The Dark Knight Trilogy (Christopher Nolan, 2005-2012)

[cdnchris]

Admittedly I'm not familiar with Bane from the comics but he was a decent heavy. I thought the voice sounded like Sean Connery as Darth Vader but it wasn't too distracting for me. I thought he was a solid villain. Hardy did a fine job, despite the handicap of having to follow Ledger's Joker, and he was probably wise in keeping it toned down.

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I do sorta wish Scarecrow played a bigger part in this one. He seemed like an interesting villain and he seemed underused in the series, especially since Cillian was playing him.

[flyonthewall2983]

Ideas for a series of "Bane in Conversation" spin-off short films:

Bane has a parent-teacher conference with his son Charlie Brown's teacher
Bane orders dinner at the Taco Bell drive-thru
Bane discusses confinement with Rob Brydon's Small Man in a Box
Bane discusses urban infrastructure with a subway operator
Bane discusses political reform with William F. Buckley (who has a severe cold)
Bane dicks around on a TI-99 4A

Please tell me you came up with this lol. It's brilliant

[Matt]

I have to share credit with my partner, Josh. We have been talking to each other in Banevoice since we saw the movie yesterday.

[YnEoS]

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Felt like this film was trying too hard to be a great conclusion to the trilogy, and as others have mentioned, overstuffed itself resulting in a whole bunch of ideas and stories that would've made interesting films by themselves, but seem to be thrown around haphazardly without ever being fully developed.

I was really surprised how talkative this film was, and didn't really find much interest in most of the dialogue. There were quite a few good performances which made these scenes more tolerable, and it sprinkled enough witty little gags throughout so that it was never completely intolerable. The fights seemed effective and fairly minimal to me, but being fairly uninterested in most of the story I found myself wishing there were somewhat larger and grander HK action style set-pieces.

I've heard a lot of people praise the opening action scene of the film with Bane, but it seemed rather boring to me. Seemed to rely on the same dramatic device Nolan recycles throughout the film where you think someone has the drop on someone else, but it turns out to be the reverse. I don't mind so much that these reversals are rather implausible, but they happen so frequently as to become a matter of course, and there's never sufficient set up to let one appreciate a good surprise reversal. In fact Anne Hathaway's whole stick for the film seems to be that people thinks she's a sweet innocent girl, and surprise, she isn't.

It seemed most of the time the various plot threads with minimal time and depth necessary to check off the stock great movie moment. Taking the whole Batman Catwoman relationship for example. She's cool and likable enough that we want her to be good, throw in a nice double cross and then the Han Solo redemption at the end. Then when the basics had been established it seems her character was mostly abandoned to allow the film to explore the other plot threads. I'm not knocking the re-use of tried and true narrative devices. But in the hands of a skilled director these can be built on top of strongly developed characters to make them really sing, or be used as a cinematic shorthand to drive the story to what the director really wants to say. But in DKR it felt like it was just plot devices leading to other plot devices so that by the time we got through it all it felt like we'd experienced a lot, but none of the stories ended up being particularly interesting.

I did quite enjoy the Talia twist at the end. But then after thinking about it more, that was mainly because up until that point the whole Bane/Ras connection was completely uninteresting and it felt like Nolan was just throwing in Batman Begins references to try and make the whole trilogy feel like a cohesive whole. Then when the big twist came it was a relief, but only because I realized that the actual story wasn't the bland one I'd been sitting through for the last 2+ hours, and then it just ended.

[reaky]

The true inspiration for Tom Hardy's Bane-voice: Douglas in The IT Crowd.

[knives]

I believe he's said the Gypsy King was the inspiration actually.

[Drucker]

I just saw the movie and was blown away. I feel a little sheepish posting this as many of the comments seem to be of the underwhelmed nature, but I'll try to be concise:

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Don't get me wrong, I loved TDK and BB, but I felt this one held together just as well and was great. TDK, for all it's strengths, you can count me in as one of the people who felt that last hurrah went on a bit too long. Batman Begins was great as well, but to me didn't have the power the other two do.

