The Dark Knight Rises

[MacGuffin]

Spoiler spoiler spoiler


I find the ending works a lot better when I assume that Alfred was imagining seeing Bruce and Selina.  It's closure for him psychologically, not to be literally taken as Bruce surviving.

Yeah, when Alfred stared into the camera and smiled, I thought it was the perfect shot to end on.  Kinda disappointed when it continued on to show his POV.

[Stefen]

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Besides, the character of Selina Kyle had spent the whole movie being set up as being in what was almost certainly a lesbian relationship with Juno Temple, it wouldn't make sense for her to suddenly be romancing it up with Bruce Wayne in Italy, except in the addled imagination of an elderly British butler.

haha yeah, for a second I was mad stoked that Nolan was gonna go there. In an art snob way, not a frat boy way. She ended up just being another weak female character in a Nolan flick. For such a supposed strong woman she sure seemed to take Bruce and Miranda's relationship to heart when Batman is giving her his motorcycle and telling her to wait for the fighting to start and then blow open the entrances which sends her into pity party mode so she looks down at the ground and passively-aggressively whispers, "so you can save your stuck-up girlfriend." That's some immature see-through emotional shit that gets used by junior high kids, and apparently also Catwoman.

It reminded me of that scene in High-Fidelity where it flashbacks to one of Rob's girlfriends in college and he's walking her up to her apartment building and when she leans in to kiss him goodbye he gets all mopey, turns his face away and says, "what's the point? it never goes anywhere." then pulls the hood of his hoodie over his head and walks away as she starts to

At least Batman didn't start crying. Not yet.

[picolas]

Spoiler spoiler spoiler


I find the ending works a lot better when I assume that Alfred was imagining seeing Bruce and Selina.  It's closure for him psychologically, not to be literally taken as Bruce surviving.

Besides, the character of Selina Kyle had spent the whole movie being set up as being in what was almost certainly a lesbian relationship with Juno Temple, it wouldn't make sense for her to suddenly be romancing it up with Bruce Wayne in Italy, except in the addled imagination of an elderly British butler.

but then he would've also had to imagine lucius fox finding out about bruce patching the autopilot. which he didn't know anything about. and he only saw catwoman's face briefly on a computer screen. why would he imagine her being with bruce? nolan's intent is clearly to show bruce wayne survived.

even if they didn't show bruce and kept it ambiguous, that would still be stupid/hinting at ruining what made nolan's batman so interesting. the only correct ending after bruce makes his choice is death. totally unambiguous sacrifice. preferably show him vaporizing inside the bat so there's no debate afterwards.

oh and another obvious change that would've made this movie better: he really should've been in more pain from that knife. he should've been holding his body together just so he could die properly. limp-running towards the bat. so much better.

[Reel]

Chris is on The Treatment

[Brando]

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Besides, the character of Selina Kyle had spent the whole movie being set up as being in what was almost certainly a lesbian relationship with Juno Temple, it wouldn't make sense for her to suddenly be romancing it up with Bruce Wayne in Italy, except in the addled imagination of an elderly British butler.

haha yeah, for a second I was mad stoked that Nolan was gonna go there. In an art snob way, not a frat boy way. She ended up just being another weak female character in a Nolan flick. For such a supposed strong woman she sure seemed to take Bruce and Miranda's relationship to heart when Batman is giving her his motorcycle and telling her to wait for the fighting to start and then blow open the entrances which sends her into pity party mode so she looks down at the ground and passively-aggressively whispers, "so you can save your stuck-up girlfriend." That's some immature see-through emotional shit that gets used by junior high kids, and apparently also Catwoman.

It reminded me of that scene in High-Fidelity where it flashbacks to one of Rob's girlfriends in college and he's walking her up to her apartment building and when she leans in to kiss him goodbye he gets all mopey, turns his face away and says, "what's the point? it never goes anywhere." then pulls the hood of his hoodie over his head and walks away as she starts to

At least Batman didn't start crying. Not yet.

I didn't get the impression that Selina Kyle and the Juno Temple characters were in a lesbian relationship. She was trying to flee Gotham alone.  If she was in a relationship with her, wouldn't she try to get her to come with her after seeing what Bane did to Batman?  I don't know I don't really have much of a Gaydar. After hearing Catwoman was going to be in the third and who was playing the role, I was very skeptical but I have to say I really loved Anne Hathaway in the role. You can make a case about if she would return to save batman or runaway with Bruce but I didn't see her as weak.  Christopher Nolan's "women problem" wasn't with weak female characters but that he would kill them off. I wasn't bothered by the "save your stuck up girlfriend" comment and I don't think that one line can sum her up into a weak character. There was a ton of horrible lines in that movie. Bane "You came back to die with your city?"  Batman "No. I came back to stop you."

