[Movie] The Dark Knight (Batman Begins Sequel)

Originally Posted by LeHah

I'm not sure I agree. We never know the story behind Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet - but not only is he completely fucking insane and scary as hell - but his performance isn't some crappy insanity pastiche usually reserved for the worst episodes of Law And Order: Special Victims Unit. You know, like the one where that kid played that Dungeons And Dragons videogame and tried to save his dead stepsister?

I was being sarcastic there, in all seriousness. I hate "crazy" as a discussion point in most villains, especially in the Joker's case. Because it's rarely going to hit a note beyond "Psuedo-Intellectual." And if that's usually the case, there's always someone who wants to fucking discuss the motivations of a guy who has no background and is just. Fucking. Crazy.

With pang, this is all ending up like that time where it was somehow made out that I'm arguing about a the continuity of a guy in a blue suit of underwear fighting for everlasting peace instead of just saying a guy is full of shit and giving the reason for it

these things happen, though

Originally Posted by Rotorblade

See how you just outlined the plan of a psychopath who apparently doesn't like plans but talks about an immovable object and an unstoppable force?

Work with me here. Try replacing every instance of the word "crazy" in the film with "antisocial."

Does this make you feel better (Y/N)?

Is there a third answer where I say that's a dumb line of discussion in trying to get me to admit I'd rather him be a different character rather than have the same character with less "explain someone's psychosis with no foundation or background?"

Originally Posted by Rotorblade

I hate "crazy" as a discussion point in most villains, especially in the Joker's case.

I think its a fantastic discussion point. The problem is that almost no one is properly equipt to discuss the topic.

And then you have the other half who are these third year pysch majors who think its clever to attempt to profile a comic book character. Yeah, okay, keep that up and you'll be a short-order cook for truckers in three years time.

This is exactly a problem with TDK - the "lets sit around and discuss our motivations!" like a goddamned summer camp sing-along. You know why Mask Of The Phantasm is the best Batman movie made? They don't discuss the reasons, they just tell a story; everything you can ask for is there if you decide to break it down, instead of the writer throwing it in your face.

I agree with you there, more or less, LeHah. It's just, again, when I saw "That's a great theory" or something on the last page, I just rolled my eyes. Yes, that is SUCH a great point about nothing.

Originally Posted by Rotorblade

Because it's rarely going to hit a note beyond "Psuedo-Intellectual."

Originally Posted by Rotorblade

Is there a third answer where I say that's a dumb line of discussion in trying to get me to admit I'd rather him be a different character rather than have the same character with less "explain someone's psychosis with no foundation or background?"

I'm not throwing the DSM-IV at you, I'm just using some basic stuff.
I do not think it is a stretch to call someone who murders for fun antisocial.

Could be wrong though. It'd be nice if I could ask a genuine question without someone trying to take me to task for some imagined butthurt.

Internets.

In "The Dark Knight" Joker's case, I think the vagueness of his insanity in this film blankets him under a variety of mental disorders. Part of me wants to say "It goes without saying that he's anti-social" and another doesn't want to know what your point is behind it. I mean, if that comes off as aggressively "butthurt" and whatever, sorry for being backhanded. Nothing else to call it.

Several Batman villains have sociopathic/psychotic tendancies. It's also worth noting that they happen to have actual backgrounds which makes discussing them in context to their source material (the comic they're in, the movie they're in, the television show they're in) a lot more gratifying. Do I feel it's worth trying to pinpoint this Joker's motivations in this movie? No. He plays his role of "Crazy" fine, even if I'm annoyed with a few of his lines. Fun to watch, not exactly meaningful or enjoyable to discuss.

Originally Posted by Rotorblade

Yes, that is SUCH a great point about nothing.

I'm not sure how you jumped from my interpretation of one piece of dialogue to pseudo-intellectualism, but okay.


So, Batman. Everybody likes Batman, right?

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Originally Posted by Interrobang

I'm not sure how you jumped from my interpretation of one piece of dialogue to pseudo-intellectualism, but okay.

Quote:

As was the whole Joker is an agent of chaos and hates plans-but-uses-plans-all-the-time bullshit

Considering we were talking about motivations and dialogue, your comment was a decent springboard.

Well, I don't really care about his motivations and such. What I've been wondering is what are they gonna do with the Joker now that they have obviously set him up as a continuing arch-rival for Batman, but the actor playing him went and killed himself.

Perhaps dunk him in the vat of chemicals at the beginning of the next film he is featured in so there is a decent excuse for him looking, acting, and sounding different?

