Escape to the Movies: The Dark Knight Rises

[atomicmrpelly]

Woah people are being heavily critical of this movie!

It's like Bob said, it wasn't first class, but it was pretty good! Yes it was overlong, but that made it feel epic! And yes there were some character issues, but they weren't nearly as glaring as people are making out! I thought Bane was a very effective villain, I was surprised that they didn't go with a more well known Batman villain but then if you were going to do that you'd have the joker wouldn't you?! And I'm really surprised that everyone is calling the plot twist predictable, I didn't see it coming! Is that because I haven't read the comics or because I didn't pay attention in the last 2 movies?!

 

[walrusaurus]

Freeze would have been the more obvious choice. As he is both vastly more identifiable as a batman villan than Bane, and his story is more tailor made to the Nolan ethos. Considering that they ended up making Banes motivations very similar to freezes anyways, i feel like freeze would have been a much better fit for the film.

The biggest issue i had with bane, he was never explored the way that Joker was. Even though the joker didn't really have any concrete motivation for why he was the way that he was, by the end of the movie we had understood the charecter. Bane on the other hand we are explictly told why he's doing what he does, and it just feels hollow and insincere. I think a big part of it has to do with the ridiculous mask. No disrespect to Tom Hardy, but he is not a good enough actor to sell the character with nothing more than his eyes and physicality. He never gave a sense of depth or even menace. He was kind of just, there.

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

The Dark Knight Rises

MovieBob gives us a spoiler-free review of The Dark Knight Rises.

Watch Video

Unsuprised. Trilogies almost never end well

Well at least they tried.

I was worried that it would stack up poorly against Avengers, b.

Fucking called it. I and have been saying for a long time that its going to be a disappointment that doesn't live up to the previous two movies. I figured it would be good, jut not a satisfactory conclusion to the trilogy.

What are you all talking about? Especially you MovieBob.

DKR was easily better than the Avenger's and Batman Begins. Easily.

The Avenger's was just a lot of flashy fun, powered by a hoaky and poorly written script that got overlooked by charming performances and fan pleasing one-liners. It was a good time at the movies though.

DKR may not have been the smoothest and deepest movie in the world, but it had substance.

Also, Tom Hardy was brilliant as Bane. He took a lame villain and made it smart, interesting, dynamic, and very scary.

And sure, the hand to hand combat leaves much to be desired, but at least Nolan did his best to improve on it.

While Dark Knight was an excellent film and crime drama, Dark Knight Rises felt like a really good Batman movie to me, if that makes any sense.

All in all it was face paced, interesting, dramatic, well acted and directed, with a bombastic soundtrack, and a quotable, yet not silly script.

Also Bob, there wasn't two "risings" in the film. One was a return based on circumstance, and one was a battle for a man to accept his internal fears of his own mortality so he could finally sacrifice everything for good.

Man, Bob you really gotta look a little deeper into movies instead of just judging them based on your odd pop-culture standards.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

The Dark Knight Rises

MovieBob gives us a spoiler-free review of The Dark Knight Rises.

Watch Video

Unsuprised. Trilogies almost never end well

Well at least they tried.

I was worried that it would stack up poorly against Avengers, b.

Fucking called it. I and have been saying for a long time that its going to be a disappointment that doesn't live up to the previous two movies. I figured it would be good, jut not a satisfactory conclusion to the trilogy.

What are you all talking about? Especially you MovieBob.

DKR was easily better than the Avenger's and Batman Begins. Easily.

The Avenger's was just a lot of flashy fun, powered by a hoaky and poorly written script that got overlooked by charming performances and fan pleasing one-liners. It was a good time at the movies though.

DKR may not have been the smoothest and deepest movie in the world, but it had substance.

Also, Tom Hardy was brilliant as Bane. He took a lame villain and made it smart, interesting, dynamic, and very scary.

And sure, the hand to hand combat leaves much to be desired, but at least Nolan did his best to improve on it.

While Dark Knight was an excellent film and crime drama, Dark Knight Rises felt like a really good Batman movie to me, if that makes any sense.