I can see some of the shortcomings others have mentioned such as not enough time on certain characters, Bane getting killed with such sudden ease, Tom Hardy's weird voice, etc. but quite frankly, I think there was enough greatness in the movie to compensate. The beginning almost felt like the opening to Superman vs. Doomsday-where you're just pulverized by this horrible force (I'm not a big comic book guy and that's my only frame of reference). Surely not as strong as an opening sequence as TDK, but it did end up coming back around full circle. There really felt like one consistent story here, and for what had to be a good hour or just under, there is just constant darkness. others mention that they didn't, but I certainly DID find myself at the edge of my seat pulling for Batman to come back on top. When you see the symbol light up on the bridge, it is spellbinding.

This movie shows why Batman is great-he is really just a man, and certainly could be defeated. He's not like other superheroes. I think the political implications of the movie, as well, while perhaps not eloquent, made several good points about what really matters in life. Batman is forced to prove that he meant what he said for all of those years and was going to put Gotham before everything else, and he did.

JGL was excellent. The touch of Scarecrow with a ripped suit jacket to resemble a scarecrow was great. there were fewer cheesy one liners and the ones that did appear were funnier.

Overall, absolutely excellent!

[mfunk9786]

This made $18.05 million yesterday, which puts it on track for around $40-50 million for the weekend, suggesting that this film will not have anywhere close to the financial staying power that The Dark Knight had.

[flyonthewall2983]

No surprise there, between the fallout from last week and the Olympics starting it won't surprise anyone there's little chance to make those monster numbers again.

[knives]

I hope the studios don't blame Nolan for it.

[mfunk9786]

I don't think Christopher Nolan is going to have any trouble getting movies made for the rest of his life, even if this was released to a box office gross of one cent.

[flyonthewall2983]

As narrow-minded and naive as studios can be, I'm sure they know this was out of everybody's hands. Chris has acted well and accordingly as one should, and Warners has followed suit. The real casualty of it all is Gangster Squad, something that frankly looked like it wouldn't change the world much anyway.

[flyonthewall2983]

The tally is now at 64 million for this weekend.

[Alan Smithee]

I would imagine that word of mouth hasn't been as gushing this time around and that's hurt the box office on top of the massacre. I've certainly seen more bad reviews this time. TDK was almost universally praised and everyone was telling each other to see it much like The Avengers which will be this year. You don't have to make a good movie to make a buttload of money but if you make something commercial and good it can put you over the top.

[flyonthewall2983]

The worldwide gross is at over 500 million currently, so at least they are seeing a healthy profit from it. I've never wanted to see a movie like this succeed on this level, but with what happened I feel a bit obligated as a fan of the series and as a movie-goer to be hopeful all this bad publicity doesn't sink it's reputation. More importantly, I hope over time the movie isn't as linked with the incident as it has been.

[Alan Smithee]

Even though I don't care for the film I agree completely. It's totally unfair for the film to be in that shadow.

[warren oates]

I'm a fan of Nolan's movies in general, except for Insomnia, which I hated, and Batman Begins which my s.o. swears is too silly for me. But I really like most of his other films, including The Dark Knight -- and I love The Prestige. I'm sad to say that for me this is easily the worst Nolan has done, and made worse by the films that came before it, by what it could have been and by the specific failings that are most responsible for how bad it is.

I'll just say that I've defended Nolan in the past against charges that he's a poor craftsman and a sloppy filmmaker with a stilted visual sense mostly by falling back on the position that he's primarily a storyteller, interested in spinning great genre yarns. But in Rises the story is D.O.A. There are plenty of busy happenings, but it hurts one's brain to try and figure out why any of it should matter to the audience, or, for that matter, to the on-screen characters for whom dramatic challenges seem to consist primarily of sudden revelations that "it was all part of ________'s plan" then a few scenes of passive suffering followed by some sort of Deus ex machina.