All right, let's get one thing straight right from the beginning: This movie isn't perfect. It's far from it. All those reviews you see stating how near perfect the movie is? They're lying. There are some really blatant flaws in it.

But it is salvaged quite nicely by other aspects, thankfully. So before I lean into this, I'm stating quite plainly: I think you should see this movie.

Now, I went into this movie fairly hyped. I'm a Batman fan going back a long way, and I'd seen some early footage of Heath Ledger playing the Joker and I was intrigued. I liked a lot of things about the hype going in, though I was understandably skeptical about the Oscar buzz surrounding Ledger (and still am) and screams about this being the best movie in years.

Twenty minutes in, I thought the movie was going to be rubbish. The bank heist scene was one of the worst written bits of script I've ever seen. How many times do we need to drop the Joker's name? I'm an intelligent guy, I could draw the connection between clown masks and the later appearance of the Joker. Nevermind the playing card at the end of Begins, the visual clues in the bank heist alone were more than enough. I felt talked down to and it was irritating. Also, you're telling me NO ONE would notice one of that line of school buses covered in mortar, or, I don't know, PULLING OUT OF THE WALL OF A BANK? Come on.

That scene could have been so much better if they'd just had the guys offing each other one after the other, with the eventual reveal of the Joker at the end. We'd have gotten it. We're all readers, here. We don't need our hands held. Less is more, Chris Nolan and Chris Nolan's brother. Less is more.

This movie also suffers from an unfortunate bout of Return of the King-ism. The gazillion endings really hamper the pacing, which had just begun to recover from the Jim-Gordon-Is-Dead-No-He-Isn't-But-Rachel-Really-IS-dead-LOL abortion at the midpoint. Want me to care about someone being dead? A) don't make them Maggie Gyllenhaal delivering a painfully flat performance, B) don't kill off someone and make them come back to life ten minutes before you kill off someone else. It dampened the effect, quite noticably. Structure is an important thing, and it just got undercut by that bit of wandering story.

Also, and this is largely nerdery so don't count this as film criticism, how are you going to have Batman use guns on the batpod? Really? REALLY?

Okay, onto the really important bits that everyone cares about.

How was the Joker as a character? Well, he was entertaining, and certainly fun to watch. A few people have gone off on his being contradictory, but that doesn't bother me. I think the agent of chaos rubbish was largely a story invented for Dent's benefit and can be chalked up to the multitude of stories concerning how he got his facial scars; dude just likes fucking with people. HOWEVER, there was entirely too much time spent with Joker explaining his motivations. Especially with that godawful soliloquy he delivered once he was captured by The Batman.

You know when the Joker was truly effective? When he was silently staring through prison bars, or performing magic tricks, or riding in the backseat of a police car with his face hanging out the window like the family dog. The less he explained himself, the better he worked. Whenever they started delving into the nature of Joker's madness, it cheapened him. Joker summed up his motivation properly twice: "You're just too much fun" and "this city deserves a better class of criminal." That's it. That's all you need. None of this terribly written immovable object rubbish. Why does he do it? Because he's good at it, and he likes it. The thing that let me enjoy Joker in this flick was thinking of him as Machiavellian rather than an agent of chaos.

So how about Harvey Dent? How did Dent work? Surprisingly well, given he's basically a narrative device. Eckhart is an actor I've really liked ever since I saw him in Thank You For Smoking, and though I wasn't as dazzled by him here, it was reminiscent of Benicio Del Toro in Usual Suspects, taking what could have been a throwaway character and making him memorable. The little teasings of his being a less than savoury guy, threatening the mobster, railing against Batman, the fact he's an ex-IA weasel, it was all nicely set-up for his eventual turn towards Two Face. Of course, if you know Batman at all, you saw it coming a mile off, but if I hadn't known anything about the comics at all, I'd have appreciated the "live long enough to see yourself become the villain" bit more. As it stood, I liked the fall of Dent, and the way he was manipulated into not-evil, but just frustration. He did everything right, he played by the rules, he was a good guy, and all it got him was a dead fiancee (he should thank Joker for that bit) and a burned up face. I appreciated they never made him overtly evil, just a guy with a strong sense of justice getting pushed a little too far and losing his grip on what makes him tick.

