"The Dark Knight Rises" Review by Otero ( **SPOILERS** )

(I apologize this train of thought)

(and really... Im going to be going in and out of SPOILER territory without much warning... I am drunk)

It's the Return of the Jedi of the series.

If Return of the Jedi didnt have the character of Han Solo because Harrison Ford died of a drug overdose in some hotel room weeks after filming Empire.

The majority of the plot and themes from the first two of the trilogy are expanded upon and rehashed. You have the League of Shadows back with their plot-convenient-destroy-the-city device, and a character named Bane who falls into the anti-batman-yet-so-simular-to-batman category of villians from The Dark Knight. You have another "bruce in a prison and overcoming it" arc, and much more. Order and Chaos are again shown as two sides of the same coin... With Bane taking over the city, to control it. (The guy even sets up a court system) And Catwoman riding the line between the two as a robinhood-in-heels.

and...

you know... it all feels like like a retread. with little to nothing (besides a few subplots I'll bring up later) to offer.

Is that a bad thing, I dont think so, nothing seems too out of place, only BIGGER AND MORE then what weve seen before.

its like, we find out theirs a second death star, and we get excited... because we already know what thats capable of... and HOLY SHIT ITS MORE POWERFUL?! (AND FINALLY A REBEL FLEET IS TAKING IT ON?!)

The first 30 or so minutes feel like most of an ending I wouldve taken from the Dark Knight. We see Cristian Bale acting his best like Kermit the frog from the recent muppet film; just moping around his house for 8 YEARS apperantly, and growing a wicked beard like in the beginning of Batman Begins.(its like poetry they rhyme) Something feels off about how they wrote/directed Alfred in this one, Michael Caine is 10 pounds of charm in a 5 pound bag, but here a lot of what hes given feels like him phoning in whatever generic emotion the scene needs, in 20 words or less. You have the "trying to cheer up bruce" Caine, the "im stern and leaving you" Caine and the "im going to cry with mostly my teeth" Caine. This film highlights all 3.

At some party scene we are introduced to Anne Hathaway as she's already infiltrated Wayne Manor, it felt like a winking at the audience moment for a while, in a subtle way, and a nice way to introduce her, she doesnt need a backstory. I was hesitant on Hathaway... I mean c'mon... Catwoman think of 3 other things you'd rather see than catwoman in this Nolan trilogy. I grew up watching Batman Returns and even there I thought she was just some hokey femme fetale. But she plays it intelligently (for how rediculously 35-year-old-mom-jogging-suit-and-heels the costume is) and is interesting to watch, despite all the "trailer lines" that were written in for her. I was waiting for some form of the word "catwoman" to slip out of someone mouth.... but no, shes treated as your run-of-the-mill cat burgler, with more sass, some ass, and lines like "cat got your tongue?".

And in some unrelated plot thread that will crash into the main one we have the kid from Third Rock From the Sun and 'Mr. Exposition' in Inception. This plot thread and Hathaways make up the only new-ish thing this movie has to offer the series: we see the 'Batman Imposters' from the Dark Knight to their "logical extreme". As Batman is a unified symbol of Order and brought villains with a more Chaotic Nature/Motive, Batmans absence has created fractured bits of Order in its citizens. You see Catwoman stealing to survive and only from the rich (not justified,per se, but she isnt going out of her way to murder people and set off a nuke in a city) and the character of John Blake... who acts as a young commissioner Gordon. Just a good cop, who with very little detective work, finds out Bruce Wayne is Batman, and eventually gets shoehorned in to be Batmans replacement. ("oh wow, Im an orphan too")

where was I.... oh yeah, so BANE is evil, sounds like Henry Kissinger, and wants to take over a city, set up his own jurisdiction (that will only last a few months) and then blow the city up with a nuke. You'd think he'd plan the jurisdiction, after the nuke... The majority of the heavily padded first act is dedicated to building this guy up, having all of our primary and secondary characters place the pawns of his game at his feet. With catwoman having an excuse for a few action scenes thanks to some fingerprints Bane needed to fuck with Wayne Enterprises stocks. Lucious Fox moving all of this shit you wouldnt want "anyone to get their hands on" in one place... and some sleezy other-company-guy who's only there to explain how Bane is ALREADY IN THE CITY due to some construction contracts. Also, Not seeing anything but his eyes really took a lot of the impact out of whatever he was saying. I can deal with a face in heavy makeup, I can deal with someone who for only 20 minutes has half of their face all CGI-ed to shit, I can deal with cillian murphys face.... but even when hes scarecrow-ed out hes spraying hallucinogen gas to scare the shit out of anyone. Bane.... is just a mask, and only comes across a voice in the mask, with nothing but body language to sell it.

