Batman carries on beginning in ... The Dark Knight

where's that rex reed review of batman begins where he's all "why can't there be nubile young boy wonder sidekick in this?" lol

That's actually a great article, just for all the background information on the creation of the series and all that.

Mar Evanier observes:

Two points of note. One is that he seems to recall that his pilot script, which featured The Joker, was the first one aired. Actually, the first episode that aired featured The Riddler and the second week featured The Penguin. It wasn't until the third week that The Joker showed his white face...and that script was credited to Robert Dozier, son of Exec Producer William Dozier. So something is wrong in his recollection.

Also: The way Semple tells it, he makes it sound as if ABC forced Batman on Bill Dozier as a project he neither initiated nor wanted to do. Dozier used to tell the story of how he came across a Batman comic book in an airport gift shop and that's how he got the idea to do the show. I seem to recall that in one telling, Dozier even described the issue in question well enough that guys like me could identify it was Batman #171 — which featured The Riddler and which contained story elements that turned up in Semple's script for the first episode aired.

I'm pretty sure Semple's right about all the other stuff but those two matters have me a little puzzled.

First negative review:

http://nymag.com/listings/movie/the-dark-knight/

Forget Gotham City—or Anton Furst’s splendid Gothic Gotham of Tim Burton’s Batman, which summoned up the freaky superhero’s inner landscape of vaulted arches and gargoyles. We’re now in a modern, untransformed Manhattan, where the Joker’s opening bank heist unfolds in a tense, realistic style with multiple point-blank shootings. It’s a shock—and very effective—to see a comic-book villain come on like a Quentin Tarantino reservoir dog. But then the novelty wears off and the lack of imagination, visual and otherwise, turns into a drag. The Dark Knight is noisy, jumbled, and sadistic. Even its most wondrous vision—Batman’s plunges from skyscrapers, bat-wings snapping open as he glides through the night like a human kite—can’t keep the movie airborne. There’s an anvil attached to that cape.

So far these negative/middling reviews just have me all the more interested!

We’re now in a modern, untransformed Manhattan

well is it manhattan or is it chicago?!?!

filmed in chicago, l.a., hong kong, etc. apparently everywhere but manhattan (according to the imdb)

i always thought "gotham" was chicago and "metropolis" was n.y. but maybe i have it backwards?

it looks like i do have it backwards!

Rewatched Batman Begins last night - now very clearly obvious that, good as it is, it's JUST a warm-up for this.

And yes, these two 'negative' reviews seem to be irritated by things I see as positives.

First negative review

The Anne Thompson piece in Variety linked to by caek a week ago is kind of negative too.

Denby:

Instead of enjoying the formalized beauty of a fighting discipline, we see a lot of flailing movement and bodies hitting the floor like grain sacks. All this ruckus is accompanied by pounding thuds on the soundtrack, with two veteran Hollywood composers (Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard) providing additional bass-heavy stomps in every scene, even when nothing is going on. At times, the movie sounds like two excited mattresses making love in an echo chamber. In brief, Warner Bros. has continued to drain the poetry, fantasy, and comedy out of Tim Burton’s original conception for “Batman” (1989), completing the job of coarsening the material into hyperviolent summer action spectacle. Yet “The Dark Knight” is hardly routine—it has a kicky sadism in scene after scene, which keeps you on edge and sends you out onto the street with post-movie stress disorder. And it has one startling and artful element: the sinister and frightening performance of the late Heath Ledger as the psychopathic murderer the Joker. That part of the movie is upsetting to watch, and, in retrospect, both painful and stirring to think about.

So, uh, was trying to get tickets to see this on the IMAX screen here in Chicago... but apparently every showing for the entire run is already sold out.

"Tim Burton’s original conception"

I think these reviewers need to come to terms with the fact that well-established comic book characters, and even some less-than-well-established characters, are the modern day's mythology. The manner in which you cast, paint and tell a myth depends on what you want to express through the telling.

Burton's muse was slightly different than Nolan's, to be sure. I can't fucking wait to see this movie.

Right – Denby (and others) are quibbling with Nolan's conceptions.

"Tim Burton’s original conception"

-- Pancakes Hackman, Monday, 14 July 2008 13:57 (1 hour ago) Link

^ this

i tried to watch the 1989 batman a few years ago and i couldn't get through it.

fuck david denby, pretty much

xp: You won't be able to get through this one in 20 years either, if you're lucky.

you saw?

