Batman: The Dark Knight

Let me start by being clear on this one point: this movie is not bad. It's just not all that great either. When compared to the phenomenal amounts of CRAP coming out of hollywood, it's pretty entertaining, but it's certainly a far cry from the "perfect movie" reviewers everywhere have been telling me it is and anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

The story is clunky and simple, certainly nothing there to challenge the viewer to think about and Heath Ledger's roll was... was... average. I suspect the only reason people have been saying otherwise is because of Mr Ledger's unfortunate circumstance of being "not alive anymore". But sad a fact as that may be, i'm going to call a spade a spade here. It's not like i can offend the deceased anyway (believe me, i'm sick enough to have tried). Besides, to be fair, most of it certainly isn't his fault.

But, why am i giving the movie reviewers rave as "the best batman yet" a thumbs down? Well, where do i begin? How about at the beginning with the story:

The reason people say the joker steal's the show is because, literally, that's all this "show" is: the joker. It's 2 and a half hours of joker. Joker joker joker. In fact, you'd think with so much action and plot oriented around the character they would've found time to (even accidentally) flesh the man out. But, no. Not in this movie. There's even a point where the police CATCH the joker and are interrogating him. Just when you think you're finally going to learn something about the criminal who's been harassing gotham city since literally the opening scenes of the movie, one of the random cops makes it clear that the joker has literally NO distinguishing characteristics, other aliases, matching dental records, fingerprints or any other hints at an origin or existence outside of "the joker". That's right, the enemy of gotham city, batman's nemesis, the biggest name in villainy in the entire DC universe is a complete UNKNOWN!

Excuse me while i scream my head off into the sky.

...

There, that's better...

While some may find this a "minor point" for the movie, they'd be wrong. It's a point that pretty much breaks my cardinal rule of what DEFINES a decent bad guy (and by this, i mean, as college profs are apt to say, what's "necessary, but not sufficient"). More than anything, ANYTHING, your audience should KNOW YOUR BAD GUY! This is part of, nay... the GREATEST part of, what makes a true villain truly villainous. In the first Batman movie (michael keaton, jack nicholson, etc) there was the whole theme of "joker makes batman makes joker...". Joker was still a psychotic criminal, but you KNEW something about him. You understood why he was the way he was (even if it was a twisted tale, as it truly should be). But in the Dark Knight, the writers drop this MOST VITAL OF PIECES and make the joker psychotic... just because. It's such a lazy concept they even had to have michael caine (alfred) overtly tell batman that "some men just want to watch the world burn".

Wow... just, wow. This, coming from a movie that tries to make the distinction between "a hero you deserver" and a "hero that you need". I guess when considering Heath Ledger didn't WRITE the role, he did a decent job... but in order for an actor to TRULY deserve that "excellent job" credit, he needs the writers to be there right along with him and if they are not he needs to be the one to make the writers change their lines (and yes, actors have made writers rewrite roles to fit their acting).

Moving away from Heath Ledger for a bit, let's talk about the other almost completely overshadowed enemy of the movie: Two Face. His roll is so unnecessary and meaningless in the movie it's easy to see why he's completely overshadowed. He was much more important as district attorney Harvey Dent but even then had an unaccountable mean streak and over dependence on a two headed coin that you just don't care enough when this so-called "white knight" falls from grace. Ultimately, this villain (but probably not entire character) could've been removed from the film and the only thing that would've happened is the movie would be half an hour shorter. Considering that by the end of the movie it feels artificially lengthened, i suspect that half hour wouldn't be terribly missed.

Fans of the first film will be happy to note the horrible acting of katie holmes has now been replaced by the horrible acting of maggie gyllenhall (had to look that one up). While katie's character was wooden and unmemorable ("she was in batman begins?") gyllenhall's character takes unmemorableness to the next level by being such a blatant story-device you hardly bat an eye when she's murdered halfway through the movie by the joker. My literal reaction was one of mild disinterest and considering it happens in an over-the-top explosion, that's saying something:

"Did rachel (gyllenhall) just die?"
"I think so."
"Oh."

Overall, i could keep ragging and raging on the story, but i think by now you get the picture. The movie has good action sequences (but in these days of superb CGI, what doesn't?) and a number of almost insurmountable challenges for the dark knight you do feel a little of the suspense coming through. But even this is marred by one too many scenes of belief suspension for it to make the movie. While the former batman movies made you suspend disbelief with batman's encyclopedic knowledge of chemicals and forensics, The Dark Knight takes it to the next level. After batman survives a fall from a skyscraper onto a car in the streets and walks away like it was a hangnail, you pretty much know that nothing the movie throws at him will make him break a sweat and that just does "wonders" for the immersion levels of the film.

