The Dark Knight Rises "Preview"

No, I didn't sell any of my precious bodily fluids to see The Dark Knight Rises in pre-release. This is my pre-review, or How I Learned to Stop Caring and Save $10. (This will pay off at the end, I swear...somehow this got ranty... And the Kubrick reference goes throughout. I dunno, I just like Kubrick.)

Real Horrorshow

I used to care quite a lot about Batman, and devoted a quantity of creative and academic time to the study of the Caped Crusader and his retinue of droogs. This exploration culminated in my senior year in college, which I spent adapting Frank Miller's graphic novel The Dark Knight Returns into a feature-length screenplay. Movies and Batman were my bread and butter.

As with any intense study, there's a period of exquisite balance of the most enthusiasm, the most knowledge and the most propensity for scathingly witty remarks of jaded criticism. I was just beginning my ascent in 2005 when Batman Begins was released, and approaching the apex of this curve during the 2008 release of The Dark Knight. I wanted to see those movies films, and then I wanted to tell you about them. Now it's 2012 and I want strangers to read what I think about them. My, how time flies.

This Is My Rifle...

There were plenty of reasons for me to want to see the first two installments in Christopher Nolan's trilogy. The trend in grittier, (hell, I'll say it) smarter superhero movies was at its freshest at the time the first film's inception. I'd seen Ang Lee's Hulk (spoiler alert: under. rated.), two X-Men movies (good and better) and Tobey Maguire's Spiderman (legit, he was in Seabiscuit). I had geeky high hopes, disposable income and was one of the darlings IB Film department. I expected something mature, clean, smart and appropriately dark (even Burton's classic duo miss the mark and land on, well, Burtonesque) of Batman Begins. Besides, Liam Neeson was in it.

And there's the rub. Having skipped over some of the other access points to loving film (you know, the boy stuff, like special effects, kung fu and cult), I was most attracted to the things in film I could envision emulating in a Career that Would Garner Recognition of My Critical and Creative Training: Directors and, by extension, actors. Not having a spot from Chris Nolan in my pantheon of auteurs, I was most curious about the cast.

Bruce Wayne/Batman - Christian Bale
I'd seen the opening half of The Machinist (the good half) and considered Bale an indie improvement on Tom Cruise...which was calling him sort of an undecided B-; there's lots of room for improvement on ole Tom.

Alfred Pennyworth - Michael Caine
An old school class act. Hopes were high enough to call them expectations.

Lucius Fox - Morgan Freeman
He got clubbed over the head in Shawshank Redemption. Sadly, he's been in an acting coma ever since. And even more tragic, people keep throwing money at him for it!

Ra's al Ghul - Liam Neeson
He's Oscar Schindler. I mean, jeez, how can you not just adore him? (Since this time he has evolved into a bit of an action hero. Now he's like if your movie-dad would weep sensitively and be able to save you from Nazis, possibly by murdering all of them)

Sgt. James Gordon - Gary Oldman
And you can stop me right here. I love Gary Oldman. He's one of those actors for whom I could name about a role and a half (John Hurt is the same), but I felt like I'd seen him everywhere being wonderful and even if I hadn't, I just knew he was the bomb.

Exciting! I wanted another reason to like Cillian Murphy and I didn't care one way or the other about Katie Holmes. Then came the film and I was, in the words of the only character I could pin to Gary Oldman at the time, "very disappointed."

Bale's mumbling Batman has been the subject of much excusing. Here's a newsflash: If he can't breathe and act at the same time, fix his costume. If you can't fix it in production, fix it in post with ADR. Of course, all his Bat-voice problems, as well as his unsubtle portrayal of Wayne as a completely uncharismatic stereotype, could be remedied by casting someone who has looked up the word nuance in the dictionary. Perhaps, well, Cillian Murphy, who was hanging around this movie to little particular end. The lack of grace in this film is its biggest flaw: the once-sleek antihero whines more than he whispers and the testosterone-bloated take on the Batmobile says far too much about the inclination to strip finesse from every aspect of the mythos.

No other real surprises, for good or ill, just one big casting misstep and some suspiciously poor stylistic choices. But, okay, okay. It's watchable. You can't say that about every Batman movie. Would I see the second one? Why, of course...

