Much has been written and discussed about the Batman film, “The Dark Knight”. I watched it myself on the first weekend, but I didn’t come out so much overwhelmed as rest of the audience except for the Joker part. In fact I only felt pinched since for me there’s hardly any movie that carried such tremendous potential to be perfect in every sense of the word: technically, artistically and entertainment-wise and yet failed to utilize it to the full or even most of it.
1. Batmans: In the second act of the film after the Bank Heist by Joker, the film progresses to introduce the Batman, or batmans because this also shows how he is inspiring every other guy on the street. I don’t know how this scene was necessary because neither does it give any insight to the future developments nor does it help in giving the Batman “an-applaud-worthy” entry (the later part where the Joker kidnaps one such “inspired Batman”, could have harmlessly been the first such scene). With his slow action moves and silly show off of his gadgets and weapons doesn’t quite help the movie in any way. Bottom line: one of the many scenes which should have been replaced with something more powerful and "match-able" to the prologue.
2. Harvey Falsely Admits He's Batman: After Harvey admits that he is Batman to save the real Batman from revelation, there's a chase, Joker pursuing the Gotham Police that have Harvey. Towards the end Batman speeds towards Joker only to crash himself. They should have thought of something different because we already have that sort of scene towards the end (when Harvey shoots Batman). What was his plan when he was riding the batpod towards the Joker if he didn't want to crash against him after all? With all that war-cry and no consequence, it makes the Batman look very indecisive and even dumb because for Commissioner Gordon to capture the Joker at that precise moment seems to be a lot of co-incidence rather than a planned execution.
3. Final Batman Save: The Batman goes to save the hostages where we see the clear let down of the movie: one more time the action choreography. The SWAT teams act as if they have been paid by the Batman to get beaten, if noticed closely one can clearly see them waiting to get punched by the Batman. They even react before he hits, at times. It all seems like a child’s play, not because he does it with so much ease but because it is easy. And in the Harvey Dent situation when he is shot he again pretends to be dead. Come on, after having such super strong suit and expensive gadgets, don’t you have any new idea to use instead of dropping down every time the situation's critical?
The weakness of TDK is the movie nowhere looks like a Batman flick because we get to see how wisely the Joker plays his plans, his abilities to surprise and make us laugh which in turn helps the whole character grow inside us while there is no such sequence where we are taken aback by the way the Batman does things. In fact, even the action looks so stupid that it might make a viewer doubt whether he really is the Batman or another one of his copycats. Though he does follow the cases of the Joker very closely like a detective but the moment he’s in the suit it looks like he’s still to learn how to move. I understand Christopher likes to keep it gritty and realistic but having some stylish punches being blown in slow-mo while his cape is dancing with him would have clearly brought the film many levels up. In this movie we have a lot of reasons to love the Joker but not many to love the Batman, even if the Batman catches the Joker it still seems the Batman could never match the Joker, not when it comes to his plans at least. The screenplay should have kept the Batman parallel with the Joker because it’s only when the hero and the villain match in every bit of their ability that the story becomes even more thriller.
Some editing at the start, much better choreographed action scenes and a deeper “Batman” story would have helped the movie to be on the highest level. And since they are not there in the film, I think it is slightly over rated.
Comments
Post a Comment