Author Topic: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion (SPOILERS)  (Read 31836 times)

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"The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion (SPOILERS)
« on: July 18, 2008, 08:45:29 AM »

Offline nickagneta

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I saw The Dark Knight at the midnight showing last night and have to say....I am freaking dragging this morning.

After watching the coming attractions(which included a 30 second, not too much detail trailer of the next Terminator movie), watching the movie for an hour and 45 minutes, at which point the theatre had a malfunction and the movie got stuck for about 10-15 minutes, had the air conditioning go out in the theatre, and then watched the rest of the last 45 minutes of the film while sweating to death and then drove home, ...I'm really tired.

The film itself was an excellent story with some pretty predictable twists and turns but entertaining, for a total of 2 hours. Unfortunately the film was 2 1/2 hours long. It was just too long and for periods lost my attention because it was too long.

ATTENTION: Spoilers coming go back if you don't want to know!!

The whole Batman having a massive spying computer was not necessary to good storytelling and the entire two ships on the harbor, let's see who blows up who, stunk. Just boring stuff that didn't need to be in the movie in order to just turn Harvey into Two-Face.

I do have to give credit that Heath Ledger and Christian Bale did not disappoint. There's something about that Joker role that brings out the best in actors, or maybe the worst, and Ledger was brilliant. Sociopathic, psychotic, intelligent, humorous, and entertaining to watch all roled up into a single package. Bale is also the best Batman ever and was great once again.

Ledger's walking out of Gotham General Hospital in a white nurse's dress, makeup, and playing with the malfunctioning explosive switch was unbelievably funny. He also had some typical Schwarzenagger one liners that were of the charts. My favorite was "You won't kill me because you can't and I won't kill you because you're too much fun." Excellent.

Couple of last points.

They didn't bring Katie Holmes back and Maggie Gyllenhall is without a doubt one of the most unglamourous, ugly actresses in Hollywood. And it showed. She was worse than Holmes was in Batman Begins and parts of the theatre kinda cheered when they killed her off.

Two-Face's make-up job was unreal.

I thought another great comedic spot in the film was when a Wayne Industries employee discovers who Batman is and goes to Fox demanding $10 million a year for the rest of his life. Fox retorts with "It is your belief that the owner of this company, a billionaire playboy, is an outlaw vigillante who enjoys going out at night and beating up deadly criminals with his bare hands and it is your desire to blackmail him? Let me know how that works out for you." Or something to that effect.

Overall 4 stars out of five. Kill 20-25 minutes with good editting and a script change or two and it was 5 stars out of 5.
« Last Edit: July 18, 2008, 01:14:33 PM by Roy Hobbs »

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #1 on: July 18, 2008, 08:52:00 AM »

Offline SShoreFan 2.0

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Nick,

As soon as I saw the red line in your post I stopped reading!!  Going today at noon.

The son of a guy I work with went last night and texted his dad the following reveiw

“The only complaint I have is that I didn’t see it in Imax. I loved that it was 2 hour and a half hours long and never has the phrase “pulse pounding from start to end” been more true.

I also thought that every critic (raving about) Ledger would take away from him, but he was better than they said. I wanna be the joker. I have found a new career path.”


I cannot wait to go.
I love my kids, call me a sap - it's true.

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #2 on: July 18, 2008, 08:55:43 AM »

Offline rickyfan3.0...

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If this movie had no hype, I would have said very good movie... but this movie does not live up to the hype IMO. Still a good flick though.

Very entertaining, but quite formulaeic and EXTREMELY predictable.

Ledger was really good. I think he met expectations, but all told, this movie fell short of what I felt would have and could have been a classic.

I would give it probably a 7 out of 10, and say that the first one was a 9. Again though, alot of this is due to the hype... I guess I was expecting greatness from this movie and it just never quite got there for me.

Definitely worth seeing though.

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #3 on: July 18, 2008, 10:08:42 AM »

Offline Champzilla

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Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #4 on: July 18, 2008, 10:17:54 AM »

Offline MBunge

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TDK is probably the most ambitious super-hero movie ever in terms of how much it tries to do and it almost entirely succeeds.  Ledger is also incredible as the Joker.

However, there's so much story moving at such blinding speed that it might just wear people out.

Bale's scary Batman voice is also ridiculous.  Kevin Conroy did the two-voice thing brilliantly on the animated series, but ever time Bale's Batman opened his mouth I expected some character to say "Oh, come on!"

Mike


Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #5 on: July 18, 2008, 10:24:57 AM »

Offline Birdbrain

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Wow kind of surprised with some of your responses.

I got to see a pre-screening of it since I work for TW.