This is My Gun.

Flash forward three years. I'm older, wiser, and sassier than ever. I've seen hundreds more movies from all over the world, actually read my first Batman comics and am reaching for the Valhalla of snobbery that is specialized knowledge that suddenly overlaps popular culture. I don't believe the hype, I don't follow the production (much), I don't even read reviews anymore. Naturally, I had to see The Dark Knight Returns, but I wasn't about to camp out for it (Snoot, snoot).

The sequel sees some personnel changes, so a little housekeeping:

Katie Holmes is replaced by Maggie Gyllenhaal in the role of Rachel Dawes. Meh. Her part was so minimal and her performance decent enough that I was a positive-neutral on her. But now there were some stakes: I liked Maggie Gyllenhaal well enough (would like her more if she stood up straight), and if there was going to be more heavy lifting, I was ready to see her try to do it. (Very enjoyable actor) Aaron Eckhart isn't African American, so no risk on the choice for Harvey Dent, but I was hardly expecting ballsy casting at that point.

And then came Heath. Look around the promotional materials and you'll see the golden cowboy of pretty-boy fame...looking like someone dressed Marlon Brando up like a clown and smooshed them together so hard they stuck. He is why I threw caution to the wind and got my hopes up. Batman Begins was a shot gone awry, but The Dark Knight sounded very fun, indeed.

I've used the romanticized rote "a man who looked into a dark place for his craft and didn't come back from it" as my boilerplate since the car ride home from the screening. My initial interest was more along the lines of morbid curiosity: Was his performance a legacy to be proud of? In a word, duh.

I've seen Batman Begins more than once because it's not totally horrible and I can half-watch it (and because I like to rant about it, sometimes, too. It's a toss up). The Dark Knight, on the other hand, offers me the thrill of watching an incredible work of art. Nuance? Check, check and double-check. A true transformation is a rare and precious thing to behold. Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker is unselfconscious to the point of sublimation. And yes, whether because of the role or for it or for only slightly (I won't buy totally) unrelated reasons, he died giving this show to us. I wish he hadn't (I feel an article on Method acting coming on; and he's the exception that proves my dislike of it). There's not going to be another Joker for a long time, and seeing the role as more than a replication of or a reaction against Ledger's twitchy malevolence will be longer coming still. He's not the only torchbearer here: Oldman's Gordon makes me cry at the end, Aaron Eckhart's Dent is just edgy enough.

But the list ends there.

I can't credit Nolan with creating the Joker; there are a lot people in that skin, but all of them are horribly, wonderfully Heath. Gary Oldman's reputation for perfectionism also has me leaning in the direction of actor-driven-excellence. The most ironic scene in the movie is the interaction between Bale's continually unappealing Bruce Wayne and Eckhart's "white knight" Harvey Dent, as they discuss the bat-elephant in the room. The audience is allowed to compare and contrast, and looking at that scene, I found myself wondering why given the choice between the two, Batman wasn't blond. Young people in power can't be smarmy douchebags all the time. Dent oozes charm, smarts and drive. Wayne just oozes (how could Rachel be conflicted at all, oh, wait, because the plot demands it). It's a great disguise--who would ever guess in a million years that Bruce Wayne would have the strength of character or the presence to be a hero? But I found myself doubting, too. Sometimes two faces are better than one: Depth is key and Eckhart brings more to either of his roles than Bale brings to both of his combined.

Then it all gets worse. Morgan Freeman's sleepwalking must have been catching; the writers got it first and passed it to Michael Caine. Alfred has a lot less to do and Caine does a lot less with him. Maggie Gyllenhaal is underused at best, and the damsel-in-distress direction in which Rachel is written waters the role down. In general, the trend toward poor resource allocation takes hold. The action drags with little suspense, both in the banter-choked chase (if the plot had allowed Gordon to speak, he would have told that cop to shut the fuck up, he's trying to be real police) and the artificial-feeling bomb-on-the-boat scenario. Throwing away Two-Face spits in the eye of good plot construction as well as Eckhart's value for the sequel. If this is their twist--we killed a character, didn't see that coming--I would have traded it for all the other predictable elements of the movie's character and narrative development in a heartbeat. As telling as the Bat-tank in the previous movie, Scarecrow reappears for another pointless look. The irrelevance of his inclusion displays a fundamental misunderstanding of the draws in these films: Continuity must brook development. Comicbook reboots and adaptations are just a high-budget what-if game. It's when you're free to throw characters aside, that you should be most guarded about doing so: You can always kill Two-Face, because there's no illusion of permanency. Keeping him around is a lot more challenging. I wish I could have seen the reward on that risk.

