The Dark Knight (2008) (1 Viewer)

[Chuck Mayer]

Regarding heart...this movie is fundamentally hopeful. The Joker offers numerous opportunities for society to fail, and humanity holds. But the first film is more pure. This is a pretty dark movie, with a pretty dark end. But I think it has a tone of heart. It's just got a lot of melancholy as well.

And I loved the HK sequence. Just right for a mid-action scene

 

[Lou Sytsma]

Loved it too but the movie would be unchanged with its exclusion.

 

[Robert Crawford]

That's debatable for me as those scenes further enhanced the film in my opinion.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

No, I agree there. It's pretty disposable. But seeing all those Shanghai skylines in IMAX was worth the time for me.

Must be a good one, because I can't stop thinking about it.

 

[Lou Sytsma]

Great! Sounds like you got your money's worth from IMAX then.

 

[MichaelD]

Yeah but get rid of the HK scenes and you don't have the sonar setup for the end.

 

[Paul_Scott]

Well said-that sums up my reaction too.
This is the first film I can recall that I now think should have been 1.5 hours longer...with an intermission. The post catastrophe Dent would have taken advantage of more breathing space. The thing is- he was all alone at that point. There was no sanctuary for him anywhere. He wouldn't be able to exist for long on his own and his scars (internal and external) would make it impossible to find solace with friends. He was a man with nowhere to go and his trajectory led to the only plausible conclusion for him.
Needless to say, I think Harvey is at peace now.
As much as I was craving seeing the Two-face money shots- I was sad to see it happen so soon. I liked Harvey quite a bit.
Contrast that with another recent 'tragic' villan whose disfigurement and evil trajectory was already certain before we sat down in the theater. In the case of the latter, he couldn't manifest his evil potential soon enough to suit me- here it was honestly dispiriting to see that happen.
And that's just how 'tragic' should feel.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Or the motivation for the Joker to get imprisoned, or the ability for the Joker to burn his half of the money, therefore sending his message to the mobsters, etc.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Brandon, that brings out a point I was thinking about last night when writing my overly wordy review. The story structure is a house of cards. Even though I didn't like the accountant trying to bribe Lucius (they left Batmobile plans out somewhere???), it led to something else I *did* like. The entire film builds on information from previous scenes. Like I said, the structure of the narrative is a REAL achievement for a blockbuster film (outside of Pixar and early 90's Disney) . Great dramas have been doing such meticulous planning for some time, but it's a revelation here.

 

[Paul_Scott]

Yup. It was essential.
I just realized how little screen time Fox had in this film. Talk about making every second count...sensational conflict at the end. I am so happy that the characters here behave true to their convictions. They aren't just action figures performing specific plot functions. Despite having all of 5 minutes of screen time, Fox impressed as a full character with depth.
Now someone explain to me what happened when he typed his name- did the system self destruct? Or did it simply shut off?

 

[Chuck Mayer]

A little cheesy, but I saw sparks on the sides, so I think it was eating itself to some extent, Paul.

And yeah, Freeman and Caine made the most of about 5-10 minutes of screen-time. They really do feel like real characters, though I believe their previous performances help out a bit.

A bit of speculation...were the ferrys holding their OWN detonators or ones for the other ship (as the Joker said)? In this case...I think he was being honest. He doesn't want to punish anarchy (killing yourself when you take a life), he wants to embrace it. I thought he was lying when I saw the film. But now I would bet he's telling the truth

 

[Nick Martin]

The computers at the far left and right began to short out and spark, so they must have self-destructed.

EDIT: Too late.

5 to 10 minutes of screen time total? Wow. There's proof right there that I clearly did not feel the sense of time passing by, and therefore never felt that it was too long, or even long at all.

 

[Brandon Conway]

I'm pretty sure it self destructed since sparks were flying.

Another small moment I loved - how Alfred burned Rachel's letter because he realized that the time would never come that Bruce could face that he drove her away from loving him due to becoming Batman. Se recognized that Bruce Wayne was the mask and Batman was his true face, and that he would never return, and that saying she would wait for that a year earlier was incorrect because it would never come. But Bruce Wayne cannot be shown that door. He has to believe there was at one point some hope of leaving that life, even if his instincts and the world around him has shown him that that's not the truth.

I really hope a 3rd film gets made by Nolan. They have a great set-up for it now with Batman "on the run", Gordon "hunting" him while actually protecting him, Two-Face waiting in the wings with the truth, and a city that need to mature to recognize that Batman is not only the hero they need, but the one they want, and for the right reasons.

 

[IanDP]

One thing that kind of bothers me...
What was the deal with Scarecrow? What was he up to? Why was he there? What was the point of his cameo? Why is he hanging out with the "imposters"?
It was midnight, I was tired, and it was and early in the movie so I think my brain was still warming up.
EDIT: I saw it again, and I realized what's going on. Thanks Brandon. In fact seeing it again, I noticed a lot that I missed the first time.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Scarecrow wasn't hanging out with the Batman impostors.

The Scarecrow basically became a drug dealer, with his chemically altered drugs being a way to continue his experiment. It shows how small time of a criminal he is compared to Joker.

The copycat Batmans showed up to thwart the drug deal.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Brandon, there were lots of small touches like that. The writers and actors fundamentally understand their characters' motivations.

As for a third film, I think all that is left is scheduling and Nolan's paycheck. I don't think we'll be waiting a year for it to be announced.

 

[Lou Sytsma]

Jumping from the scene where Batman tells Dent and Gordon he'll look after the Hong Kong mobster to the scene where the Hong Kong mobster is tied up outside the police station handles all of that without missing a beat.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Well, Warner will assuredly give Nolan total control. He works on such a small level in the planning stages that in that way he's similar to Eastwood. I could see Warner making an agreement with him along those lines.

 

[Paul_Scott]

That was my inital impression- but then it would make just as much sense to me if Bruce was willing to sacrifice Fox to retain this insanely useful authoritarian tool. I can fully see this Batman here transitioning eventually into the embittered self righteous solitary facist of Kingdom Come.
And I think that is so f'ing cool. Not because I like fascism, but because I love seeing logical consequences to characters behaviour. There are wonderfully rich, substanative ideas to mull over and digest here- which makes it seem a shame so many adults think that younger kids shouldn't be exposed to a film like this. Any film that takes pains to show difficult and unpleasant consequences springing from well intentioned choices is a film that a child SHOULD see imo. It's the other crap that's gonna rot their brains and deaden their souls.

 

[Paul_Scott]

Lou, I don't see this sequence as being soley logistical in terms of its story function (that is- getting lau, laying out the sonar exposition, etc). I also see it as neccessary metaphor. Bruce thinks he has no limits as Batman. Going around the world, and the audacious way he circumvents high rise security, as well as the Chinese government, drives that in. You also have a greater sense of just how tight he and Lucius are, and how far Lucius is willing to go to help- which is paid off when he puts his foot down at the end and says "that's it. No further".
This passage accomplishes several important functions at once, while still yielding a very nice action set piece. I think it would be a more problematical film without it. I wouldn't cut it.
I think the pace is what some people are going to have a problem with, not the time. It is relentless and that will probably led to fatigue for some viewers.
That's why I think another 1.5 hrs could have helped. Normally I find longer films simply indulgent. This one merited more time imo.