House

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Naomi, Michael

Write Up.

That this film exists is just staggering. That I found out about it and can now inflict it's glory on others is even more amazing.

The Dark Knight Rises

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Tyler, Josh

Write Up.

Conflicty feelings won't go away. I think after the giddy highs of The Dark Knight any expectations I had were going to be too high. And this is such a tonally different film than the last two. Bottom line is, at this stage, I gotta say the is my least favourite out of all of Nolan's Batman films.

Some things you cannot fault about it are of course, the tech. Seeing it in Imax last time was amazing too. Even in the fake Imax. This time I was in a regular cinema but the sound was a little more even than it was at Imax.

The performances are mostly good, even if I disagree with the writing of some characters.

Unexpected Ben Mendelsohn!

But again, the rest of the film left me completely underwhelmed. It's like The Nolan Bros. hearts weren't in it any more, they were obliged to make this one and just wanted to get it out of the way to get on to more creative things. Because really, it's a bit of a mess and nothing about the film connected with me emotionally, none of the action excited me, I was confused by the constantly changing tone and found all the plot revelations to be disappointingly obvious and clunky delivered.

It doesn't help that all the plot revelations were speculated by fans years ago, only to have them denied by the film makers but then confirmed within the film. If you know anything about Batman so called twist is obvious and the way they try to hide it shortchanges both villains. I mean, sure in the past Nolan's villains have differed greatly from the ones we know but usually with a good purpose and done well enough to not make me mind at all.

I did like this version of Catwoman, although she's really only in the film to serve a specific point and I would hardly call her a villain. Nevertheless her motivations were clear and highlighted a specific aspect of the whole "rise up" theme running through the film. Her one liners are great even though I think the clash horribly with the serious real world tone the other films set up. But not more so that Banes very cartoonish evil villain plot...

Bane just doesn't work at all for me. The Joker didn't have any specific motivations to his actions. That's what made him scary and dangerous. It feels like they kept the idea for their sequel with Joker but just switch it over to Bane. His motivations are ambiguous as well, but in a bad way. They tell us how he got his mask and why he's been trained but nothing about his actual character. His giant oversized time bomb device just brought back memories of Batman Forever. His fights with Batman are lacking any creativity and amount to nothing more than just some un-bat-like brawling. And his voice is kinda ridiculous, fanboy gripe, but still annoyed me and the way it was mixed in the soundtrack.

Speaking of the soundtrack, uh, on second though, let's not. James Newton Howard, your actual melodic lines are sorely missed.

If you know the characters at all it seems obvious Talia would have to be somewhere in the 3rd film, given how much it relates back to the first and seem as there is only so many female cast members it doesn't take long to figure out what they are setting up. But man, out of all the characters to get short changed she is the worst. One of the more interesting characters just thrown in and then shoved off, even more-so than Scarecrow. That was very disappointing.

While I know I saw action and scale, I never felt any of it. I did feel the running time this time. By the time we got to the end montage featuring contrivance upon contrivance I was just ready to go home.

It's not a bad film, there's a lot of cool stuff in here. It's not what I wanted to see after the first two and what I did see just failed completely to interest me more than any average action flick. Everyone seems to enjoy it though so I'm probably alone on this. Someone accused me of just "not being able to have fun" a rather hypocritical statement from this particular reviewer, that just served to piss me off even more and further taint the film. Unfortunate. I'm glad Nolan's freed up to do other films. I'm glad someone else is gonna take a stab at a new version of the franchise, perhaps one that IS ACTUALLY MORE FUN like all the other Batman films were. Even Dark Knight was more fun than Rises. That film remains my favourite of this series.

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Jordan, Amberly

Write Up.

Had some time left to kill before the midnight screening of the last Batman film... So this happened.

The Dark Knight

IMDB

First time viewed: No

Current Release: No

Watched With: Jordan, Amberly

Head over heels in love with this one. It take the universe set up in the first film and runs with it. The tone is even darker, the new villains are fascinating.

Of course Heath Ledger's Joker is a thing of beauty. He makes the anarchist in me giddy. Easily the most frightening and compulsively watchable villain. His thought process leads to some wonderfully inventive action set pieces and situations. His capture is a little less climactic but I feel if not for Ledger's untimely death we would have gotten closure in the 3rd film. Instead we'll just have to presume that he's rotting away in Arkham.

As wonderful as the Joker is my heart belongs to Harvey Dent. I believed in Harvey too. Once again we don't really get to spend a long time with Two-face as a villain, however, unlike scarecrow, Harvey Dent's fall gives the character a massive arc to play over the course of the film. The impact his fall has on the world of the film and the characters in it, after all they invested in him is what makes this chapter so dark and his story so tragic.

Maggie Gyllenhaal is here this time as Rachel Dawes and the way they twist her damsel in distress is just another of the reason this is by far the most emotional of all the films for me.

Goes without saying, it looks great, sounds great, the actions is great, I love the way the structure works to balance out all those plots into a cohesive and connected whole and with the Joker we get some of that comic book levity the first film largely lacked. Definitely my favourite of the bunch.

Batman Begins

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Jordan, Amberly

Christopher Nolan begins his take on the Batman saga. foregoing the hilarious camp of the Adam West era (still one of my favourite films) and the heavily comic book stylised design of the Tim Burton films, instead opting for a more real world approach, something tangible and almost believable, striving to flesh out the characters psyche with a depth the previous films lacked in varying degrees. 

They also had Scarecrow as a villain, he was always one of my favourite. Especially excited when they cast Cillian Murphy but unfortunately we don't really get that much time with him as the scarecrow. And like most of Nolan's incarnations of the character they only resemble the characters I know and love in smaller ways, to fit in with his realistic vision. 

So right off the bat, not pun intended, we have a characters that has been interpreted in many different ways over the years. With this very dark, serious, realistic tone we lose any of the fun comic book style quips, the more fantastic elements and overly stylised world with which to put it in. A breath of fresh air at the time. 

They amassed a great cast to play iconic roles. And of course being a Nolan film, the tech specs are impeccable. I still have qualms about a musical theme for a character being only two notes, especially when it took two great composers to come up with, probably one note each, but in truth it really works for the film and it's a great score. 

The fanboy in me cries foul play every time I get to the climax and Batman won't kill anyone but "chooses not to save" the villain. That's a cheap cop-out and something I still think goes against his character but I guess it's a small gripe, like many I have with Nolan's take. In general I'm extremely happy with adaptation. It has great characters, the structure is well planned, the action is great and it introduces this new version well and establishes the tone of a world where the fantastic so subdued that it is almost believable.

The Dark Knight Rises

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Sam, Tim, Matt

Never before has such a perfect storm of events collided to create exactly what I'm feeling right now, which is possibly the worst case of post movie depression I've ever had. I reserve the right to withhold my current opinions of the film until I have seen it again with a less clouded head, a clearer atmosphere, lowered expectations and some more time to process. I'm afraid after having not seen a film of any kind for a week and a half may have in fact broken me. Perhaps I've forgotten how to watch them. As it stands I don't like my opinion of the film and I don't trust it. I fear this first screening experience may have tainted it for good though. I've never felt so out of touch with everyone else's reactions.

I definitely need to rewatch the other films of the series as soon as possible. And I'm seeing this film again tomorrow night at the midnight screening, although I think that might be too soon. I'm just gonna leave it here for now. I'll write something more legible when I've got back in the swing of things.