He doesn't need to see it!

I kind of want to buy the Burton Batman on DVD but I have a dreadful feeling that I'd hate it now. I've got the animated series to watch which will hopefully gimme a decent Batman fix.

He doesn't need to see it!

that's our morbs! http://www.booleansoup.com/images/emoticons/eyeroll.gif

I bought the Batman box set that was out a few years ago. Some of the Burton stuff still works, some doesn't, there's some atrocious editing and the plot in the first one is still a bit wispy. Keaton better than I remember. And the shields on the Batmobile are hand-drawn animation! As is Joker falling to his death! (WHOOPS SPOILERS)

"Batman: Gotham Knight" has some really, really good stuff. For all of Marvel's box office success lately, DC owns the animation ground.

i always thought "gotham" was chicago and "metropolis" was n.y. but maybe i have it backwards?

-- moonship journey to baja, Monday, July 14, 2008 6:38 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark Link

it looks like i do have it backwards!

-- moonship journey to baja, Monday, July 14, 2008 6:40 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark Link

!!! i have always assumed same all my assumptions have been upbraided

gotham has been a nyc nickname for 200 years or something, right?

The origins of 'Gotham' as a nickname.

actually wait i thought both were ny

So, uh, was trying to get tickets to see this on the IMAX screen here in Chicago... but apparently every showing for the entire run is already sold out.

-- jon /via/ chi 2.0, Monday, July 14, 2008 7:52 AM (Monday, July 14, 2008 7:52 AM) Bookmark Link

dang, was gonna look into this after lunch today. i want to see them blow up the brachs candy factory on the big big screen.

fwiw i thought metropolis was supposed to be located on the eastern seaboard circa annapolis?? though the daily planet building from the original supes t.v. show is located in providence, ri

I forget who said it - Julie Schwartz or someone probably - "Metropolis is NYC in the daytime, Gotham City is NYC at night."

jvc, i just went to the imax @ navy pier website and there are still tix available for opening weekend (though only the 3 and 6 am showings) and tickets for ALL showings the next weekend.

No spoilers and I guess I don't even have to say it but this movie ROCKED. Heath Ledger, dammmmnnn. I don't know about Oscar-worthy, but it was something-worthy alright.

Big gripe, same as the last movie: music was awful.

And please if you can, see it on an Imax screen. I saw it on a regular screen and it was disorienting enough, I can't imagine how unsettling it must be on Imax.

metropolis is toronto

Holy Crap!

jvc, i just went to the imax @ navy pier website and there are still tix available for opening weekend (though only the 3 and 6 am showings) and tickets for ALL showings the next weekend.

Yeah, we found this out yesterday when my wife stopped by after work. The moron I talked to over the weekend just had no clue, and their website was down.

I have two tickets to a preview screening (in the UK) next Wednesday night. EXCITED.

So excited that over the last four days I've watched Batman Begins, Gotham Knight, and seven episodes of the animated series first season.

I've got an advance ticket for this at the IMAX on Thursday night...

What's the deal with preview screenings? I don't understand how it can be so easy to get in to see a film before its general release?

If you so much as walk aimlessly around certain malls (especially in big cities) there will be people who are giving out, if not actively harassing you to take, free screening passes. The last two movies I was directly offered passes to I turned down and they both, ironically, were gigantic hits (Borat and Knocked Up).

If you register at seefilmfirst, you'll get emails offering you tickets for preview screenings. It works on a first come first serve basis though, so there's no guarantee that you'll actually get a seat even if you've got a ticket. I've seen loads of pretty good films this way though.

list and map of chicago shooting locations for the dark knight.

this one is my favorite because they blew up the fucking parking garage (kitted to look like a hospital in the movie i think) and didn't tell any of the neighbors. the explosion and 10 story fireball scared the hell out of much of the west side.

What's the deal with preview screenings?

I have a Visa credit card and received some rewards-type e-mail last week offering free advance tickets. I hope they're for real and that I won't return home to find my apartment ransacked.

Kenneth Turan approves.

(Though he somehow forgets that the 'next film' Nolan did was The Prestige.)

Also, a soundtrack review.