The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
I am left feeling kind of uncertain here. I just sat down, after having seen The Dark Knight Rises at the local cheap seats, and am searching for a way to proceed in writing this review. You know, I think it's a case of sequel-itis. As probably lots of other reviews have mentioned when discussing this particular movie, The Dark Knight Rises had much to live up to. After all, Christopher Nolan's previous Batman effort, 2008's The Dark Knight, was both extremely dark and at the same time - in this reviewer's opinion and plenty of others too - phenomenally good (please note: that doesn't mean I'd recommend Dark Knight to everyone, but for what it was, it was very satisfactory in my mind).
So I asked myself, could this summer's The Dark Knight Rises live up to that legacy? Having purposely avoided reading reviews of Rises up to this point, I was unsure. Now I know. But to be honest, I wouldn't say that a viewing of this new Batman movie left me with definitive feelings, either way.
Where to begin? I will proceed with this review off of one of two basic assumptions. A) Those reading this review are people who have seen the film, and therefore are just interested in someone's opinion on it other than their own. Or B) The reader is interested in seeing the film, but has put off watching it for some reason or other. So in other words (in that second case), the reader isn't a die-hard fan who has already been to the theater long ago and has their own set of perceptions on it already. A person who is interested, but not partial. Know what I mean?
I say this because I have every intention, for those who have not seen the film, to spoil much of it. So don't say you weren't warned. I am of the opinion that unless I absolutely loved a movie and think it is worth saving for others, there is no harm in giving much or all of it away (especially in the case of a flick that is now in the cheap seats, where even I an afford to see it).
So on with the spoilers. The Dark Knight Rises begins after eight years have passed from the previous film. In this time, Bruce Wayne has been in virtual retirement, and Batman hasn't been seen at all. Things haven't been good for our man, but thanks to his choice as Batman to take the rap for old Harvey Dent's misdeeds in Dark Knight, the city is actually safer than ever. They came up with this law that is helping keep criminals off the streets. You'd think this would make for a real good time all around, but sadly no.
See, there's this mercenary named Bane who is going to mess up Gotham City, like nobody else has yet. A nuclear fusion reactor that can, with the flip of a switch, be turned into a super bad weapon that could blow up the whole city is quickly introduced to the plot. And our boy Bane starts helping out a rich competitor to Bruce Wayne to make some illegal trading and get all that lovely money of his (Bruce Wayne's that is) to go right down the tubes. Bruce Wayne broke? Yup. I'll explain part of that in a minute.
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| Remember this guy? It's Bane, played forgettably by Jeep Swenson, in 1997's totally regrettable Batman and Robin. The film was top heavy with villains, meaning this depiction of Bane spent all his time growling and roaring and looking like a professional wrestler between gigs. / Source: Batman.Wikia.com |
Let me clarify that, while I'm trying to simplify this thing, at the same time you should know if you've seen either of the two proceeding films in the trilogy, that Nolan has a penchant for making things pretty complex. And of course, The Dark Knight Rises is no exception. I'll admit it, I had to see 2008's The Dark Knight on DVD at least a couple times before the whole thing made sense to me. The Dark Knight Rises is like that too. So if you get lost in my explanation, or I miss some details, please forgive, huh?
Where was I? Oh yeah, Bruce Wayne is poor. How'd we get there? Two ways. One, Wayne dumped lots of money into that nuclear reactor that conveniently can be used as a big super bomb, and shut it down when he found out it could become a weapon if it fell into the wrong hands. But that isn't even the worst of it. There is this drawn-out scene where Bane and his goons ride motorcycles out of the Gotham Stock Exchange (with stockbroker hostages in tow) while a program on a tablet computer (not an iPad - kudos there) works away at obviously nefarious deeds. Suddenly Batman returns to the scene after his apparently long absence from crime fighting, and joins the chase.
The cops want Batman more than the much scarier Bane (a guy dressed as a bat vs. a guy who has a Darth Vadar fetish? For myself, I'm going after the one with the breathing problem who we just witnessed taking hostages, rather than the one who conveinitly showed up to join the chase) and they attempt to apprehend "The Bat" instead. Bane gets away, and Batman doesn't catch the rider with the tablet computer until after the sketchy stock trading has been done. Cue ominous music.