Now. As for THE BATMAN. Great Bruce Wayne. Great, fantastic, brilliant. Loved him basically playing his character from American Psycho. He came off as egotistical, arrogant and a complete prick. Great. That's Bruce Wayne. I loved it. The massive control freak nature was there, it worked. Now, the batvoice. Yes, it's irritating, but we all knew that. For some reason it didn't bother me as much this time out, probably because I was used to it. The one thing I was truly glad I did before seeing this was watch the Gotham Knight, as it worked as a very nice tonal accompaniment to the film, especially as it concerned Batman's increasing frustration with what he had to be. I could have used a bit more mortality from Batman, see him a little more battle damaged and beat up, as they did with Gotham Knight, a little of that internal conflict externalised. He's getting sloppy as his focus becomes less. He's never meant to be a hero, he makes a lousy hero, and he knows it. And this time, can we not have Jim Gordon narrate HOW he's going to be the whipping boy for the city when they've just explained it to us, please?

Now, on the upside, the score was wonderfully matched to the movie. And it was shot exceptionally well from a cinematography perspective. Depth of focus, colour contrasts, transitions and framing were exquisite. I was especially impressed with the muted sounds as Joker hung his head out the window after escaping Police custody. That moment of sheer elation worked so well without doing anything overt to highlight it. It was what the entire movie should have been.

Also, Chris Nolan has learned how to shoot an action sequence. Good on him. Much better than the atrocity that was Batman Begins fight sequences. The whole movie had a fantastic tone, and that's what tilts me from not liking it to enjoying it. Despite some major flaws with the screenplay, it still managed to feel dark and brooding while keeping my attention with decent pacing (with certain exceptions, as I've pointed out) and it's this overall tone that keeps me from calling this movie overhyped rubbish. I think it was Sass who pointed out that if you strip away all the Batman stuff, it's just an action film with delusions of grandeur. Well no kidding, that's what it is even -with- the Batman aspects of it. But it's a pointless revelation. Action films are a genre to themselves, and at least this movie attempts to do something beyond the basics, although I think it overshoots and hurts itself at times. Comparing this movie to things like Blue Velvet is like comparing Indiana Jones to Bridge on the River Kwai. It's apples and oranges.

No, it's not as smart as people make it out to be, but in terms of action movies, it's smarter than most. The problem is simply when it tries too hard and makes itself look like a kid in political palace arguing about how Islam is fine because no one gets raped in Iran. Sometimes it's best just to be concise and not make yourself look like the complete git you really are.

I'll take Dark Knight, and even really pandering pseudo-intellectual schlock like Equilibrium any day. Because do you know what action movies are when they lose the delusions of grandeur?

Spoiler:

Yeah. I'm siding with delusions of grandeur here. Even pseudo-intellectualism beats that shit any day of the week. It's a comic book movie that is actually a decent ride. I personally hope it rubs off on the rest of the genre, and we see less Iron Man and more Batman. Definitely watchable and enjoyable if you ignore some fatal flaws, but the hype is just that.

You son of a bitch, Deni. What did Iron Man ever do to you!? You try to sell some goddamned cars and look what you have to go off at the mouth about. We all know what this is about. This is what happens when an advertisable force hits a guy who's father never bought him a goddamned Whopper.

Originally Posted by Rotorblade

You son of a bitch, Deni. What did Iron Man ever do to you!? You try to sell some goddamned cars and look what you have to go off at the mouth about. We all know what this is about. This is what happens when an advertisable force hits a guy who's father never bought him a goddamned Whopper.

You got me. I hate Iron Man because I'm a Wendy's guy.

Now you know my secret (delicious baconator-laden) shame.

Originally Posted by Denicalis

Even pseudo-intellectualism beats that shit any day of the week.

I disagree and adamantly - and I'll tell you why if you give me enough elbow room.

Pseudo-intellectualisms got us crap like V For Vendetta (which is basically backhanded support of fascism) and Pan's Labyrinth (Liberal apologist bullshit for the Franco regime) while actual genuine criticisms of fascism or liberal stupidity like Starship Troopers are shoe-horned as nihilistic garbage. (People who like TDK cannot like Starship Troopers - because one force-feeds the audience while the other makes absolutely no qualms with its moral uncertainty.)

Protip: Starship Troopers is one of the most important movies you will ever watch because it breaks the single most sacred convention of war movies - and ends up making a much more important point on the topic of war than Platoon or Saving Private Ryan ever could attempt in their best wet dreams.

The Dark Knight is similar. The movie is handing a gun loaded with half-assed bullshit to a crowd of comic book fans in an roughshod attempt to be intelligent. Now, I'm all for intellectual comic book movies that fail in-so-far as they're earnest in the attempt (see - Hulk) but TDK is nothing more than a series of community college midterm essays on some half-understood Jungian imagery and maybe some super-basic concepts of duology thrown in.