All in all it was face paced, interesting, dramatic, well acted and directed, with a bombastic soundtrack, and a quotable, yet not silly script.

Also Bob, there wasn't two "risings" in the film. One was a return based on circumstance, and one was a battle for a man to accept his internal fears of his own mortality so he could finally sacrifice everything for good.

Man, Bob you really gotta look a little deeper into movies instead of just judging them based on your odd pop-culture standards.

Mmmmm we judged it based on the issues the film had and general fiction of the batman universe. It was more or less good but still flawed.

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

The Dark Knight Rises

MovieBob gives us a spoiler-free review of The Dark Knight Rises.

Watch Video

Unsuprised. Trilogies almost never end well

Well at least they tried.

I was worried that it would stack up poorly against Avengers, b.

Fucking called it. I and have been saying for a long time that its going to be a disappointment that doesn't live up to the previous two movies. I figured it would be good, jut not a satisfactory conclusion to the trilogy.

What are you all talking about? Especially you MovieBob.

DKR was easily better than the Avenger's and Batman Begins. Easily.

The Avenger's was just a lot of flashy fun, powered by a hoaky and poorly written script that got overlooked by charming performances and fan pleasing one-liners. It was a good time at the movies though.

DKR may not have been the smoothest and deepest movie in the world, but it had substance.

Also, Tom Hardy was brilliant as Bane. He took a lame villain and made it smart, interesting, dynamic, and very scary.

And sure, the hand to hand combat leaves much to be desired, but at least Nolan did his best to improve on it.

While Dark Knight was an excellent film and crime drama, Dark Knight Rises felt like a really good Batman movie to me, if that makes any sense.

All in all it was face paced, interesting, dramatic, well acted and directed, with a bombastic soundtrack, and a quotable, yet not silly script.

Also Bob, there wasn't two "risings" in the film. One was a return based on circumstance, and one was a battle for a man to accept his internal fears of his own mortality so he could finally sacrifice everything for good.

Man, Bob you really gotta look a little deeper into movies instead of just judging them based on your odd pop-culture standards.

Mmmmm we judged it based on the issues the film had and general fiction of the batman universe. It was more or less good but still flawed.

Yeah it was flawed.

And Batman Universe? Christopher Nolan established his own batman universe, so I think it is better to judge the movies within their own fiction, but that's just me.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Yeah it was flawed.

And Batman Universe? Christopher Nolan established his own batman universe, so I think it is better to judge the movies within their own fiction, but that's just me.[/quote]

This is going to be TLR....... move along.... move along.... LOL

There are 4 types of entertainment watchers, those in it for the lulz and thus the lowest common denominator, those who want something a bit more, those who want quality and fan boys.

I really do not care for reinventions that dilute aesthetics, history, settings and or characters much, its rather grating to my nerves as the original content tends to be less asinine and pretentious.

What Noland did is the age old hackz at reinvention through hollwoodization, I mean the real world through the eyes of the drug crazed anorexics that then adapt fiction to the big screen is getting old.

With all the potential they had on using a near perfect representation of Two Face they really screwed up Bane big time, they should have just went with a whole new character as I really hate most film reinvention, Noland did a good job on everything but the villains(tho the Joker dose stand out as a perfect alternate Joker) IMO tho I guess its no worse than every other Batman flick.

With that said Nolands films are solid films possibly even great action films (such as that goes) but something is missing to make them really great Batman films. Even so Burton's films are no better but there's a "something something" to them I like more.

I would really like to see Batman film fiction(And Superman and Xmen and Wolverine and Green Arrow, and Green Hornet) handled better without all the needless reinvention.

Green Lantern gets the doobie prize for running long and truncated fiction, tho even with all the stuff they skipped it came off a better ..er... realization of the fiction tho Wolverine came damn close it just had sucky content.

And while I am at it Last Airbender suffered from 2 grievous issues, first off its never good to over time condense stories but that was not the main problem, they basically took out the Asian culture,mannerisms and as much aesthetics as they could without making it something completely different. Thus it made the already iffy bland acting , flat and dumb as there is no character to the characters.

