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Post by Incandescence 112 on Mar 10, 2022 15:17:11 GMT -8
Oh, I think there's certainly a lot of intentional political commentary in the Nolan trilogy, Dark Knight in particular. I'm just amused by folks who only notice politics in superhero films when they disagree with said politics. (Or when they point out that Christian Bale's Batman eventually turned into Christian Bale's Dick Cheney.) And even if it does well in China, I think there are a slate of other factors working against The Batman's potential box office, despite the minimal competition at the moment. The fact that it's the first film in a new series... the limited exclusive theatrical window before it heads to HBO Max... the fact that it's not playing in Russia. Aquaman surprised people when it made a billion dollars, but as you say, it makes abundant use of the sort of big, loud action spectacle that plays well on an international scale - the sort we've seen with F&F, Transformers, Ice Age, and other blockbuster franchises that make most of their money overseas. ( Joker is a more unusual example, though it was probably boosted in many theatrical circles thanks to its buzzworthy R rating and outsized media attention.) Yes, although to be fair, Lucius was pretty opposed to Batman's surveillance, and The Dark Knight Rises does admirably follow up on the fact that Bruce and Gordon's lies were pretty damn harmful. So I'd say a neoconservative reading of The Dark Knight isn't entirely supported by the text.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 10, 2022 15:21:29 GMT -8
Oh, I think there's certainly a lot of intentional political commentary in the Nolan trilogy, Dark Knight in particular. I'm just amused by folks who only notice politics in superhero films when they disagree with said politics. (Or when they point out that Christian Bale's Batman eventually turned into Christian Bale's Dick Cheney.) Yes, although to be fair, Lucius was pretty opposed to Batman's surveillance, and The Dark Knight Rises does admirably follow up on the fact that Bruce and Gordon's lies were pretty damn harmful. So I'd say a neoconservative reading of The Dark Knight isn't entirely supported by the text. Yeah. Exactly. It repeatedly states that some of Batman's and Gordon's methods are highly questionable, and very likely harmful. Anyways, regarding The Batman's box office, though it was initially reported that its production budget was only $100 million, apparently it was actually $200 million (probably partially due to all the production delays), and you'd probably have to add another ~$150 million in marketing costs. Regardless, if it simply draws in the 800 million dollar range worldwide, and they line up Joker for the sequel, I'm sure the second and third installments will draw considerably more, partly because they'll be a little lighter on the quiet detective work (which villain could possibly require more detective work than The Riddler?), with more fanciful action, and a somewhat lighter tone. Batman used to be one of the major franchises that drew more domestically than internationally, but with the ever-increasing market in China, that seems to be slowly evolving.
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Post by Jeremy on Mar 10, 2022 20:54:23 GMT -8
I think $800 million is a reasonable ballpark, all caveats and other factors included. Which would be no small potatoes, even in an age where we expect every superhero film to land a cool billion. (Although the fact that DC just postponed several of its upcoming films suggests that they're still weary over lingering Covid delays.) Yes, although to be fair, Lucius was pretty opposed to Batman's surveillance, and The Dark Knight Rises does admirably follow up on the fact that Bruce and Gordon's lies were pretty damn harmful. So I'd say a neoconservative reading of The Dark Knight isn't entirely supported by the text. Ah, but Dark Knight Rises also casts Bane as a leftist ideologue who wants to redistribute the power of Gotham to the people, with all the crime and chaos that entails. Obviously not every character in the trilogy fits the neocon reading, and Nolan does a good job juggling the different perspectives. But there's certainly evidence that the series is more right-of-center than the average superhero franchise.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 11, 2022 12:13:09 GMT -8
Yes, although to be fair, Lucius was pretty opposed to Batman's surveillance, and The Dark Knight Rises does admirably follow up on the fact that Bruce and Gordon's lies were pretty damn harmful. So I'd say a neoconservative reading of The Dark Knight isn't entirely supported by the text. Ah, but Dark Knight Rises also casts Bane as a leftist ideologue who wants to redistribute the power of Gotham to the people, with all the crime and chaos that entails. Well, Bane could just as easily be read as an insincere villain who's co-opting supposed left-wing ideology (that he doesn't actually believe in) as a cover to create chaos, before he gets back to the original plan: blowing the entire city up.
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Post by Jeremy on Mar 11, 2022 14:25:09 GMT -8
Point being, Bane is utilizing an ideology popular with a lot of Batman's critics. He may not necessarily believe in it (his personal motivations are somewhat foggy, beyond a love of chaos and destruction), but he understands how to appeal to the average Joe in a way that runs counter to what Batman is used to.
