The Dark Knight Rises
Gotham City is on the brink of war again, eight years after the death of Harvey Dent and the fall of Batman. Eight years and Bruce Wayne hasn’t left his home or put on the cape and helmet, watching Gotham wither and die. But when a new evil arises - masked villain Bane - it’s time for Gotham’s one and only hero to make his big comeback and go out with a big fantastic bang.
I absolutely need to stop writing my reviews shortly after seeing the film - everything’s still too raw, so I’m going to babble a lot.
I don’t really know where to start, so as always I’ll put together a list of my three least favorite things and then I will explode in fangirly glitter over the rest. XDD
1)My biggest pet peeve: Catwoman. I am sorry but I haaaaaate that character like whoa. I must admit I’m not completely aware of all the background and stuff but God, she was annoying. -..- Which wasn’t Anne Hathaway’s fault at all, I really liked her in some scenes but the way they handled her character...blergh. Maybe I am too spoiled because Avengers did such a good job with Natasha but Selina Kyle was every “female villain but not so much”-trope pressed into one tight catsuit. I hated her highheels and although they tried to jokingly explain their existence it did not convince me at all. I hated her hair. But I liked the ears. And I hated her interaction with Bruce Wayne (see 3) xD).
2) The dialogue. Urghs. I felt like watching a screen play reading. NOBODY TALKS LIKE THIS, MISTER NOLAN. That might have been my biggest problem: the balance between comic book movie and daaaaaaark and gritty and ohhhhh soooo serious film was completely off. The pacing was sometimes awful (that timeline was great and fucked up at the same time XD), the movie was too long, the moral of the story was repeated over and over again (WE ARE NOT STUPID AND THERE IS A FINE LINE BETWEEN LEITMOTIF AND MINDLESS SUCCESSION MISTER NOLAN) and although I loooooved the complicated plot and the le-Terreur-esque trials and everything (that was amazing and I was afraid and terrified during the second half of the movie) - it wasn’t tied together as neatly as The Dark Knight’s storyline, so that much of its potential was wasted in a hole somewhere in the dessert.
3) Okay, this is going to sound stupid but... right now, I hate Batman.
Like fucking whoa, I hate Batman. He is cold as ice. And whiney. And terrible. And the only reason for me to actually feel something in this movie was Alfred. (Oh, and Lucius Fox. And Timothy Blake. And Commissioner Gordon )
Batman himself? Or the women? Oh please. Go and die, I don’t care for you and you obviously don’t care for the good guys mentioned above either so just... go away and let Gordon and Blake handle all the cool stuff. DAAAAAMN. God damn it, I hate him. He made so many good people cry for selfish reasons. I mean come on how many self-discovery plotpoints can a single person get? -..-
But on to the nice stuff where I quote myself:
[That] was Alfred. (Oh, and Lucius Fox. And Timothy Blake. And Commissioner Gordon )
My heroes. Q_Q Blake was the best, srlsy. But maybe I just fell for the “young idealistic boy saves the world”-trope again. I DON’T CARE. All the side characters were much more convincing and much more thrilling to watch than all the forced chemistry between Wayne and Kyle. (Seriously, WORST PAIRING EVER). I don’t want to spoil anything, but Blake and Gordon were the perfect team, Alfred had me in tears at the end of the film and Lucius Fox was brilliant as always. I wanted more of Blake. I wanted him to be the Bat so badly it almost hurt.
The CGI Department outdid themselves this time (only pet peeve: everyone is talking about the poor pooooooooooor poooooor people of Gotham... and all we ever see are some orphan boys? Really? Is that everything you got, movie?), everything looked the part (Wayne Manor must be Hogwarts though... so many rooms and floors xD) and shiny CGI gimmick stuff was everywhere. *_*
Meh. Sorry guys, I can’t talk about the movie right now. I feel drained (which is a good thing xD) and unsatisfied (which is... not so good), maybe because Joseph Gordon-Lewitt is the next best thing since chocolate but there wasn’t enough of him and my favorite complaint ever: NOT NEARLY ENOUGH CHARACTER INTERACTION. -..-
I know that I shouldn’t do it but when I compare the Avengers to The Dark Knight then I must say that Avengers kept its promise of being an entertaining film in the superhero genre. The Dark Knight Rises didn’t. I’m not even sure what Nolan tried to go for with his movies, but whatever it was... The Dark Knight Rises sometimes felt like scriptwriting101 (“Oh we need some emotional fallout between two major characters! And don’t forget to sprinkle somekissingscenes over it, no matter how forced it is!”) and like editing 101 because some scences were rushed as hell whereas others were drawn out too long.
Everything I just said is sooooo incredibly negative but that’s not what I wanted to convey. Q__Q This movie IS great, it’s edgy and dark and complicated and wonderful and heartbreaking - but also very very flawed in ways which could have been avoided very easily I think. *le sigh*
But please, go and watch it for yourselves and then let’s discuss the hell out of it, please? I’m not sure what to think about it right now. XDD
(And someone go and write me some fanfic about Timothy Blake and Commissioner Gordon being awesome together! Or Blake and his wonderful love interest.OR SOMETHING WITH HIM IT DOESN’T MATTER PUT HIM IN THE AVENGERS IF YOU WANT TO BUT DOOOOOOO IT!)