batman's big i'm-watching-you computer is admirably 'fascist' or at least orwellian (i guess those are difft things)
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:07 (sixteen years ago) link
people are saying pretty otm things. bale/batman is pretty boring, not particularly sympathetic. joker is fantastic, and far more interesting. maggie g is great. and cute. oldman is similarly good (as usual).
this is really stunning on imax
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:08 (sixteen years ago) link
Results 1 - 10 of about 97,700 for frank miller fascist. (0.24 seconds)
http://goodcomics.blogspot.com/2006/02/why-frank-miller-is-fascist-writer.html
― Scik Mouthy, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:11 (sixteen years ago) link
i thought there were some missteps--overwrought, not-particularly-well-thought-out speeches and dialogue about justice, truth, heroism chief among them--but the filmmaking was so tight and well-paced that i didnt care (or, just as soon as i was getting really annoyed with some bit of dialogue, theyd cut to a sweeping shot of the city)
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:11 (sixteen years ago) link
Results 1 - 10 of about 2,210,000 for batman comic. (0.31 seconds)
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:14 (sixteen years ago) link
You genuinely thought this movie was well-paced, max? It turned downright slovenly in the last 45 minutes.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:15 (sixteen years ago) link
yeah by well-paced i mostly meant just as soon as i was getting really annoyed with some bit of dialogue, theyd cut to a sweeping shot of the city--the end drags on a little long and once joker is out of the picture i was just sort of zzzzzzzzzzz
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:18 (sixteen years ago) link
has anyone noticed how much better the sequels to most of the recent superhero movies are than the original? spider-man 2, x2, now this? and then the third movie usually sucks.
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:19 (sixteen years ago) link
i don't think either of those films were better than the originals. i didn't see the third of either.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:21 (sixteen years ago) link
I've been thinking about that; my guess is that because each 'first' film almost necessarily needs to deal with the origin of the hero in question, that the first films exist almost from the get-go as introductions before you get to the actual story the director wants to tell. Also, the first film is a training ground for testing out new ideas. By the third film, everyone's too comfortable with what can be done, and so quality control, in the form of "can we manage this?' being answered with "yes" but not countered with "should we bother?", evaporates and "pile on the villains" one-upmanship cuts in, and you get Spidey 3 or The Last Stand.
― Scik Mouthy, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:22 (sixteen years ago) link
Does that make sense?
yeah thats what i was thinking too
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:24 (sixteen years ago) link
But anyway, all Joker's talk about pro-Anarchy, anti-Planning = utter hokum as he has by far the most complex Plans of anyone in the picture. I can only excuse this as lies that he tells Dent to try to make him go bad.
i dont remember the speech that well but i thought this was less that joker doesnt have any plans and more that he makes plans without a point--he's less 'anarchic' than he is, like, 'anti-utilitarian' or something. there are no ends in joker's world.
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:27 (sixteen years ago) link
maybe these movies should all be made-for-tv miniseries instead
― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:30 (sixteen years ago) link
http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/Movies/07/22/bale.questioned.ap/index.html?eref=rss_latest
This is mental if it's true.
― Scik Mouthy, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:30 (sixteen years ago) link
and you could replicate max's imax experience by sitting really really close to the tv
xpost
― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:31 (sixteen years ago) link
haha yes, the cover of today's evening standard says "police question batman"
― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:32 (sixteen years ago) link
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1037174/Batman-star-Christian-Bale-arrested-assault-claims-brought-mother-sister.html
― Scik Mouthy, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:32 (sixteen years ago) link
I know he thinks he's a bit method, but this is stupid.
― Scik Mouthy, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:34 (sixteen years ago) link
would love to see an HBO gotham mcu series, so long as there are super-villains
― max, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:34 (sixteen years ago) link
my guess is that because each 'first' film almost necessarily needs to deal with the origin of the hero in question, that the first films exist almost from the get-go as introductions before you get to the actual story the director wants to tell.
it makes sense, but i think i enjoy the origin part of superhero movies more than the soap opera love stories etc that sequels bring into it.
xpost maybe his mum and sister were planning a heist.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:36 (sixteen years ago) link
"I'm sorry, son, but Heath's performance is just better than yours."