The crux? Bane has masterminded the methods in which to break Bruce Wayne, and next he intends to do the same to Batman. He knows they are the same bloke, you see. And he's an ex-member of the League of Shadows. And he's got a really scary but somewhat hard to understand voice. Is he Darth Vadar come to life? From his story, you could be forgiven for mistaking the two for each other.
And here we bring in Anne Hathaway's role as Catwoman. She's up to her lovely eyebrows in Bane's schemes, you see. A touch of editorializing will follow. Now I have said previously on this blog that I didn't know if Hathaway could pull off Catwoman. True, others have also tried the role and failed at it (Halle Barry's Catwoman?). And I am based toward either Michelle Phiefer's smoky lioness version or the style and sex appeal of Julie Newmar. So did Hathaway get the job done and find her niche as Batman's femme fatale? Read below and I'll stall awhile before answering (smirk).
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| Catwoman, past to present. From left to right, Eartha Kitt, Halle Berry, Anne Hathaway, Julie Newmar and Michelle Pfeiffer. / Source: Hollywood.com |
Now I should have known that Nolan could do something good with an unlikely candidate for a Batman villain. After all, though some might disagree, I think Heath Ledger's role as the Joker was probably one of the best portrayals of the character that I've yet seen. It was so against what I would have predicted for Ledger that I almost can't see him in the part. It's as though the Joker of The Dark Knight was somebody else entirely, and not the Heath Ledger of other films I'd seen previously.
Having that in retrospect now, I can say that Hathaway did an admirable job of playing Selina Kyle / Catwoman. In fact, here's my gripe: Hathaway did a better job than I would have thought, but I also believe the film itself went and put Catwoman in the wrong role as well. How's that? Catwoman as hero (or heroine, if you prefer the feminine term).
Rises Catwoman is a cat burglar and all around bad-ass from the streets who gets mixed up in obtaining Bruce Wayne's fingerprints as part of the measures needed to steal his fortune. But Bruce Wayne/Batman doesn't beat the crap out of her, but instead tries to join forces with her to hunt down Bane. Catwoman leads Batman into a trap (Newmar would be proud, so far), and Bane soundly thrashes our out-of-shape superhero. Exit my musing on Catwoman for the moment.
On this fight between Bane and Batman, I gotta say that this is another place where I felt the filmmaker did a good job. Having eight years pass with Batman on the lam, doing no crime fighting and not keeping up on his game, I could actually see Batman getting his butt handed to him. Then again, this whole thing could have ended here, I think. We have already established beforehand that Bane's mask, if removed, would lead him to feel excruciating pain. But Batman doesn't go for the obvious de-masking of his foe. He's too noble for the potential easy kill. Not yet, anyway.
And Batman, by failing to take advantage of his opponent's somewhat obvious Achile's heel (I'd say it is plain as the nose on Bane's face, but he has no visible nose, so...), ends with Batman receiving a broken back and getting half his cowl ripped off. And to add insult to injury, Batman/Wayne is then thrown into a special and exotic pit prison. Saying that thing are not going well for our hero up to this point would seem an understatement.
Eventually our hero finds his way out of this pit of despair. See, this place is literally a hole - great round pit in the ground - and everybody can see freedom far above them. But the inability to climb out of the hole is Bane's idea of a great joke. There is this one spot that is almost impossible to jump across, and so nobody gets out.
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| At a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises, a masked gunman opened fire on the movie-going crowd, killing 12 and injuring 50 more. Very sad. I must admit, sitting in the cheap seats before the screening, I looked around and felt a pang of nervousness. / Source: Muviemup.blogspot.com |
I don't mean to brag, but between the hints given and then the scene where Bruce Wayne first gets himself back into shape and makes his first attempt to climb out, I quickly figured out that the safety rope the prisoners use to keep from going splat when they fail the critical leap was the thing holding everybody back. And as soon as our hero realizes this, he gets out too. Where is he? Looks like somewhere in Asia. Where is the nearest terminal to get on a plane and get back to Gotham City? And how is he going to get the money to get there? Let's just say that Wayne's journey post-escape wasn't featured prominently in the movie.