This is dangerous in the ways that Kevin Smith is dangerous - its not intellectual, its fucking Philosophy For Dummies. So now you've armed every Joe Queer and Betsy Buttfuck with some stupid egotistical chin-stroke where they all can argue about topics that go straight over their fucking IQs.

"Yes," they agree together, "Joker does complete Batman!"

No no no. Thats something which has been discussed and taken apart and insinuated at for 60 years; if you're a screenwriter and you can't say such a thing in subtle terms, you shouldn't be writing this kind of shit. This is like letting Maxim into Joseph Campbell's private study.

I know you get this Deni, and thats why its frustrating to me. With more time, perhaps you'll notice that the cracks in the movie are in fact faults which the whole thing comes apart under. Its pop culture intellectualism for the people who need to be smashed over the head with Jim Beam bottles to see the obvious. You are not so stupid and neither am I - and liking a movie for those reasons is to lower yourself to the ignorances of the average American idiot.

Originally Posted by LeHah

I disagree and adamantly - and I'll tell you why if you give me enough elbow room.

Pseudo-intellectualisms got us crap like V For Vendetta (which is basically backhanded support of fascism) and Pan's Labyrinth (Liberal apologist bullshit for the Franco regime) while actual genuine criticisms of fascism or liberal stupidity like Starship Troopers are shoe-horned as nihilistic garbage. (People who like TDK cannot like Starship Troopers - because one force-feeds the audience while the other makes absolutely no qualms with its moral uncertainty.)

Protip: Starship Troopers is one of the most important movies you will ever watch because it breaks the single most sacred convention of war movies - and ends up making a much more important point on the topic of war than Platoon or Saving Private Ryan ever could attempt in their best wet dreams.

The Dark Knight is similar. The movie is handing a gun loaded with half-assed bullshit to a crowd of comic book fans in an roughshod attempt to be intelligent. Now, I'm all for intellectual comic book movies that fail in-so-far as they're earnest in the attempt (see - Hulk) but TDK is nothing more than a series of community college midterm essays on some half-understood Jungian imagery and maybe some super-basic concepts of duology thrown in.

This is dangerous in the ways that Kevin Smith is dangerous - its not intellectual, its fucking Philosophy For Dummies. So now you've armed every Joe Queer and Betsy Buttfuck with some stupid egotistical chin-stroke where they all can argue about topics that go straight over their fucking IQs.

"Yes," they agree together, "Joker does complete Batman!"

No no no. Thats something which has been discussed and taken apart and insinuated at for 60 years; if you're a screenwriter and you can't say such a thing in subtle terms, you shouldn't be writing this kind of shit. This is like letting Maxim into Joseph Campbell's private study.

I know you get this Deni, and thats why its frustrating to me. With more time, perhaps you'll notice that the cracks in the movie are in fact faults which the whole thing comes apart under. Its pop culture intellectualism for the people who need to be smashed over the head with Jim Beam bottles to see the obvious. You are not so stupid and neither am I - and liking a movie for those reasons is to lower yourself to the ignorances of the average American idiot.

But, see, that's not why I like it. Everything I dislike about this movie is precisely what you outlined. I hate the kids who walk out of that theatre pontificating about how Joker is a perfect foil for Batman, a mirror reflection blah blah blah. Absolute fucking twats. No argument from me. But you're approaching this from the perspective of it perpetuates idiocy and will encourage it. I'm approaching it from the perspective that idiocy is so firmly rooted in the culture that nothing is ever going to change it, and as such, I just assume I'll write reviews for people able to differentiate between faux-philosophy and actual intelligent conversation.

You're absolutely right, this is the sort of movie that leads to people running around in a coffee shop late at night, sipping a no-whip, extra hot, caramel latte and talking about Nietzsche while understanding nothing of the context. Won't argue that.

Maybe I'm just more pessimistic than you, but I think those people would do that about the Muppet Show or Finding Nemo if they didn't have another outlet. I just don't talk to them. I ignore these people. I live in a drivel free Universe where no one tries to explain to me how Joker is some sort of a biblical reference to Abel. So I ignore it.

My enjoyment of this film is purely based on the perspective of a guy who spends a lot of time behind a camera, and they crafted a nice bit of cinematic art. The story is rubbish, I agree with that. It's poorly written and it's painful, but I like the brush strokes on the canvas.

Idiots will proliferate not because there are movies for stupid people, but because stupid people lack the drive to read anything beyond school textbooks or graphic novels. It's not an intelligent flick, it's not even a step in the right direction, but it is a departure from something like Spider Man. And I'll take that for what it is. Not a victory, but at least a draw.

P.S.

I fucking love Starship Troopers.