Gaaaaahhh... I am le blowhard ><

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

Yeah it was flawed.

And Batman Universe? Christopher Nolan established his own batman universe, so I think it is better to judge the movies within their own fiction, but that's just me.

This is going to be TLR....... move along.... move along.... LOL

There are 4 types of entertainment watchers, those in it for the lulz and thus the lowest common denominator, those who want something a bit more, those who want quality and fan boys.

I really do not care for reinventions that dilute aesthetics, history, settings and or characters much, its rather grating to my nerves as the original content tends to be less asinine and pretentious.

What Noland did is the age old hackz at reinvention through hollwoodization, I mean the real world through the eyes of the drug crazed anorexics that then adapt fiction to the big screen is getting old.

With all the potential they had on using a near perfect representation of Two Face they really screwed up Bane big time, they should have just went with a whole new character as I really hate most film reinvention, Noland did a good job on everything but the villains(tho the Joker dose stand out as a perfect alternate Joker) IMO tho I guess its no worse than every other Batman flick.

With that said Nolands films are solid films possibly even great action films (such as that goes) but something is missing to make them really great Batman films. Even so Burton's films are no better but there's a "something something" to them I like more.

I would really like to see Batman film fiction(And Superman and Xmen and Wolverine and Green Arrow, and Green Hornet) handled better without all the needless reinvention.

Green Lantern gets the doobie prize for running long and truncated fiction, tho even with all the stuff they skipped it came off a better ..er... realization of the fiction tho Wolverine came damn close it just had sucky content.

And while I am at it Last Airbender suffered from 2 grievous issues, first off its never good to over time condense stories but that was not the main problem, they basically took out the Asian culture,mannerisms and as much aesthetics as they could without making it something completely different. Thus it made the already iffy bland acting , flat and dumb as there is no character to the characters.

Gaaaaahhh... I am le blowhard ><[/quote]

Yeah sorry I stopped after "4 types of Entertainment watches"

Sorry, but there is only 1 type. You.

People get what they get out of what they watch, sometimes they want lulz, sometimes they want something more.

Humanity and our perception of art in entertainment is to varied to be classified.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Yeah it was flawed.

And Batman Universe? Christopher Nolan established his own batman universe, so I think it is better to judge the movies within their own fiction, but that's just me.

This is going to be TLR....... move along.... move along.... LOL

There are 4 types of entertainment watchers, those in it for the lulz and thus the lowest common denominator, those who want something a bit more, those who want quality and fan boys.

I really do not care for reinventions that dilute aesthetics, history, settings and or characters much, its rather grating to my nerves as the original content tends to be less asinine and pretentious.

What Noland did is the age old hackz at reinvention through hollwoodization, I mean the real world through the eyes of the drug crazed anorexics that then adapt fiction to the big screen is getting old.

With all the potential they had on using a near perfect representation of Two Face they really screwed up Bane big time, they should have just went with a whole new character as I really hate most film reinvention, Noland did a good job on everything but the villains(tho the Joker dose stand out as a perfect alternate Joker) IMO tho I guess its no worse than every other Batman flick.

With that said Nolands films are solid films possibly even great action films (such as that goes) but something is missing to make them really great Batman films. Even so Burton's films are no better but there's a "something something" to them I like more.

I would really like to see Batman film fiction(And Superman and Xmen and Wolverine and Green Arrow, and Green Hornet) handled better without all the needless reinvention.

Green Lantern gets the doobie prize for running long and truncated fiction, tho even with all the stuff they skipped it came off a better ..er... realization of the fiction tho Wolverine came damn close it just had sucky content.

And while I am at it Last Airbender suffered from 2 grievous issues, first off its never good to over time condense stories but that was not the main problem, they basically took out the Asian culture,mannerisms and as much aesthetics as they could without making it something completely different. Thus it made the already iffy bland acting , flat and dumb as there is no character to the characters.