All joking aside, I gotta say that it was nice to have a film in which some time passes. Nolan doesn't try to rush things, and I for one appreciated it. Too many movies avoid the idea of time passing, as though time was an artificial construct that we all were being manipulated by. Oh wait. Never mind. But seriously, its good to see a film that let's time pass between critical events, and doesn't use a super-cliche musical montage to do it. Good job there.
Wayne is in the prison three months or more, trying to get his health back, and then trying to figure out how to escape. Meanwhile Bane has trapped all the police of Gotham City underground, and has taken over the city and broken all public property rights and set the interests of capitalism in America back centuries. As plenty of others have alluded to, it's the Occupy Wall Street movement if it had access to powerful weapons. And guys who will do anything their fanatic leader says. And the guts to see what a return to the extreme period of the French Revolution is like. You know, that sort of sociopath.
A quick flashback to Wayne/Batman in prison. Hint: the film is full of flashbacks. Anyway, all this time we keep flashing to a kid who escaped the pit in days past, and everybody assumes it was Bane. Later we find out it wasn't Bane at all, but someone else entirely. It was actually Ras Al Gul's kid who escaped the pit, and it's actually Ras Al Gul's kid who is leading the assault on Gotham City. Remember Liam Neesom in Batman Begins? How he wanted to destroy the corruption of Gotham City, on behalf of the evil League of Shadows organization? Well his kid has found a way to do it, and with style. I'm going to save this one particular spoiler and let those who still want to see the movie figure it out for themselves. It wasn't the most shocking reveal I'd seen in a film, but it was a bit of surprise to me, and made things a bit more satisfying. You can at least figure out that Bane isn't the real head bad guy, based on what I've said. No, it's a so-called regular citizen. That is important.
Back to the action. So Bruce Wayne / Batman goes back to Gotham City and helps start a counter-revolution which leads to the citizens trying to get away before the decaying nuclear device goes off, and the cops go fight the badguys, and Catwoman goes from being all about her own interests to saving Batman's life, and we meet Batman's successor, and lots of people either figure out who Batman really is, or are told outright, and the movie ends with a changing of the guard, as it were. Yes, I could go on spoiling all the details and telling you who does what and why. But you know, as I approach the end of the review, I just don't feel like it.
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| I see I'm not the only one to make the connection. Nice. / Source: Zgul-Osr1113.DeviantArt.com |
The movie's conclusion is good enough, I think. Not so good that I felt it was worth building lots of anticipation for, but not so bad that I feel no respect for it and therefore no obligation to keep it under wraps for those who have yet to see the film. Ultimately, The Dark Knight Rises falls into a middle category for me. And that's the problem here, folks.
For me, the film didn't have the satisfying feel of The Dark Knight. Yes, we have a happy ending by the end, even though it looks like things are going to instead turn out in the "sad & noble ending" category. And yes, it wraps the story up nicely, seeing as we are told that this Nolan Batman series is at it's end. But I still didn't come away feeling like it was as good as it could have been. Certainly not for lack of trying on the part of the filmmaker, but it just wasn't able to live up to its predecessor. Nor was the story fool-proof enough, to my eyes.
For instance? Where to begin? I'm not going to sit here and quibble the whole thing as others have probably done, nor do I wish to look smart at the expense of the movie's plot. Yes it is tempting, but the act of completely decapitating the film is not satisfying to me. I really think this one, unlike some other recent "summer" movies I've seen, is one of the smarter and better done films I've seen. 2012's Total Recall comes to mind in the category of dumb action flicks. Especially since Total Recall had so much potential. The Dark Knight Rises has lots of potential too, and manages to live up to most of it. Yet somehow, Rises still manges to leave me feeling like it wasn't the satisfactory conclusion I'd wished for.