We see a lot more shots of gotham in this one, usually from afar to remind us that its an island.

Some new girl going by the alias Miranda tries to get as close to Bruce as she can, to the point where shes now CEO of Wayne Industries. (oh man she's totally a good guy right?) and out of nowhere we get an immediate post sex scene where Batman is standing over Gotham celebrating having sex with someone who looks one-part maggie gyllinhal, two-parts katie holms.

Oh yeah, Batman's in this. It took an act, and afreds out of the movie.... But Batman's in it now. He is immediately tricked by Catwoman, gets lured into the sewers, and gets his back broken by Bane (who didnt see that one coming... ) and is, from what im guessing... in an Indian Prison.

BOOM! ACT TWO!! terrorist attack, cops are buried underground, a sports arena is demosished. Bane brings out his Nuke, and states his motive that its his town. Everyone immediately thinks this idea is awesome, and goes with it, sure cops are killed by a scarecrow cameo (or forced... to walk on ice?) but I mean the trash is taken out on time, everyones still getting mail. The only thing different is now theres maybe 3000 cops underground.... all together, in an area that they cant get out of, And 3000 prisoners with guns on the streets. We see negative effects like the T.V. working, and people hanging from bridges, which apperantly cures Bruce of his scoliosis and allows him to climb out of the jail that he thought Bane did years before.

We see some scenes showing off the Tumbler, Bat Pod, and The Bat and each get enough screentime to warrent a few toy commercials. With the nuke ticking down to zero, we get a soap operatic.... "oh no that secondary character I boned... was liam niesons daughter" and SHE got out of the Jail.... making Bane, just some Militant that some Doctor and a Blind guy saved. Neat. I'll take it. Bane is immediatly shot by Catwoman, The other 'Al Guul' crashes her russian semi in a way that mirrors her fathers death. Neat. I dont have a choice... but she gets to be a bad guy for a minute and a half.

And then in what seems like 5 minutes of movie. Batman takes a nuke out of the city, allowing it to blow up offshore, seemingly sacrificing himself, the city makes a statue of Batman, and we see the 'return of the king ending(sssss)'

Caine cries with his teeth.

John Blake goes to the DMV and we hear his name is Robin. Uses some coordinates, goes through a waterfall, and finds the batcave. Neat. I'll take it.

But then Caine goes to some restaurant in France... jump cut jump cut jump cut... oh hey Bruce wayne didnt die. Alfred leaves the table.

Where this movie is most flawed is the fact that theres too much going on, at least too much to care about what little we see of all of it. Subplots are brought up only to be disposed of in a random scene an hour later, and everything is trying to inflate the upcoming third act into something BIGGER AND BIGGER until all tension is resolved in a matter of minutes. Leaving you little time to feel like anything is actually resolved, only finished. Pacing is all over the place as we literally jump months around in movie-time to justify the progress and actions of the numerous plots and subplots this film has. I feel like another runthrough in editing would have brought this film to even more greatness.. but I guess thats why we have faneditors.

Im trying not to nitpick too hard, because I genuinely enjoyed seeing this film in theaters. Nolan is known for his cinematography and of course I have little quarrels with that in this one. Instead of Blacks/Browns and Blues/BLUES were treated to an overexposed, desaturated White/pale green tone which works. We've seen Gotham as a character go from the dirty shady corrupted browntown, to a constant blue early dawn of the city in change, to a cold white. The city looks serine in the peace that its had, and even dirtier when theres war in the streets. The score is still just two notes, but the added horns and background chanting made it all the more fitting. Theres no moments that match the FUCKYEAH of the Jokers introduction to the mob, or the interrogation scene, but THER ARE moments in this... such as the shot of bane looking upon the stadium with only a young boy singing the national anthem in the audio mix. Or Catwoman Kicking Bruce waynes Cane, or Her dissapearing with Batman all "so thats what its like". In the end, this movie like the Dark Knight is all about Cause and Effect, we see further effects of what the previous film set up, along with enough nods to batman Begins to make it feel like a proper bookend. As a trilogy, its come full circle, albeit sputtering its way to the finish line.

short answer: did I enjoy it?

yes, its as flawed and enjoyable as the other two.... and Im going to miss that over-the-top batman voice.

Last edited by otero (2012-07-21 06:58:04)