I thought Insomnia was a well done thriller. And Inception is an incredibly fun and entertaining heist film (contrary to the Nolan naysayers of this board). And all these films were wrapped up in a clean, well-conceived fashion. Its one of the things I liked about Nolan for as dense as his plots get, he always knew how to wrap them up, making the entirety of the film seem very much in place and look very polished. This was unfortunately not the case with The Dark Knight Rises.

I LOVED Inception, very entertaining. And yes, DiCaprio is one of my favorite actors.

I think DiCaprio is an incredibly talented actor. Especially in this past decade. I don't know about you guys, but I don't have that much of a problem with his moody stuff (although I understand why it would be grating to some). And he's very smart with the films he picks to work on. I admire the guy and think he's one of the smarter actors working out there.

ok KK, you may have talked me into giving this movie another chance. (TDKR)

Great. Just read my first post on this thread, I was literally ranting about how much I disliked this movie. But I warmed up to with my second viewing and it was worth. Despite all its flaws, it was entertaining and enjoyable.

I think Leo's Romeo is absolutely outstanding..... one of the best he's done. And I understand what you're saying about 'serious and moody'. The moody bit is grating.

Urgh....I hated that film. I hated every minute of it. And I hated Leo especially in that film. Leo in the 90s was not in my taste. Titanic, Romeo, etc. urgh...

OK, I’ve seen the film, and I have to say I found it to be very uneven. There are some great bits, some cool bits, some bad bits, and some really bad bits. Here we go...

Impressive little write-up BloodBoal. Now let me add a few bits here and there ;)

Let’s start with the opening, shall we? OK, the music is there, and it’s already a bit loud. That can’t go any louder, can it? Well, yes it can, and as soon as the action starts, I didn’t even try to understand what the characters were saying because I knew I wouldn’t succeed. Between the overly loud Moussaka song, the sound effects for the plane collapsing, people screaming all over the place, and Bane’s “mgrumpharumphgrumphumph”, there was not much for me to be excited about. That scene is supposed to be impressive, but on the whole I felt it was a bit underwhelming. Actually, I felt like a lot of scenes that were supposed to be impressive in this film, and give you a “Wow” of amazement, just didn’t deliver. But more on that later.

Hardy’s Bane is quite impressive visually, I have to say. His muscles are just HUGE, man! I also liked how they used his voice. I know a lot of people here didn’t, but I really did. It felt like it surrounded you and you couldn’t get away from it. A nice touch. But as most people said, after he breaks Batman’s back, Bane isn’t as threatening for the rest of the film...

Yes, I got used to Bane's voice eventually. And I thought that opening scene was very impressive. Was it hard to hear Bane sometimes? Yes. But when I watched the film the 2nd time, I really came to appreciate that scene. It was choreographed incredibly well. It's a shame that Bane impresses less in the film thanks to his needless humanization.

Gordon Levitt’s character, on the other hand, was better handled. I really liked him and Gordon Levitt’s acting as well. I have nothing to complain about that character. He was likable and bringed a good balance to Wayne's moody and dark character. But that whole bullshit about him knowing Bruce is Batman was just bullshit. "I've looked into your eyes, and I knew! Now, look into my eyes, you will see what you mean to me. Search your heart, search your soul and when you find me there you'll search no more." It's deep, man!

Weakest character in the film in my opinion. As someone pointed out, he was too black-and-white, too overtly innocent and ultimately just became an incredibly dull character who spat out a bunch of cliches. "So, do you think he's back? You know, the Batman?". "I wish people knew who the Batman was!!" "Oh no, my orphan buddies are in trouble!!!" whine, whine, whine. And I will never know how he came to know Batman's identity. "I just looked into your eyes, and I knew!!" Wtf! Talk about lazy writing...

I have to say, I felt really unwell during the Wall Street, since I believe this was during that scene that the shooting took place at the premiere in Colorado. That was a really, really weird moment...

I watched the midnight showing, so the shooting hadn't happened yet. Accordingly, I didn't feel anything.

About the second half of the film: while I felt more engaged by it, there was still a lot of things that were underwhelming. First, there was the policemen’s charge (more on that below). Second, the reveal of Cotillard’s character true nature. While I find it nice to reveal there was someone else behind Bane’s actions, it’s a shame that after that scene, Bane just doesn’t exist as a character, and his death is rushed to get rid of him as soon as possible. All this build-up for that? Meh. Another thing I didn’t like about Talia’s revelation is the fact that her true self appears just for the last five minutes of the film. They should have revealed her earlier in the film. I don’t like when they reveal the true villain in the last moment, just to kill him a few seconds later. What’s the point?