In the final showdown, batman shows joker that the city's not as ruled by fear and emotion as he had hoped before finishing him off once and for all with a deadly cocktail of sleeping pills, pain killers and alcohol (i know, tasteless) thereby ending the joker's deadly and mostly pointless reign of terror. There's still the lingerings of the two-face plot, but since, as even other reviewers have noted, "heath ledger steals the show" you simply don't care and are pretty pleased to find that even this wraps up without much fuss in less 20 minutes because in your mind, "the movie ended with the joker".

WallE

Since many of my 2 readers have come forward and told me that i don't ever LIKE movies, i've gone through the painstaking effort to actually write a "positive" review, if you will (i thought The Trap had a positive review, but wtf do i know, right?). Today i saw the latest disney-pixar movie WallE; a movie so good it had me skipping down the fucking streets (happy now?).

The premise of WallE is a simple one: earth has become a massive dumb as a result of rampant consumerism fed by the global corporation/world leaders (the president is literally the CEO of the global corporation). So far so good: nothing to suspend disbelief over yet. Naturally, the only solution was for Apple to build (presumably) millions of emotive little garbage collecting robots while humanity takes a 5 year hiatus in the stars... and yes, they were made by apple as can be clearly told from their start up noise akin to a mac (ed: steve jobs: "first i take over pixar, tomorrow the world! Mwahahaha"). 700 years later, at the start of the movie, WallE is all that remains of this robot army... and still no humans have returned.

Now, i could continue this review like other reviewers and basically just recap the plot verbatim, but since i think a REAL review should avoid doing that, i'll stick to keeping this an informal "rant". Needless to say, the movie plods along at a decent pace following WallE and the main female character (Eve: a heavily armed plant finding robot/mech of death) as they try to (inadvertently) lead humanity back to earth and learn to love all at the same time (but not without a little help from dolly parton). It was a story so charming and cute it made even MY blackened little heart melt a little:

*sniff* "if those cold, heartless machines can learn to love... *sniff* than maybe i can too!"

Of course, being an antisocial, inhuman monster incapable of finding anyone of the opposite sex to spend time with me (we can't ALL be desirable garbage collecting robots, ladies!) i was forced to suppress my emotions so as to keep them festering quietly as a mental illness until the appropriate time when i snap and kill everyone around me.

But back to the review/rant:

The conflict of the film is satisfied by a Hal-esque robot who's taken to controlling humanity through their complete dependence. Naturally, it takes the star-crossed lover robots to show humanity how to really live and in time, they rise up, overthrow their robot overlord and learn the importance of taking care of oneself.

Now, i liked this movie, but i've heard many criticisms of it from the oh-so-superficial graphics related criticisms ("it's too cartoony") to criticisms of the themes being too "overused" and "topical". To these critics i have only one thing to say: fuck you! Seriously, "too cartoony"? The story was good; it could've been even MORE cartoony and it STILL wouldn't've ruined the movie for me. If your shallow standard for a good movie is solely animation quality alone, watch The Hulk... you'll probably like it - no story but great CGI.

As for the themes, so what that they're a little overused. I mean, every single movie i've EVER seen has an overused POS theme that they often forget halfway through in favour of more action, crappier love stories and/or hokier comedy. Besides, what do you expect from a contemporary movie more than a topical theme. Sorry to break it to you, idiots, but EVERY movie theme is topical: it just depends on the time frame it's written.

Now, this isn't to say the movie had no faults, just that the oft cited "faults" are nothing more than the ramblings of idiots who miss the fucking point. Since i try very hard to find something wrong with every movie i ever see (it's apparently what i'm known for), i'll outline one fault i noticed myself: Eve. Why oh why did the female plant probing ipod have to be equipped with a death ray powerful enough to destroy a battleship? Were the people who designed her expecting her to encounter hostile life forms squatting on the unlivable surface of the Earth, fiercely defending any plant life that they may have? Perhaps it's the future's version of a rape-whistle, necessary to keep perverted male robots from getting too cheeky. Or perhaps she was designed by an emotionally unstable movie reviewer who's one too many robot-romance movies off the deep end already.

Ah well, whatever the reason, the movie is largely good with adequate themes and a cute story. Quite a good "kids movie" but certainly not a "kiddie movie" (note: i hate this derogatory term for children's fiction used by assholes and super-assholes alike). Any adult with a well developed sense of fun will find it widely enjoyable. This reviewer gives it an impossible 4 out of 5 stars. Now maybe i can get back to angrily ranting on the many other movies that piss me off (there certainly isn't a shortage of them).