Even though The Dark
Knight Rises has been in theaters over a week now, the Sector still had to
offer up an opinion on what is now the final installment in this version of Batman. Director Christopher Nolan envisioned his
idea of the Dark Knight over 10 years ago when the character was on life
support thanks in partly to the royal crapfest that was Joel Schumacher’s
Batman & Robin. From molded nipples
on the Batsuit to George Clooney’s wrecking of the iconic superhero, Warner
Brothers came within a Bat’s short and curly hair away from ending the
franchise. Luckily the suits at Warners
decided they needed to go in the opposite direction from the Burton/Schumacher
era into the more “real” world Nolan was offering.
Nolan’s first film in the series was Batman Begins in 2005 which became a huge success both critically
and financially and set into motion what would become the judging barometer of
superhero films to follow. With the
initial success of Batman Begins,
Nolan followed up three years later with The
Dark Knight in 2008. Rarely a sequel
to a film enjoys greater success than its predecessor; The Dark Knight has grossed well over a billion dollars and earned
the late Heath Ledger an Academy Award for his portrayal of Batman’s arch-nemesis,
The Joker. It also set the bar so high
for Christopher Nolan, that whichever road he decided to take to end his
trilogy would be wrought with some controversy, excitement and disappointments; and make no
mistake about it – The Dark Knight Rises –
is all of that and then some.
If you haven’t seen this movie yet and don’t want to be
spoiled – then this is your last and only warning.
The Dark Knight Rises takes
place about 8 years after the events of The
Dark Knight where Batman with Commissioner Gordon’s acquiescence, takes the
fall for the death of Harvey Dent to cover up the villainous actions by the
former respected Gotham District Attorney thus keeping Gotham’s citizens from
losing hope in the true system of law and order. Well according to the film the ruse was a
success as helped to create the Dent Law – a nod to the Patriot Act? – which in
essence, helped to eliminate mob control over Gotham. But as Bane actually says to Batman in the
film,
“Victory has made you weak.”
Gotham is now relatively crime free and Bruce Wayne has hung
up the cape and feeling the years of physical abuse of his body. The man is a virtual mess with cartilage loss
just about everywhere, concussion damage to the brain and who knows what else
but it’s his damage to his soul that is far more difficult to repair. It seems that Nolan has placed Bruce Wayne in
a world that no longer needs him but it’s the fight that Wayne only knew and
fed off of and has now left him a Howard Hughes type.
I see the parallels between pre and post 9-11 in regards to
the Dent/Patriot Act and how the success of becoming secure can create a false
sense of calm and self-congratulating. It also reminded me of the line from The Dark Knight where Dent says, “Either
you die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” Regardless Nolan has done something that
probably makes most fanboys annoyed – he makes Bruce Wayne human with all the
failings that come with it. In the
comics, Batman would never sulk, or hang up the cape or tire out or become so
distraught with the loss of the love of his life to retire. He’s everlasting in every regards. Well, in order to create a relatable version
of the story Nolan had to show this. I
have no issues with it.
Even when Alfred
admits to Bruce that he destroyed the letter Rachel gave him in The Dark Knight. The letter which said she was in love
with Dent and wanted to spend her life with him. Alfred decides to leave Bruce because he
feels that he’s simply wanting back in the game to kill himself; I can feel how
difficult it would be to leave someone you love because you felt it was the
only way to save them from themselves.
It also illustrates how the theme of keeping lies for the sake of others
always ends up costing in the end.
The character of Bane played by Tom Hardy, had to be the
hardest role to play since he had the ghost of Heath Ledger’s incredible
performance looming over his head. Hardy
wasn’t horrible by any means but was nowhere near as mesmerizing as Ledger’s
Joker and essentially his Bane character was simply the junk yard dog to the
real villain in the film. I had issue
with his odd muffled British voice and in fact my cousin reminded me it sounded
like Darrell Hammond’s Sean Connery from SNL. That was weird. Bane comes to Gotham to finish what Ra’s Al
Ghul didn’t in the first film.
Nolan once again mixed canon with creative license by
insinuating that Bane was the son of Liam Neeson’s Ra’s Al Ghul from The Dark Knight, causing fanboys to have
meltdowns in their seats. It did make
for a somewhat interesting if not predictable plot point towards the end involving
another character who actually is
related to Al Ghul. Another sore point
for me was when Bane actually picks Batman up and what seemingly looks like he’s
breaking his back, as in the Knightfall comic series. It was at that point in
the film where I became disillusioned and felt Nolan was trying to squeeze too
many ideas into a 2 and a half plus hour movie.
I guess you can take the movie out of the big studious but you can’t
take the suits out of the big movie.
After Bane sorta snaps the Bats back he then kidnaps him,
finds time to fly to some remote part of the world, and places Bruce in the
prison he spent time in – you know so he can set up a flat screen in his cell
so he can watch on CNN as he blows up Gotham.
By the way did I forget to mention that Bane has a nuclear device that’s
ready to go cablooey hidden by his people in Gotham. Did I also forget to mention that one of Bruce’s
cell mates pops one of his vertebrae back into place and just a few weeks
later, he’s up and ready to rock? I kid
you not it pays to have a chiropractor as your cell mate. Yeah this part of the film really had me
wondering if the writers just said, screw it, its Batman we’re gonna make
bajillions anyway. Really Nolan is this
how you want this to end? Come on.
I wasn’t taken aback by Anne Hathaway’s Selina Kyle. In Nolan’s “real” world she’s never referred
to as Catwoman, which is fine – she is by default obviously. Her motivations didn’t explain how it ended
with her and Bruce at the café and without spoiling it much further, there was
just no reason for her to be with him anymore.
A bright spot however in the film was Joseph Gordon Leavitt’s character
of police officer John Blake. Again I
won’t totally spoil it for you but yes, he’s who you’re thinking he is and at
the end you’ll get the idea and how overarching the studios influence must have
been here.
I kinda get it. It definitely
leaves the door open at least conceptually if the studio wants to continue with
these characters but with a different director at the helm. I tell you what though, it flies in the face
of what everything Christopher Nolan said about this being a definitive end to “his”
trilogy. Perhaps he was just being coy,
he did say “HIS” trilogy. The Dark
Knight Rises wasn’t a bad film. It
was just an unfortunate victim of its predecessors success; A familiar theme
throughout.
Overall the Sector gives The
Dark Knight Rises 2.5 out of 4 stars.
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