I was stunned to find out Nolan had referenced films like Prince of the City and The Battle of Algiers for this one, as none of the energy of either one is anywhere in this mess. In contrast to the obvious and positive influence of a film like Heat on The Dark Knight. Anyway, here's a good link:

A mubi.com roundtable with Ignaty Vishnevetsky and two others that covers most of the biggest problems with this film better than I've seen elsewhere

[Roger Ryan]

I can't disagree with many of the complaints lobbed at TDNR, but I wonder why so much heated debate surrounds this franchise as opposed to the other comic book/action movie franchises? My feeling is that Nolan actually does manage to elevate this work above the fray, but not far enough to make the films as good as they should be.

As to the murky politics, I actually appreciate that I'm made uncomfortable by the contradictions. The MUBI roundtable discussion seems focused on Batman not making the right choices or the film trying to have its cake and eat it too by showing corrupt bankers and deluded mobs. I see the contradictions as reflective of the conflict established by the first two films. The messy, almost nihilistic tone is refreshing given how often superhero movies get boiled down to good guys/bad guys.

[Drucker]

To briefly add to Roger Ryan's point, I agree. While that roundtable brings up a lot of very fair points, I don't think a lack of logic takes away from the film. When JGL tells the kids to "get on the bus" for example and "lie" to them, it's because the reality of the situation has taken precedence over his personal philosophy. Ideally it would be great if we could practice what we preach 100% of the time, but sometimes that's just not possible/not in the best interest of a character or situation (see end of Dark Knight, as well).

[JMULL222]

Everyone's so obsessed with the thought of political subtext that they focus on whether Nolan is left or right so much that they somehow don't realize he's satirizing the very nature of left vs. right

[flyonthewall2983]

Everyone's so obsessed with the thought of political subtext that they focus on whether Nolan is left or right so much that they somehow don't realize he's satirizing the very nature of left vs. right

I wish this site had a "like" function.

[Mr Sausage]

It's in the nature of American discourse to assume that non-Americans are also, somehow, on either the left or the right.

[Alan Smithee]

Everyone's so obsessed with the thought of political subtext that they focus on whether Nolan is left or right so much that they somehow don't realize he's satirizing the very nature of left vs. right

I'd like to hear you elaborate on this satire. I don't want a film to come down as left wing or right wing necessarily and I don't want a film to be like "this is good, this is bad" ala Haggis' Crash but as someone else has pointed out Nolan admits they're just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. They use world events and political imagery in a way that is irresponsible. When you make a film like this you endorse, condone or condemn pieces of your story or themes through the way you shoot things, the music you use, who you cast etc etc etc. Unfortunately it seems like Nolan endorses multiple opposing points of view on some subjects such as the validity of surveillance or vigilante justice and I don't believe at all that he is saying "these are complex subjects with multiple answers" I believe he's saying, "This is what Jonathan and I came up with for another big plot turn around."

[warren oates]

Everyone's so obsessed with the thought of political subtext that they focus on whether Nolan is left or right so much that they somehow don't realize he's satirizing the very nature of left vs. right

I'd like to hear you elaborate on this satire. I don't want a film to come down as left wing or right wing necessarily and I don't want a film to be like "this is good, this is bad" ala Haggis' Crash but as someone else has pointed out Nolan admits they're just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. They use world events and political imagery in a way that is irresponsible. When you make a film like this you endorse, condone or condemn pieces of your story or themes through the way you shoot things, the music you use, who you cast etc etc etc. Unfortunately it seems like Nolan endorses multiple opposing points of view on some subjects such as the validity of surveillance or vigilante justice and I don't believe at all that he is saying "these are complex subjects with multiple answers" I believe he's saying, "This is what Jonathan and I came up with for another big plot turn around."

