The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Well, Nolan fans can relax--I think I can safely say he has delivered the film you were waiting for. DKR is huge and intimate, exciting and thoughtful, and I enjoyed it very, very much. All kudos to acting, effects mavins, stunt crews, and all technical folks. This story, which brings Nolan's Batman vision to completion, pits an emotionally and physically reduced Bruce Wayne against his greatest nemesis, an occassionally unintelligible Tom Hardy as the monstrous Bane, a masked terrorist who brings Gotham to it's knees.

Ann Hathaway makes a formidable catwoman, and her flirtation with Batman is charming and the only real source of "fun" in the film. Dour and ultimately hopeful, DKR delivers what fans want, and if I have reservations, I wanted to say first that it is seriously powerful genre film-making, and should be seen in theaters.

****WARNING. SPOILERS*****

And now a couple of thoughts. Nolan loses me a bit because he was so committed to making it "realistic." Because there is a huge raft of stuff I just don't buy as realistic, in the context of the world he created. Gotham is sealed off for four months, and it simply looks too clean and ordered. There would have been enough social collapse to turn it into a burned-out war zone, with tens of thousands of casualties. How do you get enough food into the city to feed it, without also providing escape routes for thousands? Stuff like that reminded me I was watching a comic book, and that made me wonder why I wasn't having more fun. It was neither fish nor fowl in that sense. I gave it an A- originally, but I think I have to give it a "B"--what it does well, it does very very well, but I found myself enjoying stunts and effects rather than thrilling to what was happening to people I believed in. Oh...and I'm supposed to believe no citizens of Gotham would have joined in the final action? That's...outrageous. Oh, well...I still liked it, and will probably take Jason to see it this weekend.

But "Dark Knight" was the best of the three.