I thought it was a 5* movie and Ledger will get a posthumous Oscar.  He was so creepy that every seen he was in made me cringe.  I loved the spying aspect of the movie which obviously was take on how our Government sacrifices some civil liberties in the name of justice.  The Dark Knight is very dark...........

The movie has so many layers.
Little Fockers 1.5/10
Gulliver's Travels 1/10
Grown Ups -20/10
Tron Legacy 6.5/10

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #6 on: July 18, 2008, 10:57:49 AM »

Offline Fox40Kid

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Unfortunately, I have to wait till Monday to see it in IMax.  Sounds like most of the reviews are positive though.  I can't remember hearing so much hype about a comic book movie since the first Spiderman.

At least I know this Batman will be better than "Batman & Robin" that was on last night.  That movie is awful!
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Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #7 on: July 18, 2008, 11:40:16 AM »

Offline bostonfan23

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I loved it. Just awesome. I'll be looking for rumors of a sequel.

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #8 on: July 18, 2008, 12:13:06 PM »

Offline BdaBostonBum

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I thought it was awesome. A couple things:

1. I wish 2 Face wasn't killed off already.  I did not imagine he would look that insane, an absolutely crazy character. I mean, he should be around longer just doing crazy 2 Face things (you know like flipping coins and killing people.)

2. How can they make another movie? There is no way that there could be another villain who could be as insane and twisted as Ledger's Joker. I figure the best way to follow this movie up would be to have The Joker in jail and have a Silence of the Lambs kind of thing going on, but the The Joker can't be brought back. You can't replace Ledger, he was just too good.

Side note: I want to know the person who works for WB and suggested Ledger as the Joker. He deserves a medal for that casting job. Greatest Joker ever, even better than Hamill!

Question: What villain could be put in the next movie that can maintain the darkness of the previous 2? I could only think of the Mad Hatter

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #9 on: July 18, 2008, 12:23:24 PM »

Offline blazingarrow

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Spoiler




Nolan got it just right with this one. This film had a lot of elements that ruin other comic book movies, but in this case it enhanced them

Usually I hate CGI, because film makers are lazy and have no problem making movies that look half real action, half animated. In Dark Knight, all the special effects blend in perfectly.

Couple that with a fast moving plot, and at no point did I stop and think to myself "oh yeah, this is just a movie".

Even the little comic bits added to my enjoyment of the film.

I knew it was going to be classic at soon as Joker made the pen disappear.


My only problems were Katie Holmes replacement kind of sucked, and when Batman talks sometimes it sounds like he's holding his nose. That's minor stuff though.

I've heard there's going to be another one, but what's the point? Two Face is dead, the guy who plays Joker is dead....someone who's more into comics help me out

Please no Mr. Freeze

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #10 on: July 18, 2008, 12:27:34 PM »

Offline Tnerb02

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I loved it. Just awesome. I'll be looking for rumors of a sequel.
This is a sequel.

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #11 on: July 18, 2008, 12:32:24 PM »

Offline WeMadeIt17

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I thought the Dark Knight was a great movie of course it was predictable what super hero movie isn't but unlike spider man 3 and the Hulk this had some pretty good turns.. And Ledger was incredible it is crazy how you can go from ten things i hate about you to the Joker just outstanding!   

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #12 on: July 18, 2008, 01:02:37 PM »

Offline LarBrd33

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This thread is already loaded with Spoilers so I'll just speak freely on it.

I thought it was [dang] good.  I think it might be a tad overhyped.  That seems to happen when pretty much every single review is off the charts.   The doesn't mean the movie isn't great, but I think it's possible for someone to be slightly disappointed if they were expecting a mind blowing experience.   

In fact, as I was typing this my friend just texted me: "liked it but i think all the hype made my expectations a little high".  So I think a little people might end up liking it, but being a little disappointed it isn't "The Godfather". 

Ledger carried it for the most part.   He was great.  He definitely nailed the Joker role.   Nolan has already stated that he thinks of this series as a trilogy and I kinda figured Joker would come back in some way for the 3rd.  I'm not sure what they will do with him now.  I guess it's not possible to recast him, right?  Although I was reading some Batman forum and they brought something up.  Apparently immediately after Ledger's death, Johnny Depp said he was willing to finish Ledger's scenes in the movie.  Obviously the movie was already finished so maybe Depp was unaware of this at the time.  Would that mean a guy like Depp would be willing to step in for a tiny (but possibly necessary) cameo in the 3rd?  I dunno.  And now that I think about it, it's possible that the info I was reading on that forum was inaccurate and they were actually just talking about "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus" (the film Ledger was filming when he died).  From wiki: ". Ledger's role was recast with Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell portraying physically changed transformations of Ledger's character as he travels through dimensions. The projected release date for this film is 2009.".  That might make a bit more sense.  It's sad that Ledger passed away, though.  At the end his Joker says to Batman something along the lines of, "I think we can do this forever" and I'd love to have him back.