Gaaaaahhh... I am le blowhard ><

Yeah sorry I stopped after "4 types of Entertainment watches"

Sorry, but there is only 1 type. You.

People get what they get out of what they watch, sometimes they want lulz, sometimes they want something more.

Humanity and our perception of art in entertainment is to varied to be classified.[/quote]

Oh most of you don't care about quality depth anymore, its rather sad.
LOL

I did put in TLR, even I don't what the frak I was going on about

 

[John P. Hackworth]

Well, they had to make something to end the trilogy, and now they have.

I agree with Movie Bob.

 

[gphjr14]

This was a B+ at best and what really killed it for me was Bane as a villain was underwhelming and the climatic fight between him and Batman, even more so. It's worth seeing but feel they could've gotten a better plot out of another villain. Say The Penguin, The Riddler, or Black Mask.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

DKR may not have been the smoothest and deepest movie in the world, but it had substance.

I especially liked the bit where Batman picked up a glowing science-fiction atom bomb in his cheesy science-fiction helicopter. Man that was so deep, I was like, "this totally symbolizes Batman picking up a MacGuffin with a convenient helicopter that Morgan Freeman made for some reason."

...seriously, no, this film is 3 and a half stars at best. Avengers was crisp, colourful, fun, but it was straightforward. The Dark Knight Rises was contrived - but worst of all, it was haphazardly paced; it was waaay too big for one movie. If it was two films glued together, I would have been all over it. But it wasn't. It swapped out peaceful Gotham for post-apocalyptic Gotham over the course of maybe ten minutes. It's... bafflingly awful.

The film was not bad. It was really well-made. But it really did feel like it took the same step backwards that The Dark Knight took backwards. Dark Knight was a suspenseful, realistic crime drama which explored the depths of human depravity and insanity, and how far you have to push a man before they go over whatever the "edge" is. Rises is about a man in a mask blowing up a city with a glowing bomb and then Batman comes and shoots him with missiles out of his crazy helicopter thing. Which I definitely appreciate! Don't get me wrong! But how anyone can call this deep - how anyone can argue this has "substance" - is beyond me. It has good dialog and it's acted well. It's directed and staged and filmed perfectly. But as far as the story goes... just no.

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

DKR may not have been the smoothest and deepest movie in the world, but it had substance.

I especially liked the bit where Batman picked up a glowing science-fiction atom bomb in his cheesy science-fiction helicopter. Man that was so deep, I was like, "this totally symbolizes Batman picking up a MacGuffin with a convenient helicopter that Morgan Freeman made for some reason."

...seriously, no, this film is 3 and a half stars at best. Avengers was crisp, colourful, fun, but it was straightforward. The Dark Knight Rises was contrived - but worst of all, it was haphazardly paced; it was waaay too big for one movie. If it was two films glued together, I would have been all over it. But it wasn't. It swapped out peaceful Gotham for post-apocalyptic Gotham over the course of maybe ten minutes. It's... bafflingly awful.

The film was not bad. It was really well-made. But it really did feel like it took the same step backwards that The Dark Knight took backwards. Dark Knight was a suspenseful, realistic crime drama which explored the depths of human depravity and insanity, and how far you have to push a man before they go over whatever the "edge" is. Rises is about a man in a mask blowing up a city with a glowing bomb and then Batman comes and shoots him with missiles out of his crazy helicopter thing. Which I definitely appreciate! Don't get me wrong! But how anyone can call this deep - how anyone can argue this has "substance" - is beyond me. It has good dialog and it's acted well. It's directed and staged and filmed perfectly. But as far as the story goes... just no.

Did you not read what I said?

There is a difference between depth and substance...

Dark Knight Rises had a bit of both and Avenger's had none of either.

I loved The Avenger's, i just don't pretend that it was anything more than an awesome popcorn flick.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

Did you not read what I said?

There is a difference between depth and substance...

Dark Knight Rises had a bit of both and Avenger's had none of either.

I loved The Avenger's, i just don't pretend that it was anything more than an awesome popcorn flick.

Avengers was an awesome popcorn flick, but Rises was a pretentious popcorn flick.

