|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 20, 2012 12:25:11 GMT 2
Alright, Fortress denizens, I need some help here. I just returned from a midnight showing of Nolan's conclusion to his epic Batman trilogy. And I am not pleased. Not. At. All. In fact, the last time I was this crushed by a trilogy closer, emo Peter Parker was dancing down the street. Now, I'm not saying don't see this movie. What I am saying is see it and tell me if I am going insane. You see, people were applauding at the end of the screening. I logged into Metacritic and saw 34 positive critical reviews against ONE negative with an average score of 80/100 and promises of Oscars galore. But I started out unimpressed with The Dark Knight Rises and it only got worse the longer the film carried on. The ONLY thing I felt they got right was Catwoman. The fascist Ayn Randian politics of it, the out of character nonsense, the ridiculous Bat Spaceship, the lame and trite ending that they didn't even have the balls to stick too, the lack of coherent thought that went into nearly every aspect of the story....I just can't believe this is how you follow up The Dark Knight and I can't believe that everybody but me loves it. So give me honest feedback here: have I reached a critical mass of cynicism? Am I now unable to enjoy anything ever again or am I just ass-backwards in relation to what the rest of the world thinks is good? The Dark Knight Rises discussion thread is underway. [edit] Well, it appears Harry Knowles agrees with me for once. www.aintitcool.com/node/57109Not sure if that's a good sign, but honestly he only wrote a fraction of my grievances. |
|
|
|
Post by The Curmudgeon on Jul 21, 2012 15:01:45 GMT 2
I'm going to see it tomorrow, so I'll let you know my thoughts then. Although you're actually the first person I've heard/read/spoke to that hasn't gushed about it being the best thing ever ever ever.
Let's be honest, it does look like this movie is going to go down in history and remembered for something other than what was on the screen. Yikes.
|
|
|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 21, 2012 20:08:21 GMT 2
Yeah, well I cold write a goddamn term paper on how utterly fucked this movie is, but I'll save the spoilers for now. But pretty much every non-Catwoman scene of this motherfucker is wrong for me. Nolan may have earned a spot on my shit list the fast and hard way, but at least he said this: filmdrunk.uproxx.com/2012/07/chris-nolan-i-never-meet-anyone-who-actually-likes-3dSo he hasn't completely lost his shit. Good on him for that. But I am still convinced he Raimied us because he is sick of Batman movies and wanted to tank the finale. But the Nolan nuthuggery is tooo strong for the common fan to resist, it seems.  And holy psychotic dipshit, Batman I can't wrap my head around why a person would plot a massacre at a fucking midnight movie premiere. Marvel fan, maybe? |
|
|
|
Post by The Curmudgeon on Jul 22, 2012 18:53:41 GMT 2
OK, seen it and.... yeah, I was disappointed. Knowles makes a lot of good points, and I didn't get pissed at some of them like he did, but a few things really bugged me about this film. Firstly - Bane. Fucking Bane. That was NOT the monster he was touted to be, and yeah, the fight scenes were all fucking weak. At no point did we ever get the impression this was some unstoppable force who could punch holes in walls. And that VOICE! Seriously, that's what they came up with? It sounded like Matt Berry doing a Darth Vader impression. It was ridiculous. Why, if he was raised in some God-forsaken foreign cell, would he have a more polite British voice than Alfred? Let's face it - no superhero film is ever going to top the Dark Knight. Well, except the Avengers, obviously. But this one didn't even come close. Question - how did Bruce get back from the pit in the first place? Wasn't the entire place cut off from the rest of the world? Wasn't that the ENTIRE PLOT of the film in the first place? And I liked the fact they referenced the previous villains from the previous movies with little cameo's from Scarecrow and Ghul. But, uh, pretty sure there was another villain who survived and went to prison who would surely have made some sort of impact upon release?  Yeah, that guy. Obviously he can't make an appearance, but a little explanation of where the fuck he was would have made a little bit of sense. Right now, I didn't hate it, but I sure didn't love it. As time goes on, and as I hear more foaming at the mouth fanboy reviews, which are obviously of a different movie than the one I watched, that may well change. Oh, and turns out all you really need to be a superhero in Gotham is to be an orphan and to be "plucky." Yeah, a real suitable replacement for Batman that little dipshit will be. |