I can understand some of the nitpicking things like Batman's voice being lame.  I just figure he uses the gruff ridiculous voice to mask his identity.  Otherwise you'd figure someone would go, "Hey you happen to sound just like Bruce Wayne".   Especially people who know him personally like Harvey Dent.  His overly gruff voice is about the same as using a voice modulator or something.

Someone mentioned not liking the boat scene and calling it "unnecessary".   I disagree.  It was the key part of the movie. One of the main things The JOker was trying to prove is that anyone can end up like him if pushed... and that everyone deep down is morally f'd up.   He fully expected them to blow each other up... (side note, but... did anyone think to themselves that maybe JOker was sick in the head enough to lie to the passengers... and that instead of blowing up the OTHER boat they would actually be blowing up their selves?  I totally figure he'd do that.  I expected the big black convict to flip the switch and watch his boat blow to hell).   Joker also kept pushing Batman trying to bring him down to his level and abandon his morals.  You can see Joker's glee and excitement as he believes he's plummeting to his death... laughing maniacally as he falls... only to be disappointed when he realizes Batman will not let him die.    Joker may have been victorious with showing Harvey Dent's dark side, but not proving the people of Gotham were hopeless.   Boat scene had to be in there.

Another poster just mentioned that he felt the surveillance technology thing was unnecessary.  There was a little social commentary there about our current government obviously... about how much privacy we should give up for our security.  But it was also a cool way to give batman some white eyeballs (like in the comics) and incorporate bat-like sonar.  So whatever.  I was cool with it.

Not sure who they could have for the sequel.  How could they market it?  They didn't really make it clear if Two-Face is dead or not, although it was sorta implied.   I guess the obvious thing they could do would be to reinterpret the Riddler as more of like a Zodiac killer who leaves clues.   Nolan supposedly said he wants there to be a female villain in the 3rd one, but I really don't think Catwoman would fit into this universe.  And I'm pretty sure Nolan already ruled out Catwoman.   There had also been some mentions that they weren't planning on using characters who had already appeared in comics.   I'm not really sure what they'll do.  I think maybe it would work for them to incorporate Talia al Ghul ... and then midway through Ra's al Ghul could return.  They never really showed Liam Neeson die in the first one.  Again, it was implied with the train crashing, but the guy is just as crafty as Batman... they wouldn't need the lazarus pit to explain his survival.  He's a freakin Ninja god...   I guess that would tie together the three movies nicely.   

Overall... [dang] good movie.  Just warn your friends not to be overhyped.  I was just talking to someone about it who was asking my impression.   I loved the first one.  I was one of the few people who was dumb enough not to see the twist coming in advance that Liam Neeson was the real Ra's al Ghul.  I loved the origin story.   I think maybe my only problem with the Dark Knight is that i've been obsessing over it for several months and I saw every twist coming in advance.  Partially, because I'd obsessed over the movie and partially, because the comic history is so well known that some things were obvious.   Spoiler Lightning Round:  I knew Rachel Dawes was going to bite it.  I don't think anyone was surprised to see Jim Gordon survive.  I don't think anyone was surprised to see Harvey Dent turning into Two-Face.  And I had seen enough clips to know what to expect from Ledger's joker.  This isn't the movie's fault... the movie was fantastic... but it definitely might leave some people feeling like it was overhyped.  I suggest telling your friends that if they liked "Batman Begins" they'll love this one as well... that's sufficient.   

« Last Edit: July 18, 2008, 01:09:09 PM by LarBrd33 »

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion.
« Reply #13 on: July 18, 2008, 01:15:35 PM »

Offline LarBrd33

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I thought the Dark Knight was a great movie of course it was predictable what super hero movie isn't but unlike spider man 3 and the Hulk this had some pretty good turns.. And Ledger was incredible it is crazy how you can go from ten things i hate about you to the Joker just outstanding!   

That's partially what I'm talking about.  For someone who knew what to expect... it's going to be predictable.  I think I'll take my dad to see it at Imax next week and he'll probably appreciate some of the plot "twist" elements of the movie more than I possibly could.  Someone who doesn't even know who Harvey Dent is... or doesn't realize that Rachel Dawes was merely a character created by Christopher Nolan.    I figure it will be a lot more shocking and rewarding for a guy who doesn't know what to expect.   The "predictability" is partially due to knowing the source material and knowing what to expect from the film.

Re: "The Dark Knight" movie review and discussion (SPOILERS)
« Reply #14 on: July 18, 2008, 04:49:04 PM »

Offline Champzilla

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Dude of course there is a sequel, Christian Bial signed like a 3 movie deal, thats not new information.
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