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oh and another obvious change that would've made this movie better: he really should've been in more pain from that knife. he should've been holding his body together just so he could die properly. limp-running towards the bat. so much better.

I noticed that too.  There were a lot of similar details that were missing throughout the film.  The bad guy would just give up a little too easy and let the crowd overrun him and so on.  Also, Nolan brilliantly did a great job of making the previous film seem more violent then it actually was by shooting those scenes in a way where the viewer thought they saw something more violent that what was actually shown. I think he tried to do the same here but wasn't successful. 


I'll admit I didn't see the Miranda Tate twist. I was aware of all the internet talk when she was cast and everyone was saying she was related to Ras Al Ghul.  I think the original rumor was that she was his wife. When the film began I forgot about it all cause I am very susceptible to the charms and loveliness that is Marion Cotillard.

[RegularKarate]

SPOILERS

I saw this again in IMax (so much better in Imax) and boy, I loved it a lot more... mostly because I knew what to expect. I knew this didn't live up to what it could have been, but when you consider that Nolan essentially had to give up his original vision when Ledger died, but probably felt a great deal of pressure to finish the trilogy, it's kinda understanding that he went with "entertaining film for fans".

Not a defense of the movie because I know there's a shit load wrong with it, but here are some responses to the things that I have noticed being talked about:

*SPOILS*
- WHY was batman better at punching bane's face the second time? this needed some kind of explanation for it to make sense and be dramatically interesting.

I feel like this is explained while Batman is in the pit. The thing that gives him the power to make the leap is the same that gives him the power to defeat Bane, a good dose of anger and the fear of death. This may be why they decided to let him survive at the end though I really think it was to give fans that hope (just enough to torture them with the possibility of another Nolan Batman)... still would have been better if he had died.

Speaking of which, he didn't die. It's been said, but the autopilot wouldn't have been mentioned if this was in Alfred's head, also, there's a line about the pearl necklace being missing from the inventory of Bruce Wayne's things. They were doing too much to prove he lived.

- why did talia need to initiate sex with bruce wayne? is that part of the knife twisting deeper?

Well, I think the reason she did this in the movie was to make Wayne trust her more, but this also comes off as one of the many things Nolan does to give little winks to the comic book readers... Talia and Batman have a history and he even gets R'ed by her and she has a baby Batman.

Speaking to the Juno Temple/ Catwoman love, there's something to that, but I think it's one-sided. Jen is essentially Holly Robinson and Holly Robinson is openly gay in the comics.

[ElPandaRoyal]

Some random thoughts and possible SPOILERS, i guess:

I was not a fan of neither The Dark Knight nor Inception, both movies to me suffering from Nolan's excessive ambition and obtuse seriousness about his material. The constant and intrusive music, the excessive editing, the exposition in the dialogues...

Here, those problems remain, but for some reason they didn't bother me as much. The music seemed more restrained, or at least not so repetitive. The editing gave a little more breathing room to the shots, and fight scenes at least looked like they were choreographed and not merely randomly shot and edited with as many cameras as possible. Still, with Nolan excesses in story lines, the rhythm feels rushed, the passage of narrative time incoherent and the focus on some of the characters very unbalanced. It's also very bizarre that people like to claim Nolan as the dude that makes intelligent blockbusters for the masses while his movies are so filled with expository dialog. I mean, like it was mentioned before, we get to see what a character is thinking, and immediately after, the character just says it out loud so there are no doubts left. And why not just end the scene with Alfred in Florence, with him just looking at the camera instead of cutting to his POV?

On a positive note, I liked the first hour or so very much, basically from the beginning until the whole sequence when Batman returns to action. Also, it's the funniest of Nolan's recent output, you can actually feel some sense of humor in it, mostly coming from Wayne/Selina. And to me the most amusing thing about the whole trilogy is how the writing team make these important characters in the Batman universe appear from where you least expect them.

Then Batman gets into a fight, goes to a pit, Gotham is under siege and the movie started to feel underwhelming, when it should be building up to an epic conclusion. At least there isn't the insulting sonar-thingy this time around, which to me was the final blow on the previous movie. Still, that race against time never felt very tense for some reason, probably because you know that no superhero movie will end with a whole town being blown to ashes.

[AntiDumbFrogQuestion]

Spoilers?

This late in the game?

Why are you reading about TDKR then?

You KNOW most of us have SEEN it.

Okay.

Perhaps because you just want our opinions on it before taking the plunge & spending $10-15 to see it on the big screen.

Anyways.

SPOILER

   The part when Alfred looks "at the camera", well, my friend and I BOTH thought that would have been a great way to end the movie.  Our guess is that even though this film was a guaranteed money-maker, they still had to put it through the test-audience ringer.  Maybe, because Americans are fucking stupid, they didn't "get" a version of the ending with Alfred's simple-yet-powerful glance.  Perhaps a larger percentage of test audiences didn't "understand" the reference to a part of the movie that took place less than two hours ago. So our guess is that as artful as that would ending have been, especially for a huge American cinematic juggernaut, the less tasteful (aka snobby..yeah I'm a snob) would have pissed and moaned that the ending didn't "make sense". 
   Just a theory.