|
|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 22, 2012 20:49:17 GMT 2
And again, you come up with an entirely different set of reasons why it was lame than my biggest problems. Let me count up a few I listed in an Amazon post and some more I didn't. Thar be spoilers up ahead. 1. Every character was out of character (Alfred ditching Wayne because the bad guy looked really mean and Bruce shutting down because his girlfriend died when losing loved ones to a maniac was the entire reason he was Batman in the first place). 2. No thought went into the story other than Nolan's insultingly half-baked Randian philosophy (implying the 99% would devolve into savage anarchy if not for the 1% holding us together). 3. The realism was just gone (a Batspaceship now...really? Also, crime is all gone. Just like that eh? We should pass the Dent Act globally then). 4. Bane talked like Darth Vader channeling Goldfinger while having a stroke (also, his weakness was getting hit in the face...not impressive). 5. The fights looked like bad pro wrestling 6. While the ending was disturbingly trite to begin with Nolan couldn't even sack up enough to stick with it. 7. The statue at the end made me laugh out loud with it's ridiculousness, and I audibly groaned when they suggested the detective us his full name, "Robin" (wink, wink audience members!). 8. They reveal Talia as a convenient plot twist I already saw coming, show her story in a flashback as she reveals her plot in another horrible cliche and then promptly fucking dies. Laaaaaame. Would it have killed them to make her actually all in love with Wayne (you know, like the actual character?) and be divided between loyalty to her father and her love instead of making her just a weak excuse for a plot twist? 9. Batman comes off like such a bitch. Seriously, dude gets owned by every other character in the movie. 10. The image of every cop in the entire city being sent shoulder-to-shoulder down the same sewer passage was so many kinds of stupid. 11. That ridiculous power source/bomb thingy. There's only one guy who can do it, but all it takes is a second or two to convert a power source into a nuclear bomb. 'Kaaaay. And then you can make it nott a bomb simply by reconnecting it to it's original base. Ummmmm. How would that make it not a bomb? And if flooding it would be enough to destroy it, why not just roll the fucking thing into the ocean? I kept picturing this:     And there is plenty more where those came from. This is one of those rare movies that actually taints the previous films as well. When you put these three films together, the story is very, very small for a Batman story. Really, forget everything else you know about Batman and count up how much he actually accomplished in the decade since he became Batman in the films. Stopped a couple petty crooks. Killed Ra's al Ghul after he'd alreadyy effed Gotham royally. Stopped Joker from blowing up a boat. Killed Harvey Dent to save one child. Disappeared for 8 years or so. Ran cops on the most comically over the top police chase since OJ as a comeback. Gets smashed by Bane. Disappears another few months. Beats up Bane by figuring out his weakness is getting hit in the face (world's greatest detective indeed). Kills new girlfriend. Iron Giants in his spaceship because apparently there aren't any helicopters in Gotham that they could have used to do the same thing at any time. Compared to the insane amount of money he spent on these endeavors, I'd say his list of feats is pretty fucking unimpressive. It seems like Batman really was just a fucking weirdo with too much time on his hands if you put these movies together as a trilogy, whereas BB and TDK were an awesome beginning to an epic hero story. So many bad decisions and poorly thought-out ideas in this one, though. And when you put together the hints at The Patriot Act (authorizing the government to spy on it's citizens) in TDK with the implied comparison between Bane and the Occupy movement, it becomes pretty clear that Nolan leans towards thgue fascist side of law enforcement, which pisses me off. I think this gushing review (from a reviewer whose entire career is almost all perfect scores according to Metacritic) says it pretty well: www.salon.com/2012/07/18/the_dark_knight_rises_christopher_nolans_evil_masterpiece/ So anyways, I'm glad I'm not the only one who was crushed by disappointemnt in this film. It's getting lonely out here. |
|
Quillford
Bad Witch
"You're Scheming On A Thing That's A Mirage. I'm Trying To Tell You Now, It's Sabotage!"
