The Dark Knight Rises -- My Thoughts (Non spoiler version)

picture from http://www.a2-m3.com/2012/07/10/13-minutes-of-the-dark-knight-rises-sneak-peek/

I think this is one of those cases where I expected too much from a movie. It’s staggering that I have been a fan of the character and mythos for 41 years. Regardless of what you’re about the read,  I strongly urge you to go and see the movie. It will be well worth your movie dollar and something to talk about and enjoy despite the unfortunate events at the midnight premiere in Colorado. At the end of the movie, many in the audience with me clapped and cheered. My prediction is this will be a big movie, but come nowhere close to ‘The Avengers” in box office or magnitude. That hurts me a little to write as Batman is my favorite character.

For me, what I took from this movie is that Chris Nolan wanted to have his cake and eat it too; a huge, big, goodie filled multi layered cake with lots of decoration and icing. Especially at the end of the movie. The movie suffers a little in order for him to accomplish this. I expected MUCH better from he and his brother, who with David Goyer, wrote the screenplay. In regards to the previous 2 movies, I found this movie to be sloppy in parts. This installment has much more action than the previous 2. And in my opinion, it kind of needed it. Nolan crammed a lot into this movie. To me, it didn’t seem like a nearly 3 hour movie

The story basically is a continuation of the 2^nd movie 8 years after the events of Dent’s death.  It turns out, there are tremendous consequences as a result of the scheme Gordon and Batman concocted to frame Batman for Dent’s death so the city could have a hero (in Dent) and overcome crime for the most part. Nolan does a good job tying the previous 2 movies into this one not letting you forget what has led up to this tale. A glaring observation to me was The Joker is the only thing from the prior 2 movies that’s not referenced either in dialogue or flashbacks. My opinion is how could they have left him out and included nearly EVERY character and aspect of the first 2 movies? I think I know why, but still, to me it was an obvious omission regardless of the reason.

Anne Hathaway was a much better Catwoman than I thought she’d be. I was wrong about her as the Catwoman character. Her injection into the story felt rushed to me. It could and should have been allowed to develop.  Tom Hardy was believable as Bane. Like Catwoman, I felt rushed to believe he was the bad guy. Michael Caine did an extraordinary job as Alfred. Unfortunately, he’s only in the 1^st quarter of the movie, and appears briefly at the end. Cillian Murphy’s appearance is also very brief and obviously gratuitous to me. He is more wasted and irrelevant than his cameo in the 2^nd one.  All the supporting cast did a great job; Gary Oldham, Mathew Modine, Morgan Freeman, my Pittsburgh Steelers as the Gotham Knights- hahaha!  Despite my negative laden feelings and thoughts about the movie, the acting was spot on.  2 major characters from the Batman mythos appear in this movie. One was kind of expected; one I didn’t think about but SHOULD have known.  

The end of the movie. Well, here’s where I believe Nolan failed – the movie to me had two endings and you’ll understand it when you see it. There’s a predictable scene at the end of the movie involving Gordon-Levitt’s John Blake character that made me groan loudly.

 I’d give this movie 6.5 out of 10. Even though I don’t like cake, I didn’t entirely not enjoy this experience.