Male, British, ex-RAF. Is anyone else experiencing REALLY bad lag in the review text box at the mome...
Male, British, ex-RAF. Is anyone else experiencing REALLY bad lag in the review text box at the moment? Its so bad I have stopped writing & editing reviews completely. Can't Ciao fix this?
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Full Movie Review:- CONTAINS SPOILERS!
OK, ignore the so called "great opening scene" of the bank robbery. It's good but its nothing to be spouting the word "brilliant" over. The 2nd scene with fake batmen is better (along with a throwaway appearance of The Scarecrow which is a complete waste of time as it's not explained or ulitised at all really) but you don't know who the real Batman is, especially when he's talking like he's got a really sore throat or is doing an incredibly poor Clint Eastwood "Dirty Harry" impression.
And that's what ruins his dialogue with Chief Gordon in the 3rd scene in the bank vault & in the rest of the movie in fact. Call me old fashioned but I like to be able to HEAR clearly what the lead character in a movie has to say.
The movie looks OK, its suitably dark in places. The plot is average at best with The Joker robbing mob banks to get their attention so he can offer to kill Batman for half their money. Heath Ledger's performance as The Joker is unimpressive as he tries far too hard to be insane & falls short most of the time, its not this ultra-dark madman that all the critics & fans will have you believe it is. Cesar Romero's Joker was scarier than that. Jack Nicholson's
Joker buries Ledger & keeps the shovel as a souvenir.
Ledger's Joker is not only not scary he's also a liar who can't keep his stories straight. Like the story of how he got the scars on his face. That his father did it or that he did it to himself with a razor to appease his wife. Make your mind up writers?
In the scene where they are having the parade for the dead Commissionar is that Noel Fielding of The Mighty Boosh as one of The Jokers gunmen? We're shown Gordon is killed (and the movie just jumped the shark at that exact moment) then Bruce Wayne offers to turn himself in as Batman to stop Joker's killing spree (a storyline I'd have prefered them pursue personally, it sounded like a much better idea) . Local District Attorney Harvey Dent (a name Batman fans will recognise right away) organises a press conference then outs himself as Batman to the surprise of Bruce Wayne.
During the prisoner transfer scene there's lots of views of Lower Whacker Drive so yet again this was filmed in Chicago & they obviously don't think anyone has ever seen The Blues Brothers. More vehicle chasing & the ONLY good moment of Ledger's Joker is him demanding Batman run him down on the motorcycle (the only time in the whole movie I believed he was insane) then Joker is captured & its revealed Gordon wasn't really dead & he's appointed Commissionar.
Telling Batman he's captured Dent & Rachel (Batman's love interest from the previous film not being played by the same actress as before but I didn't even notice that) Joker then reveals where they both are so Batman can only rescue one of them. Batman goes to where he thinks Rachel is but it turns out that's where Dent is. Rachel is killed in an explosion (unfortunately her "dead" body blinks when we see it in an awesome goof) and half of Dent's face is burnt (this is how he becomes Two-Face).
Having distracted Batman & the Police away from the station Joker uses his phone-call to detonate a bomb inside one of his men then goes to find the Japanese Mob boss that the police had in custody. The trouble with the movie is it's at least 1 hour too long. It takes too long for Dent to become Two-Face, it takes Joker too long to put his millions of plans into action & achieve all their aims. Threatening the hospitals to allow Joker to get to Dent.
The other back story (fronted by Two-Face) of 2 traitors within Gordon's unit (with the 2nd turning about to be Gordon's PA) is played alongside the main plot of The Joker trying to get people to kill each other is just one of the reasons why this movie is too long by an hour. You can't have 2 villains with 2 different agenda's. Pick 1 guy & 1 story then stick with it.
In the hostage situation it was painfully obvious that the clowns were hostages as soon as Gordon looked at them through the binoculars (only a brain dead idiot didn't work THAT out in a microsecond). To have Batman attacked by dogs a 2nd time is just to return to the start of the movie (and whats the point in doing that so close to the damn ending!) & we already knew he'd improved the costume to be bite-proof so this was a pointless scene.
The only really good scene in the whole movie is the reaction of the prisoners on the ferry (throwing their detonator out of the window). The conversation between Joker & Batman is too long and pointless, the movie should end right there (actually it should have ended over an hour ago but that's beside the point) but the director felt the need to close his final storyline with Gordon confronting Two-Face (not like Gordon ever did anything to Dent but why let a huge plot-hole like that spoil you dragging out the ending of your movie).
Two-Face shows exactly how weak (for weak read "incredibly crap paper thin plot idea") his justification of taking Gordon's family is. When a villain is actually telling you the audience that his motives are crap, you (Warner Studio's) should really be considering sacking the person who wrote the script as he's completely derailing himself as having a believable motive.
Two-Face shooting Batman is also pointless as the audience already known his costume was upgraded with Kevlar after the 2nd scene. The ending (if you can call it that) is sheer crap. Batman telling Gordon to make Dent a posthumous hero & blame the deaths he had caused on Batman. Batman telling Gordon to send the police after him. And not finding out what happened to The Joker.
An incredibly weak movie, WAY too long for its own good. Too many villains with individual story lines to follow. What little ending there is is left gapingly open to allow for a sequel which hopefully won't happen with Bale having recently been arrested for assault.
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Production Year: 2003 - Action/Adventure - Director: The Wachowski Brothers - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring:Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving, Jada Pinkett Smith, Monica Bellucci
Production Year: 2002 - Action/Adventure - Director: Vincenzo Natali - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring:Lucy Liu, David Hewlett, Anne Marie Scheffler, Joseph Scoren, Matthew Sharp, Jeremy Northam
Production Year: 1964 - Action/Adventure - Director: Cyril Endfield - Original Language: English - Classification: Parental Guidance - Starring:Stanley Baker, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Michael Caine, Nigel Green
Agree with your review; my wife & I both disliked the film intensely for all the reasons you've given, plus the ultra-violence (not bothered myself but there were kids under 10 in the cinema with their parents - I felt sorry for the latter LOL). One thing I have to disagree with tho - the Joker changed his story about his scars several times, that was the point! No-one can trust or believe anything he says. Personally I would have shot him in the head 1st chance I could instead of all the ridiculous faffing around, giving him umpteen opportunities to escape. All in all, preposterous, slightly bland and disappointing sequel to an excellent first 're-imagining'.
Amazingwoo 11.08.2008 09:42
If you are going to write a review which gives away huge, massive, whumping chunks of plotline then don't expect many people to want to read your review/s.
If you plan on writing all your film reviews in this manner, it'd be better to write them *AFTER* the film has been out for 3 months, that way, anyone that wants to see it, has seen it after the initial cinematic rush has died down.
There is a difference between 'spoiler' and 'telling everyone exactly what happens'.
techno_man_37 09.08.2008 21:59
sorry for the low rating but i feel you gave away too much of the film away, and as its meant to be a review tempting people to go see the film you will just give it away and ruin it for them.
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for Heath Ledger?), and incredibly, it lives up to all of it. But calling it the best superhero movie ever seems like faint praise, since part of what makes the mo...
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Advantages: Picture, sound, story, characters, cast etc etc etc Disadvantages: changes from full to wide screen Ion my ps3 dunno about actual blue ray player
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Aug 7th, 2008
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