Posts: 238
|
Post by Quillford on Jul 25, 2012 13:07:08 GMT 2
In all honesty I thought Bane was kidding with the voice thing ... but no. This was it for the next 2 hours or so. Batman doing his whole *CROAK* MY PARENTS ARE DEAAAD! *CROAK* and Bane doing his Sean Connory debating politics with Mysterio voice - I was in a hell where I couldn't laugh or been considered A WANKER. So I closed my lips and proceeded to watch. For the hype it received this film was only just meh. The reboot is going to be a warm addition to my life.
|
|
|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 26, 2012 4:06:53 GMT 2
Okay, so that is 3/3 Fortress denizens. This is odd because I swear to God I have not heard ANYTHING online or IRL aside from 1 or 2 reviews that don't consider TDKR to be as good or better than TDK. Is it some kind of hivemind nuthugging then? Is it because so many people jumped and the Batwagon after TDK was such a hit and really have no clue what makes the characters tick or a movie good? I went in there fairly confident that I was going to see a good if not great film since Nolan hadn't made a bad one yet and Batman is an extremely fertile storytelling field, but my expectations were tempered by the comic movie rule of three (the third will suck) so I hadn't built it up too much, but I was still crushed by just how bad the while thing was. I've actually lost sleep trying to puzzle out why it is that critics and nerds and mainstream audiences all love the fuck out of this movie and I (a MASSIVE Batman fan my entire life) hated it. I understand mainstream fans because they are sheep, and critics are nuthuggers, but I feel like all of the comic geeks at least should feel like I do. Life's little mysteries.
|
|
|
|
Post by The Curmudgeon on Jul 26, 2012 14:13:27 GMT 2
True story; I was called a "hipster" by a guy I know because I dared question the "OMG BEST FILM EVER" tag of TDKR. That I was just trying to be contrary and "different." Fucking unbelievable. Is it some mass brainwashing cult? Are we soon going to be walking down the street with fake smiles on our faces, having to pretend how amazing the film was, until one of us questions, like, the idiotic notion of Robin just KNOWING Bruce was Batman, and all of a sudden people will stop in the streets and point and scream? Thankfully, I came across this article on NME that shows that, yes, we are NOT alone out there. www.nme.com/blog/index.php?blog=131&p=12521&title=the_dark_knight_rises&more=1&c=1Viva la resistance! |
|
Quillford
Bad Witch
"You're Scheming On A Thing That's A Mirage. I'm Trying To Tell You Now, It's Sabotage!"
Posts: 238
|
Post by Quillford on Jul 26, 2012 17:52:56 GMT 2
Don't even get me started on this hipster crap. It's in the eye of the beholder and it makes me want to violently pull peoples extremities off in horrible ways when people use the term. Fuck you people. Just because you don't like something that is mainstream it makes you part of a crowd. What FUCKING logic is that?!
