Dark Knight Rises + some funny things
Jul. 23rd, 2012 10:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sarea
OK so, I saw The Dark Knight Rises. I was disappointed. I'm going to be like one of 10 people in the world who didn't like it, and I've made my peace with that. It was the same with Lost in Translation (*fistbumps adelagia*). But anyway, before I talk about the movie and the issues I had with it, let me share something non-spoilery that happened before the movie began.
The first thing I said tocorianderstem when the theater lights dimmed was, "I hope we get a Bourne Legacy trailer." I was so excited when those familiar opening frames started playing. I've seen that particular trailer a hundred times online, but never in the theater, and seeing it on a huge screen was super awesome. However, it was the very last trailer, and the theater we were at likes to do this showy thing where they LOWER THE CURTAINS AGAIN before the actual feature presentation, so the final minute or so of the BL trailer was obscured by the FUCKING CURTAINS!!!!! Which then rose again to show the actual movie! Seriously? SERIOUSLY?! I was so fucking annoyed. Like anyone needs the fake anticipation of the curtains rising again for the actual movie. Totally ruined the only big-theater viewing of the BL trailer that I've seen. -.- You know, if you're going to insist on doing something like that, do it RIGHT and just STOP the projector AFTER all the trailers are DONE. Gawd. :-l x 1000000000000000000000
The Dark Knight Rises
- The movie was nearly 3 hours long and I was kind of bored the whole time. I literally fell asleep (only for seconds) about 3 times.
- The whole time I was watching, I was like, what am I missing? What are people getting from these endless monologues that I'm not? END.LESS. MONO.LOGUES.
- It was bleak without any humor -- or rather, the humor there was, I found obvious/not funny. I understand it was supposed to be dark, but I really don't need 3 hours of it from a comic book movie. It takes itself way too seriously.
- Alfred was so fucking overwrought, omg.
- I just don't fucking CARE about Gotham. The fact that he's doing all this for the city means nothing to me. I kept wondering, "Do other people actually care about Gotham? Like, do they get all choked up and shit that he's willing to burn his life to ashes for a fucking city? Not even the world, but a CITY? That just seems to be aiming so low. And what the FUCK is so fucking great about this city ANYway? It's like any other big city in the world, there's nothing special about it! Move to Chicago!" (I understand that Gotham is supposed to represent NYC or any city in the world, and thus actually make people relate to it, but after all the superhero movies and other disaster films in which the entire world is at risk, going through all this to save one stupid/regular city, as if it were Mecca, is just so dull.)
- I wondered if I was being unfair because I love The Avengers so much. But I really don't think that was it. I went into the movie with a clear heart and willingness to be blown away. Granted I'm not as into Christian Bale as I used to be, and yeah, I'm not really into Anne Hathaway, but I still liked the franchise and the first two movies were sooooo good. It WAS a little distracting that the cast made it seem like Inception Returns, but I loved Inception so that part wasn't a huge deal.
- SO MUCH of the movie was utterly predictable. Even the parts I didn't predict -- like Marion being Ra's al Ghul's daughter -- was kind of meh, this has been done before. Not really that great a twist. Plus, maybe it's just me, but I AM DONE SO DONE WITH RA'S AL GHUL, period. Why does it always have to come back to him??? Thank goodness there are no more movies, or we'd have to sit through his cousin's wife's nephew's daughter-in-law coming back to finish his work!
- I actually liked that they didn't do the obvious Batman/Catwoman thing... except that they did, at the end. So that one small part that I sort-of liked, they took away.
- And Catwoman, ugh. My big problem with Catwoman was not that she was played by Anne Hathaway, who did a decent job with it. I liked the character fine. My problem with THIS MOVIE'S Catwoman was that she was so GENERIC. She didn't even have to BE Catwoman. She could have been any spunky woman! Even though people revile the old Batman franchise, I actually really LIKED Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman/Selina Kyle. She really stood out as a character. Whereas this Catwoman, because they were trying to make a "serious" comic book movie, was just some... regular woman, not like, yesssssss Catwoman. But I know they can do it, because they totally did it with the Joker!
- Bruce and Selina ending up together at the end was kind of out of the blue, given that there were barely any hints of it in the movie. In fact, I totally thought she was gay and had a thing going with Juno Temple! I actually admired them going that unpredictable route... until they didn't.
- I kept waiting for the movie to grab me and it just never did. I have no problem with bleak movies (The End of the Affair and Jude are two of my favorite movies, for god's sake), but... I don't know, I guess I need FUN from my comic book movies and there was almost NO part of this movie that was fun. Whereas The Avengers was like, all fun, all the time, just try and stop us -- FUN -- see, you can't. I mean, both of the first two Batman films had elements of fun in them, despite the darker tone. This one was just /wrists the whole time.