My God, It's Full of Stars

The final installment of the trilogy hits the screen at midnight tonight. There were a few enticing rumors circulating about the cast of The Dark Knight Rises early on. Arguably, the biggest reason for the entire franchise's staying power is that Batman has the best villains. And there are always two. When I heard the Penguin might be reprised (no complaints about DeVito's work) by Philip Seymour Hoffman I got very exited. Johnny Depp as the Riddler was less intriguing (his characters have bordered on schticks recently, but if he went Wonka instead of Captain Jack, things could have been cool). We're getting Catwoman and (drumroll?) Bane. Hmmm...

At first I shrugged. Catwoman makes enough sense, since the last film disposed of the (only) female viewpoint, and Poison Ivy isn't A-list enough to balance Bane. I remembered him from the animated series (kuh-lassic) but didn't really care (although the potential for him to break Batman's spine pleases me). Catwoman could have been anyone, too, as far as I could think. Michelle Pfeiffer (again) would have been a breathtakingly brilliant choice. Maybe a mature femme fatale could encourage Brucie to grow up a little.

Catwoman is Anne Hathaway. Snore. Not that she's a bad actress: I was too distracted to notice her in Brokeback Mountain (some strange overlaps there with TDK), and of course I have never seen the Princess Wears Prada or whatever it is, but she was just fine in Havoc. I just wanted Catwoman to be more...different? I know this is a big judgment; she might pull off something interesting. I have to take the film at face value, though, and this choice isn't exactly propelling me to the ticket counter. Sigh...

But hey, Bane could be cool: Even Ra's al Ghul turned out to be some white guy, so a little ethnic perspective would be refreshing. As far as casting went, I was expecting some Latino unknown--in all fairness, I only know three Chicano/Latino actors off the top of my head, and none were likely choices (I would have been in line yesterday if Edward James Olmos was donning mask and pump). Catwoman was a neutral for me, but someone I'd never heard of was enough of a draw to pique my interest. And then I found out...

Bane is some white guy, too? Tom Hardy is not a bad actor, either. I just saw him in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, fine, fine. But, but... WHY? Bane is supposed to be a Mexican wrestler. What's wrong with that? Is it racist? Alienating? In Mexico, they have wrestling. Luchadores dress in loud spandex and wear masks and it's hardcore-silly-serious. Just like the professional wresting in the US. Come on, people. Ditch the wrestling if you have to, but why not let him be Latino? Or ditch the Mexican and leave him a wrestler. It...explains things about his villainy. No? No.

Danny's Not Here, Mrs. Torrance

Now I'm much older and much more jaded and don't care about movies so much anymore. I read reviews, because I don't bother to see most theatrical releases, and the faces on the magazines racks are starting to be strange to me more often than not. I make comicbooks now, because I lost my taste for the Hollywood bullshit. So I flipped through an Entertainment Weekly at the office where I work that featured The Dark Knight Rises.

Bane's wearing a medically-necessary breathing apparatus? Oh, that's not going to be awkward to work into the exposition. Christian Bale's relieved to not wear his costume anymore? He wasn't worthy of the cowl in the first place. When V for Vendetta was in its infancy, James Purefoy was released from the role of V due to his difficulty performing with the mask on. Hugo Weaving replaced him because he could do his job. Period. No gasping, no mumbling, just a fabulous performance.

When I look at the posters for The Dark Knight Rises, I don't see Catwoman. I see Anne Hathaway in a mask. When I look at the posters for The Dark Knight Rises, I see Bane drastically changed for reasons I can't fathom... Unless... Hold the phone... Beefy, yelling white guy surrounded by an army of punks, Catwoman and that grey palate? Oh. Bane's not Bane; he's the mutant leader from Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. If so, I wrote the book on that one a long time ago. Regardless, this go-round I'm skipping the expectations--and the first-run theaters, too.