I agree with Alan Smithee. The key issue for me with Rises isn't about any of the political or historical references but the way in which they are thrown together so poorly and shoddily and to what end? Not satire so much as ideological sloppiness which is just a symptom of the movie's larger illness -- that it has no idea what it's about, as a whole or even from moment to moment. Nolan's having such trouble making sense of his choices in this one because he never even came close to nailing down the dramatics or thematics of his story. As the mubi roundtable suggests, for instance, he misses huge opportunities to have Bane actually mean something. And if you don't know what your villain wants or what he stands for, the hero's got nothing interesting to oppose. Which is maybe why Nolan seems to want to have it both ways with any given choice in the film. In Rises even his decision to film certain stunts with more "live action" or his use of IMAX cameras seems off compared to TDK. You can't compare the effect of the tractor trailer flipping in TDK to the opening aerial stunt work in Rises where gray planes are offset by a gray sky that might as well have been green screen (and would have been for a smarter filmmaker like, say, David Fincher). I'd say that something Jim Emerson said about Nolan's visuals applies to this film as a whole: "He seems to mistake scale for grandeur." Bingo. Hundreds of extras running down a street, the threat of a nuke and the politics of revolution do not automatically make your film epic or deep. First you have to make us care about why it's all happening.

[pzadvance]

Everyone's so obsessed with the thought of political subtext that they focus on whether Nolan is left or right so much that they somehow don't realize he's satirizing the very nature of left vs. right

I'd like to hear you elaborate on this satire. I don't want a film to come down as left wing or right wing necessarily and I don't want a film to be like "this is good, this is bad" ala Haggis' Crash but as someone else has pointed out Nolan admits they're just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. They use world events and political imagery in a way that is irresponsible. When you make a film like this you endorse, condone or condemn pieces of your story or themes through the way you shoot things, the music you use, who you cast etc etc etc. Unfortunately it seems like Nolan endorses multiple opposing points of view on some subjects such as the validity of surveillance or vigilante justice and I don't believe at all that he is saying "these are complex subjects with multiple answers" I believe he's saying, "This is what Jonathan and I came up with for another big plot turn around."

I agree with Alan Smithee. The key issue for me with Rises isn't about any of the political or historical references but the way in which they are thrown together so poorly and shoddily and to what end? Not satire so much as ideological sloppiness which is just a symptom of the movie's larger illness -- that it has no idea what it's about, as a whole or even from moment to moment. Nolan's having such trouble making sense of his choices in this one because he never even came close to nailing down the dramatics or thematics of his story. As the mubi roundtable suggests, for instance, he misses huge opportunities to have Bane actually mean something. And if you don't know what your villain wants or what he stands for, the hero's got nothing interesting to oppose. Which is maybe why Nolan seems to want to have it both ways with any given choice in the film. In Rises even his decision to film certain stunts with more "live action" or his use of IMAX cameras seems off compared to TDK. You can't compare the effect of the tractor trailer flipping in TDK to the opening aerial stunt work in Rises where gray planes are offset by a gray sky that might as well have been green screen (and would have been for a smarter filmmaker like, say, David Fincher). I'd say that something Jim Emerson said about Nolan's visuals applies to this film as a whole: "He seems to mistake scale for grandeur." Bingo. Hundreds of extras running down a street, the threat of a nuke and the politics of revolution do not automatically make your film epic or deep. First you have to make us care about why it's all happening.

It's hard to disagree with much of this but I think the perception that Nolan "endorses... the validity of surveillance" as Smithee wrote is very off-base. That device as utilized in TDK is very clearly introduced as a problematic element by, ostensibly, Bruce Wayne's conscience--Lucius Fox. There is an apparent recognition of the murky politics of such a device in that film, which I think is where a lot of the expectation for Nolan to treat current themes similarly in DKR stems from. I would agree that he misses the mark in this new film, but regardless there is precedent in this series for mature observations on political messiness.

Additionally, criticizing the color palette of the opening sequence in Rises strikes me as nitpicking and a bizarre dismissal of what makes that scene so engaging--the fact that it actually appears to be happening. I can think of no stunt that would have benefited more from a lack of green screen. That entire sequence is breathtaking for its very visceral realness--much the same as the truck scene in TDK was. I find the effect of the two scenes immensely comparable.