Underwhelming is precisely the word I would use to describe a lot of the scenes. During the trailer, it looked massive and I had no clue what Nolan cooked up, but it look effin' epic! But the battle scene in the climax was ultimately underwhelming.

It’s time for a little interlude about the jokes. I was surprised to see so much jokes in this film, more than in the first two films combined, I think. The problem is that most of them aren’t funny and just fall flat, and you have that awkward silence... The only one I did like was when Catwoman disappears and Batman is like: “Now I know how it feels like”. Nice one. I could have written it.

I found myself smiling at the one you mentioned as well. But like you said, there were a lot more jokes and there were a lot more cliches in this film than any of the previous ones. That's what surprised me, and it kind of stuck out in "epic tragedy" route the films go for.

There are a lot of cringe worthy moments in this film. First, you have the policemen charge during the final battle. I guess that’s one of those moments that are supposed to make you feel proud to be American. The problem is, I’m not American, I’m European, so I didn’t feel anything. Now, if only Nolan showed us a cop saying something like: “Oh, how I miss Reykjavik!”, maybe that would have moved me. The other thing is that this moment is just bloody stupid. Bane’s men all have weapons, yet they don’t shoot the cops because...? Same for the cops: at first, I was like: “They don’t have guns, do they?” Then I saw a few of them with guns, indeed! So why did they charge? Fuckin’ stupid.

Another cheesy moments in that scene was Foley’s death. You know, he’s like: “Yeah, let’s get them, dudes! For your people! For Gotham!”, then you’ve got a shot of Talia in her Tumbler saying “Kill them all”. And in the next shot, you see Foley’s body on the ground, with the camera zooming on it, and it feels so much like Nolan wants to make you cry, to make you feel something, it actually almost made me puke. Another moment where it felt like a TV movie. That was really the worst part of the film.

Well, that and the ending. Oh, boy, I’m surprised to see so much positive reactions to the ending. I found it to be awful. Bloody awful. First, it felt really rushed, it’s like: “OK, we’ve got to see each character’s ending, with as few lines and screen time as possible, so let’s make a list and do this properly! Lucius Fox: continues to work for Wayne Industries and does some good job. Check! Blake becomes the new Batman. Check! Alfred goes on vacation. Check! Bruce is not dead. Check!”. Lame. And they ruined every ending, in my opinion. All three films were grounded in reality, rather bleak and moody, and suddenly, in the last five minutes of the trilogy, the tone shifts and its “And they lived happily ever after!” and utter cheesiness. Seriously, what the fuck? Wayne Manor becoming a shelter for orphans? HAHAHAHA! They build a statue of Batman! MEGALOL!!!!!!!! Blake's real name is Robin: so predictable, I didn’t expect Nolan to dare do this one, yet he did! Bruce not being dead? Fuck me! It wouldn’t be that hard to pull a better ending: just have Alfred sit at his table, look in front of the camera, smile, and let the end credits roll. No bullshit about automatic pilot or whatever. That would have been perfect, but it was not meant to be, apparently.

Like I said before, there were a lot of cliches in this film and some of them were cringe-worthy. It's why I felt this film treaded a bit closer to Marvel territory, or really comic-book territory than the last two. And I was surprised Nolan showed Bale, I thought they were going to cut at Alfred as well (it seems like such a Nolan thing to do). The whole "Robin" thing was incredibly predictable too. But why is Robin his real name? What man is named "Robin"? That's a girl's name at best. It seemed...let's say forced. Then again, there were a LOT of moments that seemed forced. Especially that scene where Gordon finds out Batman is Bruce Wayne. There's NO way that Gordon would have remembered that flashback. He barely knows Wayne! And I'm sure he's put his coat around a lot of kids. Too much of this "I need to brings this too a full circle. So let's insert flashback here, metaphor here, cheesy line here!"

But I did like the last 5 minute ending overall. Joey pointed out how each character had their own moment of revelation (about Wayne living and all) and I liked that.

Now, about the music. Let’s put aside the quality of it, for a minute, not to piss off Koko & Co, and let’s ask a very important question: why did they bother recording around 2 hours of music, when about 75% to 80% of that recording is just a copy/paste job of the two previous scores? Why not just reuse what was recorded previously? That’s just a waste of time and money, who could have been used for another thing, like, I don’t know, build an hospital or an orphanage. You may like the score, and I don’t have a problem with that, but you have to admit that huge portions of it are exact copies of cues from the two others films. That’s not an opinion, that’s a fact. So, that’s why I’m left with that question to which I would like an answer.