- For full disclosure about my preferences, I admit I generally like the origin story more than what follows. Whenever there's a series, I almost always enjoy the first movie and not the subsequent ones. Or rather, I almost always enjoy the first one the MOST. I notice that sequels always tend to get super complicated with characters and plot to the point that it becomes incomprehensible. TDK (movie #2) wasn't too bad in that regard; I may not have liked it as much as other people did but I still enjoyed it and thought it was a good movie. I was perfectly willing (and did) see it in the theater multiple times. But TDK Rises totally falls prey to the same problems as typical sequels, in that everything is bigger and badder, EXCEPT for the storyline/plot/enjoyability of the movie. I SO do not want to see it again, even though I had already made tentative plans with a couple of people before I saw it, to do so. Now I'm going to have to be like, "Sorry, no can do." I cannot put myself through it again.
- Random: It was kind of crazy how many familiar faces were in the movie, with really bit parts.
* Desmond Harrington playing the cop who won't let Joseph Gordon-Levitt (incidentally, one of the more enjoyable parts of the movie) pass.
* Aidan Gillen, from Game of Thrones and The Wire. The opening scene of the movie, which was a "cookie" that was released early, was very enjoyable.
* Robert Wisdom, from The Wire and Prison Break
* Other Prison Break vets Reggie Lee and Wade Williams
* Nestor Carbonell, from Lost and Ringer
* Juno Temple, who seemed more familiar than she should have, considering from her credits I would've only been able to see her in The Other Boleyn Girl, Atonement, and Notes on a Scandal, none of which she would have had a huge role in and which are not movies that particularly stand out to me.
After the movie, C. and I went to eat at the Ballard El Camion, which just has such yummy food. And long lines that don't let up.
On Saturdayadelagia, slitherhither and I ended up having an impromptu Taiwanese cuisine day, starting with Boiling Point and ending with Henry's Taiwan. It was lovely to see B., who is so busy these days that we rarely get to see her. In between, we played Pandemic and had frozen yogurt at Peaks.
Did you know you can play Pandemic for free here? (When I toldjade_okelani she was like, "Well now when are we ever going to do anything else?") It's kind of clunky and not as satisfying as actually playing with the actual pieces, but still, it totally works. The only thing is that it's a German site, so it's half in English and half in German, which makes for a somewhat confusing/frustrating experience getting started, lol. But yay that I can brush up on my (nonexistent) German? akscully was a very good sport and helped me figure it out, even though by the time we finished playing a couple of games with Jade it was like 4 in the morning for her. :))
Two hilariously funny things from Tumblr recently:
1)
Best response to a typo ever. Seriously, this makes me laugh so hard every time I see it. It's just so ridiculous. I think I might have to frame it and put it up somewhere in the house, because every time I encounter it, it's going to cheer me up.
2) "Scary Smash" - Kids make up a story, adults act it out. This one stars Joss Whedon. It's awesome.
adelagia*). But anyway, before I talk about the movie and the issues I had with it, let me share something non-spoilery that happened before the movie began.The first thing I said to
corianderstem when the theater lights dimmed was, "I hope we get a Bourne Legacy trailer." I was so excited when those familiar opening frames started playing. I've seen that particular trailer a hundred times online, but never in the theater, and seeing it on a huge screen was super awesome. However, it was the very last trailer, and the theater we were at likes to do this showy thing where they LOWER THE CURTAINS AGAIN before the actual feature presentation, so the final minute or so of the BL trailer was obscured by the FUCKING CURTAINS!!!!! Which then rose again to show the actual movie! Seriously? SERIOUSLY?! I was so fucking annoyed. Like anyone needs the fake anticipation of the curtains rising again for the actual movie. Totally ruined the only big-theater viewing of the BL trailer that I've seen. -.- You know, if you're going to insist on doing something like that, do it RIGHT and just STOP the projector AFTER all the trailers are DONE. Gawd. :-l x 1000000000000000000000The Dark Knight Rises
- The movie was nearly 3 hours long and I was kind of bored the whole time. I literally fell asleep (only for seconds) about 3 times.
- The whole time I was watching, I was like, what am I missing? What are people getting from these endless monologues that I'm not? END.LESS. MONO.LOGUES.
- It was bleak without any humor -- or rather, the humor there was, I found obvious/not funny. I understand it was supposed to be dark, but I really don't need 3 hours of it from a comic book movie. It takes itself way too seriously.
- Alfred was so fucking overwrought, omg.