Developments like this help set the Nolan trilogy (even in its weaker moments) apart from a lot of other superhero fare. The films are aware that Batman's tough-on-crime, surveillance-heavy methods are controversial, but they also assert that other potential solutions - even and especially those that the masses are susceptible to - are not necessarily better ones.
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Post by Incandescence 112 on Mar 11, 2022 20:44:49 GMT -8
Point being, Bane is utilizing an ideology popular with a lot of Batman's critics. He may not necessarily believe in it (his personal motivations are somewhat foggy, beyond a love of chaos and destruction), but he understands how to appeal to the average Joe in a way that runs counter to what Batman is used to. Developments like this help set the Nolan trilogy (even in its weaker moments) apart from a lot of other superhero fare. The films are aware that Batman's tough-on-crime, surveillance-heavy methods are controversial, but they also assert that other potential solutions - even and especially those that the masses are susceptible to - are not necessarily better ones. It also does its best to keep the creator's own politics pretty far out of it. At their core they' lean more philosophical than political, which is an interesting counterpoint to the oft-repeated truism that claims that it's impossible for art to be about anything other than politics. Jonathan Nolan said as much during an interview where he was asked why The Dark Knight and Person of Interest weren't more critical of the surveillance state--that he was more interested in leaving audiences to decide for themselves.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 13, 2022 19:56:50 GMT -8
The Dark Knight was airing on TV last night, and I flipped it on as it came up to the last scene with Harvey Dent. Beyond what I said earlier about Dent targeting Gordon not feeling earned on a script level, I just find Eckhart's performance in the scene rather hollow. In retrospect, I wonder how it would've come off had Matt Damon not passed on the role, because to me, he's a superior actor to Eckhart, and he may have brought more nuance to the scene than existed on the page. Of course, he's also a bigger name who might've been more distracting for the audience in the role, and some may have said that he was "too short" for the role, based on the visual representation of Dent in the comics. Anyways, Eckhart's not the only problem with the scene, because it also features Batman pleading with him with that uber-raspy, out-of-breath, modulated voice, which feels even goofier to me than before, now that I've seen Pattinson pull off such an effective Batman voice.
That said, if the next Matt Reeves-directed Batman movie is a bit less sullen (likely, given the arc of the story) and claustrophobic, and is as carefully-cast as The Batman in its key roles (though I'm sure many of these actors will be returning in some capacity), I think it's gonna end up being my favourite live-action version of the Batman universe. To me, Pattinson's easily the best live-action Batman (look, body-language, and line-delivery-wise), this is the most fully-realized version of Gotham City (feeling very foreboding and stylized, but still like a large city), and the cinematography, dramatic score and action choreography are all the best. Also, Reeves allows for more quiet, atmospheric, and nuanced moments between passages of dialogue, unlike the Nolans, who spell virtually everything out on the page, and I enjoy being able to soak things in rather than having my hand held the entire time. Cinema!
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Post by Jay on Mar 14, 2022 7:31:51 GMT -8
Just caught up on the ideological conversations and yeah, they're interesting when they come up especially for Bane's weird match to Batman. I can think of other films which have interesting politics (cough, Ghostbusters) which may not 100% square with their fanbases.
I am probably going to see the latest Bat-Movie next week. Among the points of intrigue, a colleague seems to like Battinson the best now among them, people mentioning that Gotham is quite distinctive within it whereas Nolan's vision was "yeah it's just Chicago" (and living in Chicago now, I get it), and my cousin was apparently one of Battinson's lesser stunt doubles, so I'm going to need to watch the end credits like a hawk to see if his name pops up because it wasn't on IMDB last I saw.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 14, 2022 11:16:17 GMT -8
...people mentioning that Gotham is quite distinctive within it whereas Nolan's vision was "yeah it's just Chicago" (and living in Chicago now, I get it)... It's not so much that "it's just Chicago", but that in The Dark Knight, Gotham is meant to be in disarray ("everyone loses their minds", says Joker), yet visually, it looks pretty clean, and the streets are relatively empty, particularly during the big action centerpiece with the big rig and whatnot. So, to a great degee, Nolan tells rather than shows. Now, they do make more effort to show anarchy in the streets in The Dark Knight Rises, but Pittsburgh (where many of the key sequences take place) still looks pretty tidy overall, and isn't in keeping with the general ideal of Gotham ("the worst major American city"). Apparently The Batman was filmed about 80% on sound stages (likely due to the pandemic, to a certain degree), but it's blended with parts of Chicago, New York, and areas in England and Scotland (with older architecture) to create a more vivid, fully-realized, dark and oppressive environment, where it's always raining. It's probably closer to Blade Runner visually than the Nolan pictures. (I should, of course, note that Gotham did seem well-realized in the The Narrows sections of Batman Begins, but they pretty much abandoned that look with future films, never returning to that set.)