About the new material: I did like the theme for Catwoman (even though we get to hear it only like two times or something). As for Bane’s theme and the Moussaka song, I have to say I find it to be quite effective in the film (I’d be lying if I said otherwise). Everytime you hear it, you’re like: “Oh, shit! Bane is near! They’re in deep trouble, dude!”. But on a musical level, it’s very weak. I wonder why they bothered recording lengthy cues with that theme, when it’s basically just “Deshe Deshe Moussaka Moussaka!” playing over and over again. Just record that bit once, create a loop, and you’re done!

And that’s where the biggest problem with Zimmer music lies: he doesn’t care about what happens on screen. He just writes a theme which plays over and over again during the whole sequence. The thing is, it makes all the scenes be on the same level of emotion. So, how do you make the viewer understand that a moment in a scene is more important than another? How do you make them understand: “Hey, this is a turning point in the scene!” Well, you just play with the volume! You make the music louder for important moments in the scene, and lower for less important moments. So when you have an important moment like Batman sacrificing himself for Gotham, better prepare your ears for some deafining (and deathining) moment of film music volume history! By the way, during that whole action sequence, it felt like the volume kept on getting higher and higher, I was happy when the bomb finally detonated!

Thank you. All the people who seem to be applauding this score or defending it seem to forget that there is very little original material. Besides about 10-20 minutes of the Moussakka song (and this is on loop again and AGAIN AND AGAIN) the rest is a hack cut and paste job.

Anyway, all in all, I didn’t really enjoy the film. I didn’t feel any emotion for the most part, even during Alfred and Bruce scenes (even though these were some of my favourites from the film), and the film feels a bit all over the place, with too many characters, and a “get-rid-of-the-bomb” (to reuse KK’s word) finale that felt a bit over-the-top and disappointing as a climax for the trilogy. It’s not all bad though, thanks to performances like Hathaway’s and JGL’s. And the Moussaka song.

5/10

DESHE, DESHE, MOUSSAKA, MOUSSAKA!

It's DISHI Moussaka BloodBoal...get it right!

And I felt largely the same as you did with your viewing. But I suggest it you watch it again. With tapered expectations, and all your criticisms already made, you'll find yourself enjoying the film for what it is. A fun action flick, albeit a flawed one, but entertaining it remains.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I didn't think about the Colorado shooting at any point during the film. Because this film has nothing to do with it. Content wise.

Overall the stunts and fight scenes were better shot then in the previous two films. it helps that a lot of the movie takes place in daylight.

Nolan still inst what i would call an action specialist. Some of the framing during the fight scenes are just odd.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I though of the shooting only in the context that they said his attack occured during the first big gun fight scene, which I guess was the attack on the stock exchange. other than that I never gave it any consideration.

I recognise it is not a perfect film, and it's more flawed than TDK, but I find it superior to BB and the ending was the most satisfying of the 3.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I enjoyed BB more than TDKR, and I believe TDK is the bes of the trilogy. And I also liked TDK's ending the most.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The whole "Robin" thing was incredibly predictable too. But why is Robin his real name? What man is named "Robin"?

Which is probably why the character goes by his second name John. It was a nice touch, acknowledging the character of Robin from the comics without actually going to far as to state John Blake will become Robin. (which is a stupid character anyway)

I loved that John Blake was an a straight arrow, uncompromising and loyal until the end. He represented what Jim Gordon represented in the first two films, but could no longer represent after covering up the truth about Harvey Dent.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would have been fine with black-and-white, innocent approach. But he spat out a lot of cliche lines that made him border a cringe-worthy character to watch.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Bale is brilliant is being moody and distant, Leo tries to hard. He comes of as sulky and bitchy.

DiCaprio > Bale

I've only ever really appreciated Bale in his debut. Something about him irritates me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I know what you mean. Unlike many Hollywood actors, there is something unsympathetic about him. A little bit disturbing. He doesn't smile much in interviews and when he does it looks a bit weird.

But in the right role that makes him very effective as an actor.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Maybe. I've only ever seen him in Empire of the Sun, Batman and Rescue Dawn. He's always very good, but somehow difficult to sympathise with.

Dude, you gotta see American Psycho and The Prestige

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The chant is apparently "deshi basara" which is apparently Moroccan Arabic for "He rises".

I still wonder were Wayne without money gets the money to cross back the Atlantic. :lick:

Are you really just figuring out the chant now? ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The chant is apparently "deshi basara" which is apparently Moroccan Arabic for "He rises".

I still wonder were Wayne without money gets the money to cross back the Atlantic. :lick:

Are you really just figuring out the chant now? ;)

I'm not figuring out, I just randomly read that explanation. I had no interest on the chant.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.