A few specifics. First, back to my gripes on Catwoman. Anne Hathaway does a fine job in this film, though arguably not as good as Ledger did with the Joker. She uses that "Hathaway charm" and innocence in her opening moments to make you think she is someone entirely different (as a character) than she turns out to be. Her introduction scene was pretty effective, I thought. And so are her later scenes, especially when she kidnaps a congressman to act as her safety net when the bad guys attempt to double cross her after her theft of Bruce Wayne's fingerprints. Her feigned scream of panic when the cops bust in is great. Nice way to use chauvinism to your tactical advantage.
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| Yes, the 1960s Batman TV serial was hokey. And Ms. Newmar's performance was in line with that hokiness. But truly, of the live action Catwoman portrayals, I still think she is the best. Hathaway is great, and in some ways better, but Julie's Catwoman was a bad girl. Always, first and foremost. Even when she is tempted to run away with Batman for some romantic interludeing, this Catwoman is a woman of her evil sentiments, to the bone. Sorry, but that still beats serrated blade high heals and a complex character story in my book. / Source: HeroComplex.LATimes.com |
But then the film does something with this very human and relatable villain that I didn't care for. Yes, I realize she isn't a "super" villain, as Catwoman has been portrayed in all the other Batman experiences I've had. But did they have to make her into a Return of the Jedi Han Solo? Did they really need to "heart of gold" her? It's a case of past portrayals overshadowing present-day attempts, I think. Sorry, but Catwoman isn't a good guy... er, girl. Yes, the image preented of her in this film makes it possible for her actions to be more ambiguity-laced, but her decision to go against what we all expect Catwoman to really be - that is evil at her core, despite her feelings for Batman - didn't sit well with me.
Then there are a few technical guffaws in the movie that I didn't care for. Yes, lot's of people can point out more than these, but here is a sampling of what I observed.
Fore one, we have this climactic battle where the cops have been let out of the sewers and go to face the bad guys who have ensconced themselves in city hall (the irony notwithstanding). Earlier in the movie, we have seen that the bad guys are carrying guns which shoot high powered bullets that can go right through an officer's bulletproof vest. But in this scene, where the badguys all have the better firepower, things quickly degrade into a big fistfight. Sure, Batman shows up in his new super-helicopter thingy and knocks out the stolen Batmobile Tumbler vehicles that are being used as artillery support, but the first salvo of terrorist gunfire against all these cops, especially after they've been trapped underground for all these months and are therefore probably not at peak readiness, and are only carrying pistols and batons and a few rifles, is going to be a massacre. But when we pull back to see the two sides rush headlong together and the hand-to-hand start, only one or two cops are lying on the street.
Let's face it kids, this would have been a bloodbath. Yes, we don't want to show this and get an "R" rating, but let's not fool ourselves The reason we use guns today, and especially guns like assault rifles and submachine guns, is that you can kill the other guy from a distance and not get killed yourself. You can mow down a lot of the other guy too. It's the macabre efficiency of modern conflict. The cops would have been torn to pieces, if this scene had been lifelike. Yes, it's a movie, and therefore not real. But why does this have to turn into a big hand-to-hand thing? Just so we can have a climactic battle between Bane and Batman? Lots of setup, but the end didn't justify the means to me.
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| I would have been only slightly surprised to see a guy wielding a broadsword and decapitating somebody in armor in the background. It was very Braveheart by this point. Sadly, Bane vs. Batman - Round 2 wasn't as climactic for me as I'm sure they were planning. Bane's ultimate demise was much better. Very Indiana Jones, if Indy had had somebody else do it for him. If you've seen Rises, you get what I mean. / Source BatmanNews.com |
What else? Oh yes, Batman and the "truck of doom." Batman's guns are pretty potent stuff, as indicated when he tells Catwoman to use the Batcycle's guns to blow open the barricade that will allow her and others to escape Gotham City before the nuke goes off. And yet when Batman uses his guns to try and make the nuke-carrying truck divert back to the lab so it can be shut down, the truck survives lots of hits and even more near-hits without serious damage. Until it is forced to drive off the overpass and onto the street below, that is. This critically injures the driver, but leaves Police Chief Gordon, who has been in the cargo compartment with a big spherical nuke that doesn't appear to have been properly strapped down, without any serious injury. Let's face it kids, if the driver got squashed in this fall, Gordon would have been crushed by that bomb bouncing and shifting as the truck fell and hit the pavement. Squashed like a bug in a matchbox with a ball bearing in there. Give that to a four year old and I bet they can't help but kill that bug. Physics is the kid, in this case.