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Post by otherscott on Mar 14, 2022 16:50:10 GMT -8
Okay I watched this as well and was quite impressed. I thought it had a very strong and unique voice, which superhero movies can sometimes struggle with. It's the first Batman movie I know of (and maybe Jeremy can correct me) that you can definitively refer to as a "noir", though it shares a lot of elements with The Dark Knight as well.
I tend to agree with J.C. on the thematic content. I think it was subtle and more understated than Nolan but I wouldn't call that the same as underdeveloped. I think the commentary is really the spine of the movie, but I think it takes similar cynical political motifs as Joker and softens them, whereas The Dark Knight mostly remains in the realm of the philosophical rather than the political. I think the things that The Dark Knight covers are far more interesting to me than the themes of The Batman, but the I really did think they got the balance in that sense right. The acting of Pattinson in particular is absolutely top notch, the best Batman has ever been, particularly in the suit. And as mentioned, Giacchino does a great job of integrating the music into the movie rather than just making it a background soundtrack.
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Post by Jeremy on Mar 14, 2022 20:28:25 GMT -8
I think some of the animated Batman movies can be convincingly classified as noir (notably Mask of the Phantasm and direct comic adaptations like Year One); this is probably his first live-action film that really fits the mold.
A lot of folks are really loving this film, and it's clearly gaining positive word-of-mouth. I think that - going on technical aspects (performances, action, cinematography, music) - there is plenty to appreciate. Most of the film's problems are at a story level (character, plot, structure, pace, messaging), where I probably put more emphasis than many other viewers.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 14, 2022 20:44:18 GMT -8
I tend to agree with J.C. on the thematic content. I think it was subtle and more understated than Nolan but I wouldn't call that the same as underdeveloped. Exactly. Well put.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 14, 2022 20:59:33 GMT -8
A lot of folks are really loving this film, and it's clearly gaining positive word-of-mouth. I think that - going on technical aspects (performances, action, cinematography, music) - there is plenty to appreciate. Most of the film's problems are at a story level (character, plot, structure, pace, messaging), where I probably put more emphasis than many other viewers. Nah, I respond as strongly to characters and stories as anyone: I just happen to appreciate when the films they're in have strong technical craft as well, because that enhances the visual storytelling, and distinguishes them from standard network TV dramas (which are often glorified radio plays). So, yeah, I don't have any significant issues with the film's characters, plot, structure, pace, or messaging. And I found it more poignant in its climactic moments than any previous Batman film: got rather choked up quite a few times over the course of the film, and found most of the emotion of the piece genuinely well-earned. I'm very confident that this film will stand the test-ot-time, having seen it multiple times already. (And I also wouldn't classify performances strictly under "technical" aspects: they're as key to compelling characters as most anything in a script.)
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Post by otherscott on Mar 15, 2022 6:54:59 GMT -8
I also don't have a problem with the characters, plot or pacing. None of that is groundbreaking enough to get a 5/5 stars from me or anything, but there's also no real flaws to it either. I thought it actually ran pretty smoothly for a 3 hour movie. I think there's real questions about whether it NEEDED to be 3 hours long, but I also don't think there was a lull or anything that was an obvious cut or paper over point.
I also don't think the movie is much of a character piece to be fair. Batman is the only character with significant time dedicated to him and it doesn't go very deep even then. As I said, I think the political themes and particularly the presentation are the backbone of the movie moreso than characterization.
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Post by ThirdMan on Mar 15, 2022 10:53:30 GMT -8
I think the entire cast of core characters were fleshed-out more than well enough in service of the story they were trying to tell. Thought Batman, Selina, Gordon, and Riddler were given a good amount of attention, and others, like Penguin, Falcone, and Alfred, shined in their key moments (Farrell, in particular, made every moment he was onscreen count, even though he was playing a somewhat-familiar gangster archetype). To me, all of the key actors had good chemistry with Pattinson as well, particularly Kravitz and Wright. And Dano's Riddler is probably my second-favourite villain performance in a live-action Batman film after Ledger's Joker: he takes some chances, and gets quite theatrical at times, but it mostly pays off.
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