|
|
|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 26, 2012 19:50:29 GMT 2
Laughing like hell at the first comment on that article. "So basically you pick on a film you know everyone loved, just to be that guy who went against the trend. You were probably planning this article before you'd even seen the film."  Yeah, that's why he was so systematic and specific in his criticisms, because he planned it all before seeing it. Notice how his complaints are mostly different from mine as well. It's not like this is the first two films, which had a few significant flaws people harped on, but they were overwhelmed by the majority of awesomeness. This was a film that had something wrong with almost every fucking character (Hathaway was fantastic, but her costume was lame) and plot point. Another problem is the whole "here, you have a vertebrae sticking out of your back, let me punch it back in for you" bit that has him performing superhuman feats that no man has ever accomplished a few months after getting broken in fucking half. Also there was the way Wayne was hobbling about at the beginning. He retired as Batman after the last time we saw him in TDK where he was running like the wind. So why is his leg all fucked up? And if they were going to just fix it with a miracle robot leg brace or whatever, why even have his leg injured in the first place? Damn it, man. And one of the things that is getting endlessly praised is how REALISTIC the whole thing is. What the hell is going on? Then there's this review from nerd-filled site , Topless Robot. www.toplessrobot.com/2012/07/tr_review_the_dark_knight_rises.phpCan you see how HARD the writer is trying to convince everybody how much he loved the movie even though he had almost nothing but lists of complaints in the review? He spends most of it trying to defend it from himself. HE IS FIGHTING HIS OWN BRAIN! And since when does "epic" automatically mean "good"? Epic means large in scope and/or scale, and I don't really argue that's what Nolan was going for, but again, I will refer to my list of things Nolan's Batman actually accomplished in 3 movies over a ten year span. Not epic. Not at all. In fact, only the music and the gravitas of the performances would really qualify. And shit, man, Bats has a higher body count on his hands in these films than Jack the fucking Ripper did. I really need to find somebody to explain themselves on why they loved this movie because the reviewers can't seem to give a legit reason that isn't saying the word "epic" over and over. Well, Bayformers was pretty damn epic and a "real trilogy", but thankfully nobody credible is stumbling all over themselves defending that shit. |
|
|
|
Post by Ben on Jul 28, 2012 5:53:17 GMT 2
I'll preface this post by saying that I'm no comic book nerd and pretty much fall into the category of "sheep" when it comes to superhero flicks. That said, I only liked TDKR. I didn't love it. I, too, was asking where the fuck the Joker went when all the prisoners were cut lose, and I hated the cheesy missile/spaceship chase at the end. Why must Hollywood insist that missiles are always slow-moving chump weapons which any capable pilot can dodge? I also agree with Trashcanman's comment- Batman was a bitch! Everyone whipped on him all movie.
On the other hand, I didn't mind the Robin tie-in, nor did I take issue with Bane's voice. I was also definitely emotionally invested in the film, which is always a good sign. Overall, my only big issue with the film was the lack of realism.
|
|
|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 28, 2012 19:44:17 GMT 2
That's cool. You like what you like. It's mostly the over the top gushing and declarations of "perfection" and "realism" and all time greatness that rustled my jimmies. I've seen plenty of worse comic book films, but based on the first two films I was holding this one to a higher standard whereas I feel like other people were determined to love it no matter what after the first two were so universally enjoyed. But the nonsense just built up and built up until I was just so utterly disconnected from the characters and story by the time Batman got broken I just did not give a fuck what happened, and that's a really bad thing in any story.
|
|
|
|
Post by The Curmudgeon on Jul 31, 2012 10:50:43 GMT 2
Hey, I won't say I didn't enjoy it, because I did.. just not nearly enough to justify the hype. It was more than a step above other comic book movie fare like Fantastic Four and Ghost Rider, but it fucking should be. It's Christopher Nolan. The reason some people are SO pissed off is because of what came before it. If this movie was released after, say, Batman and Robin, it would still have it's considerable flaws but it would still be a damn site better. Although, for the record, Batman and Robin Bane looked WAY better than TDKR Bane.  Yeah, not realistic, but neither are fucking spaceships flying around Gotham City. I genuinely believe once the hype dies down people will actually go "hmmm.. you know, maybe it's not as great as I thought it was." Wait till the DVD comes out, and I think a revaluation will happen. It's not in any way a one star film, but I'm still going to give it that on Amazon.. y'know, just to anger the fanboys. |
|
|
|
Post by trashcanman on Jul 31, 2012 20:32:32 GMT 2
It's not in any way a one star film, but I'm still going to give it that on Amazon.. y'know, just to anger the fanboys.  |
|