It thought it had depth and substance but it lacked enough to warrant. You know what DID have depth and substance? Arkham City. That was a better Batman story than Rises could ever hope to be, and I say this as someone who absolutely loves the "grit" and realism of the Nolan interpretation. Rises spread it self too thin over too much, and it ended up as a jumbled - yet enjoyable - mess.

Avengers was pure spectacle, start to finish. No doubt. Rises was much of the same, but also tried to provide some kind of meaning along with it. It failed at the last part. Is a film better for attempting to tell a compelling story and failing than not at all? ...maybe. All I know is, for me, that's worth making the film down on. Actually, I'm surprised you quoted me originally at all, or bought up Avengers. "Did you read what I just said" indeed...

<quote=myself>but then I remembered that these films have basically been in a separate plane of existence compared to other blockbuster superhero films around it. Would you ever compare Begins to Spider-Man?

I honestly believe drawing such comparisons just are not fair because they're incomparable.

 

[Milanezi]

I haven't seen the movie yet, it arrives only next Friday here in let-down land (Brazil), I've got tickets to saturday, not Friday so I MIGHT, just MIGHT, escape the horde of teenager lunatics that insist on making jokes throughout the whole movie.
Well, what the frak is going on here MovieBob??? ...

I finally saw the movie, on Saturday, and... And I wish I hadn't written anything from my old post (the one I just quoted), after watching the movie, not only do I agree with MovieBob, I also think he was pretty nice towards the movie. It's not that the movie was bad, but it was mediocre, had an unforgiving plot hole, and well, the great revelation by the end of the movie, and I'm not talking about the plot-twist, it's the hero-related one, rendered useless the whole trilogy, since this Batman "universe" will never continue because Nolan refused to do so. And then there is the BIG OFFENSE, Mr. Nolan could have had the decency of altering a minor scene in the movie where "scarecrow" shows up, I mean, as MovieBob said,that scene doesn't even FIT Crane's character, it was made for the Joker, now okay, no problem, the actor is dead, so change the scene, or delete it, or simply change the lines and get a common thug to do what Crane does, because the Scarecrow would NEVER act like that, that scene was "Hannibal: Origins" (or whatever it was called) all over again, a modus operandi that makes no sense to the given character. I WANT to enjoy the movie, because it is a Batman movie, but thing is, knowing that there isn't going to be a 4th movie (only the reboot, now I say, THANK GOD for it), I see myself bending over to watch Tim Burton's series, because Nolan managed to ruin his whole trilogy with one movie. It's clear to me, Ledger died, Nolan didn't want to make the 3rd movie anymore because of that, but he had to because of contract, and what we got is a movie that you'll forget about a few hours after leaving the theatre.

 

[Milanezi]

Did you not read what I said?

There is a difference between depth and substance...

Dark Knight Rises had a bit of both and Avenger's had none of either.

I loved The Avenger's, i just don't pretend that it was anything more than an awesome popcorn flick.

Avengers was an awesome popcorn flick, but Rises was a pretentious popcorn flick.

It thought it had depth and substance but it lacked enough to warrant. You know what DID have depth and substance? Arkham City. That was a better Batman story than Rises could ever hope to be, and I say this as someone who absolutely loves the "grit" and realism of the Nolan interpretation. Rises spread it self too thin over too much, and it ended up as a jumbled - yet enjoyable - mess.

Avengers was pure spectacle, start to finish. No doubt. Rises was much of the same, but also tried to provide some kind of meaning along with it. It failed at the last part. Is a film better for attempting to tell a compelling story and failing than not at all? ...maybe. All I know is, for me, that's worth making the film down on. Actually, I'm surprised you quoted me originally at all, or bought up Avengers. "Did you read what I just said" indeed...

<quote=myself>but then I remembered that these films have basically been in a separate plane of existence compared to other blockbuster superhero films around it. Would you ever compare Begins to Spider-Man?

I honestly believe drawing such comparisons just are not fair because they're incomparable.