― Scik Mouthy, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:36 (sixteen years ago) link
maybe her tea's just not up to alfred's standard.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:41 (sixteen years ago) link
Entirely possible.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:47 (sixteen years ago) link
still, vigilante tea-inspired punishment beatings? bit much.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 13:50 (sixteen years ago) link
But he's still a wealthy and powerful guy using his own resources to impose his vision of social order by circumventing the legal and political systems.
Just like everybody else, ever. The purpose of every major character in these stories is to examine which rules stick and when and why to break the rest. Suggesting that a billionaire with nearly limitless resources should be a stickler about adhering to the legal system if he really cares about justice is some blinkered wishful thinking Rachel Dawes shit.
― Kerm, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:18 (sixteen years ago) link
Ken Lay would agree.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:19 (sixteen years ago) link
yes, ken lay was very interested in justice and crimefighting, which is why he's such a popular and fascinating superhero character.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:21 (sixteen years ago) link
maggie g is kinda sexless
― Catsupppppppppppppp dude 茄蕃, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:22 (sixteen years ago) link
likes:
ledger - was concerned he'd be ripping off sociopath performances of filmdom past wholesale but he truly did his own thing. oddly enough, he reminded me only of cagney at certain points. the fact that his performance was one-note (but what a note!) actually helped to keep him from completely running off with the movie. I wasn't thinking "poor dead heath ledger" while watching it, but today I was struck by the fact he *won't* be returning for the sequel, which is total sadface. ah well, at least he left on a high note. joker in nurse outfit blowing up hospital was alltime perverse + delightful.
brought the gritty - much flatter than the previous batman, which suffered from marrying its bleakitude to outlandish, contrived situations. the policier vibe gave this one stronger footing. the relentless pace actually felt relentless.
zeitgeisty - the moral dilemmas of declaring war on terror weren't just superficial frosting, they were baked in. nothing it had to say about the morality of fighting crime was particularly astute (hoary old cop/criminal duality) and perhaps we will look back and laugh but I like the way it continually returned to the topic without getting didactic about it. a little bit of ambivalence goes a long way.
dislikes:
terminator action porn OD: from the supersize-it school of filmmaking. there's more soda in this cup than you could ever possibly drink, but that's okay, it's BETTER cuz there's MORE. around the 37th kidnapping is when I put my head in my hands.
pandering: some of the playing to the crowd was creaky, e.g. editing beats for audience reactions, dorky comic relief, made in china lulz no thanks
batman, why him growl? - okay, I know bale did diff bw/bm voices in the last movie, but this was ridiculous. perhaps it was an attempt to show batman becoming animalistic due to the devolving situation (definitely thought it became more pronounced as the movie went on) but no, that didn't work.
― Edward III, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:25 (sixteen years ago) link
You might wanna check the comments in the link before you respond. Dave Kehr:
“The Dark Knight” is “Dirty Harry” stripped of Don Siegel’s ambivalence and ambiguity. Here again, one madman (Christian Bale’s Batman/Clint Eastwood’s Harry) is posited as the only effective way of combating another (Heath Ledger’s Joker/Andy Robinson’s Scorpio). The two figures are identified as morally equivalent (”You complete me,” says Ledger to Bale, nastily referencing “Jerry Maguire”), but where Siegel’s camera literally recoils in horror at the moment Harry leaps into madness (when he steps on Scorpio’s wound in the football stadium), Nolan seems to embrace, and even romanticize, his hero’s obsessive, abusive behavior. Is the Dark Knight just George Bush with a better outfit, demanding that he be allowed all of the available “tools” to combat terrorism, even if they include torture and eavesdropping? Like Bush, Batman has his own warrantless wiretapping program, but Nolan is kind enough to assure us that, once his goal is accomplished, the superhero will blow it up. Is he suggesting that we can count on the Dark President to do the same?
