Starring Christian Bale, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Gary
Oldman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Much time passed between my first viewing of The Dark Knight Rises and my writing of
this review. Actually much time has passed between now and my second viewing too, a delay due an urge to give this film the necessary attention in this post. It had probably been since The Return of the King that I had been
this excited for a film. While The Dark Knight Rises is not the
greatest film ever made (like so many were expecting), Christopher Nolan’s
third and final chapter in his Batman trilogy packs a ton to take in; I needed
time to see it again, let it stew in my brain, and devout a good deal of
time to write about it (and also time to get lazy, wait too long to write about it, and then wait to see it a third time before writing). Having finally taken the proper steps, I can say that The
Dark Knight Rises comes awfully close to satisfying the incredible hype
that preceded it. Back on July 19th, I was standing outside with my
friends in a misty rain waiting for one of the theater’s eight midnight
screenings. The communal excitement felt
in the air at its beginning had turned into speechless exhaustion (in a good
way) by the time the credits rolled a little after 3:00am. Nolan puts his audience through the wringer while watching Batman and the city
of Gotham combat its most dangerous foe yet.
This is a long film with a lot of new characters and many twists and
turns, and it does feel long.
But after
investing so much time in Christopher Nolan’s
Gotham through Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, and enjoying it so thoroughly, this epic of a
conclusion feels necessary to unite the three films into a single 7.5-hour legend.
I have no problem saying that Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy is a masterpiece, and
the second greatest trilogy of all-time (Lord
of the Rings ranks supremely in my book).
However, for the rest of this review, I will try to narrow my focus to only
its most recent third.
The Dark Knight Rises picks up eight years after the events of The Dark Knight, with Batman taking the blame for Harvey Dent’s death to leave Gotham with its “white knight” in tact. Most of Gotham’s organized underworld is behind bars thanks to the PATRIOT Act-like “Dent Act,” which takes away basic civil rights for the sake of “justice.” Bruce Wayne, with a broken body and broken heart, has secluded himself in Wayne manor. For the people in control, things in Gotham have never been better but this utopia is obviously not meant to last.
Gotham’s desperate and hungry have not benefited by the city’s rejuvenation, and that desperation has added weight to preaching of a rogue mercenary, Bane (Tom Hardy), who meticulously plans to turn the city on its head. When Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway), the fascinating cat burglar with darkly Robin Hood-like values, warns Bruce Wayne of the upcoming “storm,” in a beautiful ballroom scene, it becomes time for Batman to rise from the shadows. Once Bane’s assault on the city begins, Nolan’s Gotham gets bleaker than we’ve ever seen it before – which is quite the accomplishment. Batman is overmatched.
The lead up to Bane’s Gotham takeover in The Dark Knight Rises is very complicated and dense; the film sure does earn its nearly three-hour running time. Beyond Bane and Selina Kyle, we must keep track of many other new characters that play important roles in the narrative. Among many, there is the sleazy Wayne Enterprises board member Daggett (Ben Mendelsohn), an unknowing pawn in Bane’s master plan. We meet Miranda Tate (Marion Cottiard), another board member with an obsession over the company’s dangerous energy project. John Blake (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), in the "good cop" role becomes something of Commissioner Gordon’s protégé, sharing his unwavering faith in Batman. Old favorites Gordon (Gary Oldman), Afred (Michael Caine), and Lucious Fox (Morgan Freeman), are also given their fair share of screen time. The Dark Knight Rises becomes a juggling act of stories that would fall apart in less capable hands.
After the incredible “airplane-jacking” opener, setting up this complicated plot takes over the first act of the film. You almost forget that it is even a Batman movie. However, Nolan knows just when to turn the switch from crime drama to superhero epic. Bane’s exhilarating and brilliantly organized attack on the Gotham stock exchange marks the return of Batman. Like the airplane heist topped The Dark Knight’s semi-truck flip in spectacle, this sequence tops the Joker’s bank robbery. With Batman and a whole police on his tail, we get sense just how powerful this new foe is. To match Bane, Batman is given a new toy, the Bat, a badass plane that makes its debut in this sequence. Batman needs help to defeat Bane but makes critical mistakes with whom he trusts, to dire consequences.
As far as villains go, Tom Hardy’s Bane is a great one. Anyone who has seen Bronson knows the kind of expressive and deranged villain Hardy can be, but with Bane that madman quality is largely obscured by a mask. With his voice muffled and face covered, Hardy’s eyes and body language must express Bane’s menace. With each viewing of The Dark Knight Rises, I’ve begun to admire Hardy more and more. His cold stare, bravado-filled posture, and fanatical monologues send chills down your spine. The fun evil of Heath Ledger’s Joker is long gone. Bane's plan is so thorough, so perfectly realized, that I was left with a pit in my stomach for what would happen to Batman and the people of Gotham (at least on my first viewing). The Joker in The Dark Knight remains my favorite movie villain, but I have to give the nod for most dangerous to Bane.
The Dark Knight Rises picks up eight years after the events of The Dark Knight, with Batman taking the blame for Harvey Dent’s death to leave Gotham with its “white knight” in tact. Most of Gotham’s organized underworld is behind bars thanks to the PATRIOT Act-like “Dent Act,” which takes away basic civil rights for the sake of “justice.” Bruce Wayne, with a broken body and broken heart, has secluded himself in Wayne manor. For the people in control, things in Gotham have never been better but this utopia is obviously not meant to last.
