Batman carries on beginning in ... The Dark Knight

Never fear: the Noble Black Felon made the choice for them.

hahahaaha

The Other Shawshank Redemption

I am thinking maybe they didn't SHOW Rachel dead bcz to show whatever the hell was left of her would push it most defs into the R rating I'm still astonished it avoided. I thought it was pretty clear she was damn fucking dead, but OTOH I am the person that read all Tolkein's books thinking the Baggins were named "Bib-lo" and "Ford-o."

A renaming which would be utterly wonderful.

And yeah, she dead. I gather Emma Thomas, Nolan's wife and producer of his films, has said Harvey's death is meant to be more ambiguous.

that awkward "....hi" as his opening greeting to the horrendously disfigured Dent

haha yes! I saw it again a couple of days ago and cracked up so much at this bit. He looked for all the world like Dent's concerned mum trying to tell him his puppy had died.

was waiting for him to show him his own face for the first time and complete his descent insanity

what is Harvey supposed to have died from, falling 15 feet? Wasn't entirely clear what had happened but it never occurred to me at any point that he wasn't mostly being set up as the main guy in the next one, and felt that they were shooting their wad on it a bit by cramming so much intense stuff with him into the last 10 minutes of an already exhausting ending

like, he was all consumed with the need for revenge but he stopped to make one half of his suit jacket into some sequinned Ric Flair shit, surely that could've waited

I took that look as being what happened to his suit after the car crash when he took out Eric Roberts' driver. A tasteful distressing, at least.

And yeah on the '...hi' moment too as being the one that hit me the most second time around -- but the 'puppy dog out of the police car window' bit dug in even deeper.

I'm waiting for someone to say they hated this, so I can get revved up again...

[A huge still from the 'puppy dog' bit here BTW.]

I wasn't that crazy about it! Pick me! Pick me!

I think my brother stated my opinions perfectly: "Maybe if Joker was still listening to Prince, the movie wouldn't have been as oppressive."

some other things i noticed the 2nd time around

1) when eric roberts goes to get in the car with his driver and bodyguard you can see dent's arms reach out of the shadows on the left side of the screen and pull the bodyguard off-camera. a real quick flash.

2) is it just me or was alan ruck (cameron from ferris bueller) on the boat at the end?

3) who was the truck driver from the car chase scene? the one with the joker? he looked very familiar.

movies are oppressive

A number of the more understated performances felt stronger second time through -- Gary Oldman's in particular (no surprise, I loved him in the first film, best performance easy, but he holds his own better than I remembered first time through -- I'm thinking of the interrogation room scene with the Joker as a prime example).

Why you being all grumpy-beared out, deez? All walkin' up to the pencil sharpener with your sharp pencil for an excuse to yank my pigtails again?

im not being grumpy, im saying thats a massive part of why i love this movie! as i said upthread

nothing to do w/ yr pigtails or my pencil

haha re Prince: i honestly wanted Ledger to do a Joker version of his performance of "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" from 10 Things I Hate About You.

Gary Oldman was aces and Gordon easily my favourite character from both movies. I love the subtle change in his character between the two movies - the weary idealist cop now newly-energized and given a purpose. The old Gordon could never have jumped to the Mayor's defense the way he did, dude could barely operate a Batmobile.

I took that look as being what happened to his suit after the car crash when he took out Eric Roberts' driver. A tasteful distressing, at least.

oh, ok, that's pretty good

I took it as being the fact that he put on the same suit as he'd been wearing when HALF HIS HEAD WAS ON FIRE and that thusly it had got a bit charred around the lapel at the same time as his flesh melted off.

Cosmo Landesman's error-strewn, liberal-baiting review in The Sunday Times makes interesting reading - http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/film_reviews/article4386375.ece

Please see movie again and give your review , I think you haven't seen movie yet. I think it is best movie from all batman's.

patel, london, uk

did feel like it was a bit of a leap in logic to go "I need to take the blame for all this and become a pretend villain", when the Joker was obviously more to blame for the Dent killings than Batman, but I must just've been lost to the subtleties after 150 minutes of Intensity

Revealing Harvey as being the person behind the side rampage would deal a major blow to the legitimacy of his crusade to clean up Gotham. The Joker was rather visibly shown tied directly to the ferry nonsense, all of which was a big distraction to allow Harvey to go on his vendetta and pull the fangs from his crusade.

