Not a Review: The Dark Knight Rises

Posted by Soumya Mukherjee at 11:10 AM On to the Previous Post

An old post which I wrote when I came back from watching TDKR. Well, I did not quite feel like publishing it then... but I do want you to read this, as I had promised some of you right?
So here we go!

I will start in reverse mode:

-Climax: Yes it was epic. Yes it was fun. Yes it gave goosebumps.
   But
It was abrupt.

Bane died a street thug's death.

Cottilard getting a Bollywoodish treatment on her story-telling while she recited her story, thus delaying the detonation and 'gifting' Gordon time to plant the device that stopped the trigger action.

The editor was in a hurry. Classic example of ants in pants. How Bruce saved his ass is a question that was to be answered more than with just a mere 'fixing the auto-pilot mode with a software patch' dash.


Why did Batman not deal with the Gothamite the way he did eventually, a little earlier? He had the resources to do just the same a lot earlier.

-Story-telling: To question Nolan on that segment will be blasphemy, yes I know
   But 
Did he himself not raise the bar with The Dark Knight? 

So, where was the detailing and the patience? Where? He did not let the crucial scenes grow in our mind. 


As a fanboy of his movies, there were many things that were superb, but as a critic, the only thing that was 'whoa-that-is-frigging-awesome!!' was: The Bat.  It splashed on the screen so many times. It was overused. Simple as that.


-The mood was dark. IMAX scenes did their trick, the apathy was visible,
But
Where is the tension? When Bane breaks Batman's back, the hopelessness should captivate the viewers' senses. 

But before we could even think of popping our eyes out just because of the premonition of what is about to happen, Batman was cured, back on his feet and was found doing push-ups soon. 



In the end, I will only say that Batman series could not have gotten a better movie trilogy than what Nolan gave us, and yes, I would easily give the movie a 9 out of 10 and I must admit that the movie exceeded my  expectations, but as the plot opened, it subjected itself to such questions which makes the movie somewhat a 'reachable' one and proves that quote right:

Attainment of perfection makes things fall flat at times.

You are correct, that quote was given by none other than me.

And I will go and watch the movie again in theaters. Why , can you not critique a movie and be a fanboy at the same time? Because that would be perhaps, Christopher Nolan's greatest success that I would concur, very few filmmakers of our time enjoy.