Gotham’s desperate and hungry have not benefited by the city’s rejuvenation, and that desperation has added weight to preaching of a rogue mercenary, Bane (Tom Hardy), who meticulously plans to turn the city on its head. When Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway), the fascinating cat burglar with darkly Robin Hood-like values, warns Bruce Wayne of the upcoming “storm,” in a beautiful ballroom scene, it becomes time for Batman to rise from the shadows. Once Bane’s assault on the city begins, Nolan’s Gotham gets bleaker than we’ve ever seen it before – which is quite the accomplishment. Batman is overmatched.
The lead up to Bane’s Gotham takeover in The Dark Knight Rises is very complicated and dense; the film sure does earn its nearly three-hour running time. Beyond Bane and Selina Kyle, we must keep track of many other new characters that play important roles in the narrative. Among many, there is the sleazy Wayne Enterprises board member Daggett (Ben Mendelsohn), an unknowing pawn in Bane’s master plan. We meet Miranda Tate (Marion Cottiard), another board member with an obsession over the company’s dangerous energy project. John Blake (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), in the "good cop" role becomes something of Commissioner Gordon’s protégé, sharing his unwavering faith in Batman. Old favorites Gordon (Gary Oldman), Afred (Michael Caine), and Lucious Fox (Morgan Freeman), are also given their fair share of screen time. The Dark Knight Rises becomes a juggling act of stories that would fall apart in less capable hands.
After the incredible “airplane-jacking” opener, setting up this complicated plot takes over the first act of the film. You almost forget that it is even a Batman movie. However, Nolan knows just when to turn the switch from crime drama to superhero epic. Bane’s exhilarating and brilliantly organized attack on the Gotham stock exchange marks the return of Batman. Like the airplane heist topped The Dark Knight’s semi-truck flip in spectacle, this sequence tops the Joker’s bank robbery. With Batman and a whole police on his tail, we get sense just how powerful this new foe is. To match Bane, Batman is given a new toy, the Bat, a badass plane that makes its debut in this sequence. Batman needs help to defeat Bane but makes critical mistakes with whom he trusts, to dire consequences.
As far as villains go, Tom Hardy’s Bane is a great one. Anyone who has seen Bronson knows the kind of expressive and deranged villain Hardy can be, but with Bane that madman quality is largely obscured by a mask. With his voice muffled and face covered, Hardy’s eyes and body language must express Bane’s menace. With each viewing of The Dark Knight Rises, I’ve begun to admire Hardy more and more. His cold stare, bravado-filled posture, and fanatical monologues send chills down your spine. The fun evil of Heath Ledger’s Joker is long gone. Bane's plan is so thorough, so perfectly realized, that I was left with a pit in my stomach for what would happen to Batman and the people of Gotham (at least on my first viewing). The Joker in The Dark Knight remains my favorite movie villain, but I have to give the nod for most dangerous to Bane.
With a mostly humorless hero and villain, Anne Hathaway’s
Selina Kyle is a surprising scene-stealer as The Dark Knight Rises’ main supplier of levity. Her humor and her sexiness are needed to ease
the tension, and Hathaway excels at both.
Without ever uttering the name, she is the perfect Catwoman (though she
does have cool sunglasses that give just the right hint of her feline
persona). She is agile, slinky,
dangerous and tough, which pulls Bruce Wayne out of his early recluse funk. She is also given the film’s best lines, said
by Hathaway with the right amount of sass. Nolan’s Dark
Knight Trilogy is something of a boys’ club, but Selina Kyle can hold her
own next to anyone. Only Bane’s evil can
shake her worldview.
Few films have ever garnered as much hype as The Dark Knight Rises, and Christopher
Nolan had to ratchet up the scale in every way to reach that hype. He successfully reached an epic scale without
sacrificing a compelling story (à la Sam Raimi and Spider-Man 3). The story is
complicated, the special effects are state of the art, the battles are huge,
the score is pounding, and the stakes have never been more dire. This trilogy transcends the superhero genre,
and its third installment is the conclusion it deserves. At a pivotal moment when Hans Zimmer’s score
harkens back to the Batman Begins theme,
the realization will hit that we have been witnessing a unified cinematic legend these
past seven years, and that legend gets its perfect ending (a much discussed
ending that I will not comment on here).
One of pop culture’s most iconic figures has never been, and will likely
never be, depicted better.
All discussion of The
Dark Knight Rises, and discussion of any trilogy frankly, devolves into
talk of ranking each entry; this discussion will be no different. When one
film is head and shoulders above the rest (like Spider-Man 2) and one is so clearly bad (like Spider-Man 3), this talk is easy.
However, Christopher Nolan has made that task extremely difficult. After seeing The Dark Knight Rises three times, I can say that I like it more
and more with each viewing. The
complications become easier to follow with familiarity and one can enjoy the
details more when the twists are expected.
But The Dark Knight Rises is
not a perfect crime thriller hidden in the guise of a superhero blockbuster and it
lacks one of the greatest performances ever put to screen. For those reasons, The Dark Knight remains the most perfect superhero movie and best of the three (and my only “10”
in the trilogy). Batman Begins is a fantastic introduction, but it lacks the awesome
scale of its two sequels and falls third in my Dark Knight Trilogy pecking order.
Mark it 9.
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