I do agree, the realism was good because Nolan had created a perfect balance between "real" and "ridiculous comic book stuff". Now, Marvel managed to pull out a movie based on the outrageous, it took all liberties it could in terms of dismissing reality in exchange for the colorful comic book world. Indeed, one can't compare the Batman series to the others, but as you said, Nolan spread this last movie too thin and it became pretentious, Nolan slipped and his realism betrayed the sense of comic book amazement, turning the movie sorta... dumb I guess? Like a kid wanting to play as an adult, it's cute, it's entertaining, but not as much as the kid that plays like a kid (Avengers).

 

[Milanezi]

Just saw the movie, I agree with all that Bob but unlike Bob I don't find good actors playing out to a crap script makes up for the script being crap, which it is, I couldn't help but feeling most the movie being a boring build up the never got any pay off and this film needs a lot more Batman, Bob wasn't exaggerating when he said Joseph Gordon-Levitt character is the main protagonist of the movie especially during the second half when we get no Batman until the big save the day moment.

SPOILERS, really I'm replying to someone who saw the movie, everyone else don't read:

I didn't feel a lack of Batman, but I did feel a lack of character in everyone, the twist with Talia just turned a good-enough Bane into a hulking mess. People have to remember Bane from Batman & Robin, he sucked because he was a puppet, and again we have a Bane who's a puppet being used by Talia. And what the heck was that all about Bruce wayne coming back from the prison? That place looks like either Asia or Middle East, yet Bruce Wayne just pops up inside a city (under siege), completely clean and ready to battle... Okay, I can forgive most of that, but there's no way he would be able to enter Gotham in time...

 

[lord.jeff]

Spoiler

Just saw the movie, I agree with all that Bob but unlike Bob I don't find good actors playing out to a crap script makes up for the script being crap, which it is, I couldn't help but feeling most the movie being a boring build up the never got any pay off and this film needs a lot more Batman, Bob wasn't exaggerating when he said Joseph Gordon-Levitt character is the main protagonist of the movie especially during the second half when we get no Batman until the big save the day moment.

SPOILERS, really I'm replying to someone who saw the movie, everyone else don't read:

I didn't feel a lack of Batman, but I did feel a lack of character in everyone, the twist with Talia just turned a good-enough Bane into a hulking mess. People have to remember Bane from Batman & Robin, he sucked because he was a puppet, and again we have a Bane who's a puppet being used by Talia. And what the heck was that all about Bruce wayne coming back from the prison? That place looks like either Asia or Middle East, yet Bruce Wayne just pops up inside a city (under siege), completely clean and ready to battle... Okay, I can forgive most of that, but there's no way he would be able to enter Gotham in time...

Spoiler

The reason I feel like a lack of Batman is because of everything that happens during the pit, it feels to me like it was just written so they could have Batman out of the way for a few months, but the whole pit thing was the worst part of the movie for many reason and the main reason I dislike the movie so. As for Bane and Talia, Bane was okay for me his twist at the end sucked but I enjoyed him enough through the rest of the movie so it can be forgiven but my main issue was with Talia here importance up to her big reveal seems forced and her romance with Bruce even more so, that kiss and everything that followed came out of left field for me.

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

Did you not read what I said?

There is a difference between depth and substance...

Dark Knight Rises had a bit of both and Avenger's had none of either.

I loved The Avenger's, i just don't pretend that it was anything more than an awesome popcorn flick.

Avengers was an awesome popcorn flick, but Rises was a pretentious popcorn flick.

It thought it had depth and substance but it lacked enough to warrant. You know what DID have depth and substance? Arkham City. That was a better Batman story than Rises could ever hope to be, and I say this as someone who absolutely loves the "grit" and realism of the Nolan interpretation. Rises spread it self too thin over too much, and it ended up as a jumbled - yet enjoyable - mess.

Avengers was pure spectacle, start to finish. No doubt. Rises was much of the same, but also tried to provide some kind of meaning along with it. It failed at the last part. Is a film better for attempting to tell a compelling story and failing than not at all? ...maybe. All I know is, for me, that's worth making the film down on. Actually, I'm surprised you quoted me originally at all, or bought up Avengers. "Did you read what I just said" indeed...