http://www.davekehr.com/?p=59
― Dr Morbius, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:27 (sixteen years ago) link
Sorry to beat a dead horse but every dramatic hero since the Enlightenment has been free of the normal rules that apply to you and me, by dint of either their profession (cop, private investigator, nobleman, spy, etc) or their criminality (mafiosi, man-on-the-run, etc). It's an interesting rut that Western dramatic writing has gotten itself into, that we can't imagine the sort of heroism we aspire to other than being embodied by someone to whom the normal rules don't apply. Batman is in the basic Scarlet Pimpernel / Zorro mold, a nobleman who disguises himself not so much as to not be caught by the law (since by being noble he is somewhat above the law anyway), but so as to retain his special position in society (and thereby continue his heroic tasks)
― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:34 (sixteen years ago) link
Dave Kehr again:
Both the ferry boat and the wrong-rescue scenes are typical of “The Dark Knight”’s strategy of setting up impossible, “Sophie’s Choice”-like moral dilemmas for its hero, and then resolving them through sleight-of-hand: in a bit of reverse racism, a scary-looking black man steps up to make the tough moral choice that a wimpy-looking white guy is unable to handle; Batman arrives to rescue his girl friend, only to find that the Joker has betrayed him (!) and switched locations. In both cases the hero gets to look fine and noble while he wrestles with issues that are then resolved with no moral cost to him. I agree that the movie is not triumphalist, but triumphalism is hardly in style at this point in time. Instead, it substitutes the dark romanticism of the misunderstood outsider, who takes on the sins of the community the better to redeem the poor saps who will remain forever ungrateful to him — a slight improvement over a ticker tape parade finale, but still a self-flattering, adolescent notion.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:36 (sixteen years ago) link
difference being, in real life you have to decide whether or not you trust a vigilante, and wonder what his reasons are.
batman is just a comic book hero, and we know he's the good guy. i don't think the parallel holds up.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:37 (sixteen years ago) link
he used the term "reverse racism" = don't listen to a thing the guy says
― goole, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:39 (sixteen years ago) link
Batman arrives to rescue his girl friend, only to find that the Joker has betrayed him (!)
is this what happened? maybe i got jumbled, i thought the point was that Batman chose Dent
― goole, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:41 (sixteen years ago) link
In real life you have to decide whether or not you trust the rules, too.
― Kerm, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:45 (sixteen years ago) link
I said it could be read as a rather sympathetic critique of post-9/ll government overreach in my review. Didn't take that line of thinking as far as Kehr.
x-post
― Hubie Brown, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:48 (sixteen years ago) link
Hand's writing is so good.
― the pinefox, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:50 (sixteen years ago) link
batman seemed kind of fat and super slow in this. especially when the whole first movie was about how batman is a ninja. he really needs to go up a size in that mask
― hytop, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:52 (sixteen years ago) link
the audience in my theatre cheered when gordon reappeared - in this world, the heroes are celebrated just for *surviving*. I guess I'm getting kind of meta about this, but that seems like a low point for comic book heroics. so it's kind of hard to read tdk as a triumphant celebration of bush policies. have the ostensible good guys (and the audience by proxy) ever been so sadistically thrashed during a comic book movie? does anyone walk out of the theatre upbeat + feeling good about the state of gotham (or the world)?
― Edward III, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:01 (sixteen years ago) link
max, have you read Gotham Central? if not, you would probably like it!
― Jordan, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:03 (sixteen years ago) link
It took me a while to figure out that wasn't Renee Montoya tagging along with Gordon all the time.
― Oilyrags, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:06 (sixteen years ago) link
have the ostensible good guys (and the audience by proxy) ever been so sadistically thrashed during a comic book movie?
It's difficult to think of any action movie in the last 15-20 years where the hero isn't beaten and bloodied by the end of it. We seem to need our heroes punished, with marks all over their bodies.
Thanks, pinefox.
― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:08 (sixteen years ago) link
Kerm, 22 July 2008 14:45 (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Link
nope. in real life you have to wonder what society is going to do about the people that break/ignore them.
― darraghmac, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:10 (sixteen years ago) link
yeah, they didn't see her name for awhile and i was sure it was going to be montoya.
― Jordan, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:22 (sixteen years ago) link
-- Dr Morbius, Tuesday, July 22, 2008 10:27 AM (54 minutes ago) Bookmark Link
did this guy just call obama "the dark president"???
― and what, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:24 (sixteen years ago) link
Like Bush, Batman has his own warrantless wiretapping program
― Oilyrags, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:25 (sixteen years ago) link
morbz is obsessed with obama saying as president he'd scrap the fisa stuff he voted for
― and what, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:28 (sixteen years ago) link
those aren't morbz' words. He's quoting Dave Kehr.
― Oilyrags, Tuesday, 22 July 2008 15:28 (sixteen years ago) link