END SPOILER

[polkablues]

Makes sense to me.  Nolan's entire career has been an ode to ambiguity, it seems odd that he would suddenly abandon that ethos in such a blunt way unless there was studio interference involved.

[ElPandaRoyal]

Yeah, as I said before, I'm not that big a fan of Inception, but that movie still ended on a ??? note and did perfectly well at the box office.

[Alexandro]

Yeah this was one of those experiences like indy 4, when as I am watching the film before my eyes I can't believe how bad it actually is. I read some comments from here before going and I just didn't want to believe in them also. But it's painfully obvious right from the start that this films just sucks. It feels lazy in every aspect, and the dialogue, which was always expository in the other films, here becomes almost a joke. No, it actually becomes a joke.

I didn't understand the point of "Catwoman" in this film, and I hated seeing Hathaway so underused. Come to think of it, no one really had a point being in this movie. Batman and Gordon didn't seem to me like they paid their dues. It's all so rushed and crammed with scenes, story lines, situations. The action sequences seem endless, the ticking bomb is actually a ticking bomb. And worst, we went from a villain with a philosophy (the joker) that humiliated Batman (who only has an "ethic"), to a villain ultimately motivated by revenge, which I think makes it easier for Batman.

I don't know, this has to be the biggest movie letdown I've had in quite some time.

[Pubrick]

I'm putting this as worst movie of the year.

It's embarrassing.

If you liked transformers, you'd like this film.

[AntiDumbFrogQuestion]

I'm putting this as worst movie of the year.

It's embarrassing.

If you liked transformers, you'd like this film.

Ouch.
Am I wrong to say this was at least better than "Daredevil"? and if so, does that make "Transformers" better than Affleck's opposite-of-a-tour-de-force?

[Brando]

Makes sense to me.  Nolan's entire career has been an ode to ambiguity, it seems odd that he would suddenly abandon that ethos in such a blunt way unless there was studio interference involved.

The Dark Knight was such a success I imagine the studios would have let him do whatever he wanted. I got the impression that Nolan and the others involved had gotten sentimental over the characters and legacy of the franchise. The first two they seemed determined to ignore all that and create a story that was real and dark and true to the characters and story. All of this is just my impression and seems more likely to me for the lack of ambiguity and other elements than studio involvement.  It seems like they approached it as this is our last Batman instead of lets finish what we've started. Approaching the film as a curtain call rather than an ending while also being sentimental probably lead to a lot of the issues. Also, after the success of the Dark Knight, they probably realized this will be considered the quintessential Batman franchise.  With that being so how they ended the franchise would be a huge part of the legacy of Batman. They might have had that in mind too but I think treating the characters and story sentimentally played more of a role.

[BB]

The Dark Knight was such a success I imagine the studios would have let him do whatever he wanted. I got the impression that Nolan and the others involved had gotten sentimental over the characters and legacy of the franchise.

Studios never let anyone do whatever he or she want with a Batbudget. They may be more lenient with somebody with a track record like Nolan, but there is no way he had absolute control. Look at what happened with Bane's voice. A few people complained, the studio got skittish, Nolan changed it. Now, he probably could've fought for it and maybe could've won or better compromised, but -- far from being sentimental -- I don't think he cared about the movie at all. Disinterested, businessman Nolan finally reared its ugly head. I don't think he wanted to make a third one. I don't think he cared about Batman anymore. People have praised him for ultimately making an audience-pleasing film. Which, first of all, is just a euphemism for "dumb film," and secondly, how the fuck are the first two not audience-pleasing? Combined, they made a BILLION AND A HALF DOLLARS at the box office! With Inception, his previous three blockbusters made well-over TWO BILLION DOLLARS! Displeased audiences don't spend like that. The movie is only "audience-pleasing" because it's easy and lazy.

I'm putting this as worst movie of the year.

It's embarrassing.

If you liked transformers, you'd like this film.

Despite my tone above, I actually kinda liked it okay. I am in total agreement with you that it is reprehensibly bad and, yes, could very well prove to be the worst movie of the year (especially if its quality is weighed against its potential). But still, somehow, I had an okay time. About ten minutes in I felt a creeping "what the fuck is this," gave up any preconceived notion that I would enjoy the film, and came away with tepid enjoyment. Maybe I was determined to like it having disliked every other film I've seen theatrically this year. I don't know. There's no doubt in my mind that it's shit and I could never reasonably defend my enjoyment. But it is what it is.

I've watched The Dark Knight a few times and will probably continue to watch it every few years. I'll probably never watch this one again. Maybe once more.