<quote=myself>but then I remembered that these films have basically been in a separate plane of existence compared to other blockbuster superhero films around it. Would you ever compare Begins to Spider-Man?

I honestly believe drawing such comparisons just are not fair because they're incomparable.

You haven't really added much to your counter argument.

Once again this has become a battle of opinions.

And to that I must say I respect yours.

For me substance lies in a decently compelling script, and that's all I'm going to say about that.

Good day.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

You haven't really added much to your counter argument.

Once again this has become a battle of opinions.

And to that I must say I respect yours.

For me substance lies in a decently compelling script, and that's all I'm going to say about that.

Good day.

Eh, for me substance comes from more than just dialogue. I agree Rises had good dialogue. I didn't like the plot, that's not the same as not liking the script. Most of my issues come from the pacing of it. I'd argue Avengers is a superior film because it had much more fleshed-out character interactions, but that's a case of wit vs plot and Avengers had no plot.

So, I guess we're in agreement then. Sort of. I still think Rises was too silly to have anything hold any weight, but it did have its moments. Well, actually, that's all it had. My opinion is thus: Dark Knight Rises is a handful of perfectly written, perfectly directed, perfectly acted, perfectly scored and perfectly staged set-pieces... stitched together in a less-than-great way. Taking each scene individually, 11/10. Best film of the year. As a whole - editing, overall character arcs and all that - that's where it trips over, and that's where I find fault in the thing, and that's what made me leaving the theater going "ehhhh." Avengers - though I hate to compare - was a coherent, straight line of quality that snowballed all the way through to the credits. Rises was a bunch of incredibly peaks of brilliance, marred by occasional erratic dips of sloppiness. I really liked Rises, but what I hate most is that it was that close to me loving it.

Have you seen Prometheus? Rises actually reminds me a lot of Prometheus. Really, staggeringly well-made bits - I mean like, "wow" moments, and a hell of a lot of them = but stapled together not all that well. And thus I conclude that maybe, just maybe, Rises will redeem itself in the same way Prometheus may - in an extended edition Blu-ray release. It happened with Watchmen, too. I really feel like it just needs one or two more scenes to flesh some things out or improve the pacing, and wham! - near-perfect (if not perfect) film. I know you've not been very into this back and forth, but I'm interested to hear your opinion on this subject if nothing else?

 

[Tono Makt]

The Avengers vs The Dark Knight Rises

The Avengers: The turn off your brain, sit back and have fun movie
Before it is released: "Please don't suck please don't suck please don't suck please don't suck."
After it is released: "It didn't suck! It didn't suck! It didn't suck! It's the best film of the year!" (we'll just ignore all the glaring flaws, weaknesses and utter crap in the movie because there's enough good stuff in the movie to say it doesn't suck)
Hits the mark?: Yes. Aim low, hit target, collect 1 billion dollars.

The Dark Knight Rises: The keep your brain engaged, sit back, have fun and be moved movie.
Before it is released: "This is going to be the best movie of the summer! Remember The Return of the King, and how it was the most awesome of the three Lord of the Rings movies, and how it won all those Oscar? This is going to be totally like that."
After it is released: "This... isn't nearly as good as The Return of the King? It's not even as good as The Dark Knight? Director, I am disappoint. Let's pick at every flaw, weakness and utter crap of the movie in our disappointment."
Hits the mark?: No. Aim high, miss target, might still collect 1 billion dollars.

All in all, TDKR aimed far higher than the Avengers. TDKR tried to actually tell a story, unlike the Avengers which just tried to find ways to tie kewl fight scenes and high-larious! one liners over a 2 hour movie. That it told a mediocre story then told that story in a very mediocre way is disappointing and deserves most of the criticism being thrown at it. Hopefully Nolan reads the criticisms and takes them to heart; we hold him to much higher standards than Joss Whedon, so when he doesn't live up to them we are disappointed.