Isn't critiquing TDK for not being a serious 9/11 analogy a bit disingenuous? I don't remember any super explicit 9/11 references. So unless calling someone a terrorist is now keyword Twin Towers, it isn't necessarily an analogy for anti-Western World terror. And I know that lots of critics keep calling it a 9/11 reference, but if you don't feel the same way (as a critique), that doesn't lesson the flick. That just means you disagree with other critiques. (This is really pointed at that Landesman review, but I saw another critique write that he refuses to see the flick because he doesn't like that film critiques are treating it like a serious film and not a silly blockbuster. He then confirmed that he had no issue with the flick, just with its coverage.)

Another critic*. I love that que, apparently.

I hate that I feel like I need to defend this flick against bad reviews. After all, as much as I liked it, I don't think it was the best film ever. And I think a lot of the criticisms of it (especially in this thread - about it's humorlessness and relentlessness) are valid. But it really does feel like a lot of the MSM reviewers didn't bother watching the film, but just read The Week film section.

I don't see how anyone could possibly call this movie humorless.

I can see how certain parts of the film - like the Batman voice - seem pretty humorless.

Yeah, but that's certain parts, not the whole thing! Calling the movie flat-out humorless is ridiculous -- calling it relentless as a negative is personal taste at play but I take it as far more of a positive. (Obviously not blaming you, Mordy.)

Yeah. I'm just saying, some of those comments actually have *some* validity. Unlike stuff like, "This was a bad 9/11 analogy!" or "Critics like this movie too much, so I don't!" or "Batman is a justification for the Bush Administration." None of which, ya know, have any basis in reality.

"....hi", potato peeler, pencil trick*, "I believe in Harvey Dent" sticker, nurse uniformed Joker clumsily mashing buttons on detonator and staggering round outside hospital before it explodes, Asshole Wayne shrugging off his heroic prevention of vehicular homicide as him just trying to beat the traffic light = all funny

*this gag is the spiritual heir to that Homer vs Smithers fight where Smithers unlocks a safe while laughing evilly, and uses the door to hit Homer in the head when he leans in to see why he's doing it, and is therefore massively funny despite the idea of a human brain being destroyed by wood and graphite being disturbing

hahahahaha

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2yv8aT0UFc

I like that. Saw it the other day.

lol wait a minute this really has the guy from suddenly susan in it????

You mean the guy from the live-action Tick series and Lost! Paradigm shift!

The second half was good, after Maggie G got blown-up. I don't mean it to sound like I enjoyed Maggie G getting blown-up, it's just that seemed to be the pivotal moment and it didn't drag so much after that.

How did it drag before that????

Dunno, it just seemed to.

I probably went too early in the morning.

i might as well say it again cause it's fun - I love BATMANUEL in this.

"....hi", potato peeler, pencil trick*, "I believe in Harvey Dent" sticker, nurse uniformed Joker clumsily mashing buttons on detonator and staggering round outside hospital before it explodes, Asshole Wayne shrugging off his heroic prevention of vehicular homicide as him just trying to beat the traffic light = all funny

yeah, it definitely wasnt humorless, but most of the humor was dark & centered around the joker (the biggest laughs at the showing i went to came when he blew up the hospital) - i also got more than a few laughs from bale's wayne/bateman persona

A follow-up blog post.

it's not humourless if you want to be pedantic about the definition of the word but it was a bit monolithic. I enjoyed it but it didn't deal with anything in any kind of subtle way, just sort of bludgeoned through. so it was a summer blockbuster, what do you expect, but it didn't really make me think, not much anyway.

just because it wasn't cringe inducingly stupid like so many other summer blockbusters, because it was too serious and intense to be stupid, that doesn't make it an amazing film.

eg if I'm thinking of relentless the bourne films had me far far more hyped and physically tired at the end than this.

Ronan, I agree with you.

No one's commenting on my post anymore, thank goodness, but I've gotten emails all weekend as the film's fans watch it a second time.

(xxpost)

Dare I ask how printable they are.

"snob" is one of the politer things I was called.

Charming.

I like that one!