One more, and I'll stop. In the revolutionary trial scenes, we get a cameo of uber-creepy Cillian Murphy (talk about getting type-cast, I've never seen him in a non-weirdo role) as the Scarecrow, who is the judge in charge of sentencing. How nice that people haven't forgotten the radical phase of the French Revolution, though this scene could be ascribed to any number of violent socially-based overthrows. Anyway, the good doctor hands out justice in the form of two choices: death, or exile. Exile is crossing the frozen river on thin ice. People fall through and drown.
My gripe? Two-fold here. One, if you know anything about ice, you should know to lay down on your belly and distribute your weight when on thin ice. You still might fall through, but your chances improve greatly. Yes, maybe the guards would just shoot you, or there is some rule against such an action. But if not, I'd make it out of Gotham alive, I bet. And the feds couldn't shoot me because I was risking getting the nuke set off, as they were told the bomb would be going off if anybody crossed the surviving bridge. Nothing said about escaping over the frozen river. And they (the federal government) would really need some word on conditions, so they'd scoop a survivor up toot sweet (does anybody still say "toot sweet"?)
The other gripe on this ice thing is continuity-based. Just after Commissioner Gordon is captured by the baddies and receives the death or exile sentence, we see that the ice is frozen pretty well. But in the very next scene, in which Batman has just finished rescueing Gordon and the revolution is begun, the water is free of all ice. Unseasonably good weather we're having, yes? Even considering a couple days to get ready for the counter-revolution, this still seems like unrealistically major climatological change to me. Eh, blame it on global warming, I guess.
This could go as a parting comment, but I decided to use something else for the parting comment and put this here. I want to do this! I could be Batman too! Totally.
In the end, you could say that The Dark Knight Rises is the opposite of many action films that I've seen lately. Instead of putting all their work into amazing special effects and intense action sequences, the makers took the time to craft a story with multiple levels and intriguing ideas in it. Not perfect, but better than lots of others I could name. However, they still fail in some of the most common errors that films make, simply to keep from having to come up with explanations as to why everything worked out ok. For a movie that tries to keep everything from working out until nearly the final frames, I think this is not really the best approach.
Without beating this dead horse any further, let me get down to the recommendation. If you are a Batman fan, especially of the darker Dark Knight type of recent years, this one is for you. If you liked the other two Nolan Batman movies, this is certainly for you. If you need to see how it all ends (or does it? For myself, I really hope so), this one is most definitely for you. But if you don't feel motivated by any of these mentioned factors, and the two and a half hour period of time spent watching The Dark Knight Rises seems like more risk than reward, don't bother.
Or to sum it up in my traditional way, let's look at the money spent on the movie by me, the movie consumer. The question is, would this movie have been worth full price main theater ticket costs? Was it best if seen in the cheap seats? Was it a Redbox/video store movie? Or do I wish I'd saved my dollars all together and not watched it? In this particular case, I'm actually kind of stuck. The Dark Knight Rises falls into a rather exclusive category of being one in which I believe I wouldn't have felt quite satisfied with my money spent at a full price theater, and yet it also felt both worth the cheap seats price and then some. More of a matinee ticket at a regular theater, I suppose. If that explains where I'm at on The Dark Knight Rises to your understanding and satisfaction, then we are on the same page here. If your opinion differs, either up or down, feel free to leave an appropriate comment.
And as always, thanks for reading.
An article from The Digital Journal which discusses the deeper themes of The Dark Knight Rises. Is it worth calling Rises a political statement? They have some opinions on that that are worth reading.
The parting comment:
If I didn't already spoil it, HISHE did it for me. Still, this is great.
A two-for-one on parting comments today.
Big Bird vs. Mitt Romney? Seriously dude, I think I'd vote for the Bird. Or at least for PBS to keep funding. I grew up on that stuff, and so is my daughter.
You'll always be the superhero in my book.
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