- I just don't fucking CARE about Gotham. The fact that he's doing all this for the city means nothing to me. I kept wondering, "Do other people actually care about Gotham? Like, do they get all choked up and shit that he's willing to burn his life to ashes for a fucking city? Not even the world, but a CITY? That just seems to be aiming so low. And what the FUCK is so fucking great about this city ANYway? It's like any other big city in the world, there's nothing special about it! Move to Chicago!" (I understand that Gotham is supposed to represent NYC or any city in the world, and thus actually make people relate to it, but after all the superhero movies and other disaster films in which the entire world is at risk, going through all this to save one stupid/regular city, as if it were Mecca, is just so dull.)
- I wondered if I was being unfair because I love The Avengers so much. But I really don't think that was it. I went into the movie with a clear heart and willingness to be blown away. Granted I'm not as into Christian Bale as I used to be, and yeah, I'm not really into Anne Hathaway, but I still liked the franchise and the first two movies were sooooo good. It WAS a little distracting that the cast made it seem like Inception Returns, but I loved Inception so that part wasn't a huge deal.
- SO MUCH of the movie was utterly predictable. Even the parts I didn't predict -- like Marion being Ra's al Ghul's daughter -- was kind of meh, this has been done before. Not really that great a twist. Plus, maybe it's just me, but I AM DONE SO DONE WITH RA'S AL GHUL, period. Why does it always have to come back to him??? Thank goodness there are no more movies, or we'd have to sit through his cousin's wife's nephew's daughter-in-law coming back to finish his work!
- I actually liked that they didn't do the obvious Batman/Catwoman thing... except that they did, at the end. So that one small part that I sort-of liked, they took away.
- And Catwoman, ugh. My big problem with Catwoman was not that she was played by Anne Hathaway, who did a decent job with it. I liked the character fine. My problem with THIS MOVIE'S Catwoman was that she was so GENERIC. She didn't even have to BE Catwoman. She could have been any spunky woman! Even though people revile the old Batman franchise, I actually really LIKED Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman/Selina Kyle. She really stood out as a character. Whereas this Catwoman, because they were trying to make a "serious" comic book movie, was just some... regular woman, not like, yesssssss Catwoman. But I know they can do it, because they totally did it with the Joker!
- Bruce and Selina ending up together at the end was kind of out of the blue, given that there were barely any hints of it in the movie. In fact, I totally thought she was gay and had a thing going with Juno Temple! I actually admired them going that unpredictable route... until they didn't.
- I kept waiting for the movie to grab me and it just never did. I have no problem with bleak movies (The End of the Affair and Jude are two of my favorite movies, for god's sake), but... I don't know, I guess I need FUN from my comic book movies and there was almost NO part of this movie that was fun. Whereas The Avengers was like, all fun, all the time, just try and stop us -- FUN -- see, you can't. I mean, both of the first two Batman films had elements of fun in them, despite the darker tone. This one was just /wrists the whole time.
- For full disclosure about my preferences, I admit I generally like the origin story more than what follows. Whenever there's a series, I almost always enjoy the first movie and not the subsequent ones. Or rather, I almost always enjoy the first one the MOST. I notice that sequels always tend to get super complicated with characters and plot to the point that it becomes incomprehensible. TDK (movie #2) wasn't too bad in that regard; I may not have liked it as much as other people did but I still enjoyed it and thought it was a good movie. I was perfectly willing (and did) see it in the theater multiple times. But TDK Rises totally falls prey to the same problems as typical sequels, in that everything is bigger and badder, EXCEPT for the storyline/plot/enjoyability of the movie. I SO do not want to see it again, even though I had already made tentative plans with a couple of people before I saw it, to do so. Now I'm going to have to be like, "Sorry, no can do." I cannot put myself through it again.
- Random: It was kind of crazy how many familiar faces were in the movie, with really bit parts.
* Desmond Harrington playing the cop who won't let Joseph Gordon-Levitt (incidentally, one of the more enjoyable parts of the movie) pass.
* Aidan Gillen, from Game of Thrones and The Wire. The opening scene of the movie, which was a "cookie" that was released early, was very enjoyable.
* Robert Wisdom, from The Wire and Prison Break
* Other Prison Break vets Reggie Lee and Wade Williams
* Nestor Carbonell, from Lost and Ringer
* Juno Temple, who seemed more familiar than she should have, considering from her credits I would've only been able to see her in The Other Boleyn Girl, Atonement, and Notes on a Scandal, none of which she would have had a huge role in and which are not movies that particularly stand out to me.
After the movie, C. and I went to eat at the Ballard El Camion, which just has such yummy food. And long lines that don't let up.
On Saturday
adelagia, slitherhither and I ended up having an impromptu Taiwanese cuisine day, starting with Boiling Point and ending with Henry's Taiwan. It was lovely to see B., who is so busy these days that we rarely get to see her. In between, we played Pandemic and had frozen yogurt at Peaks.Did you know you can play Pandemic for free here? (When I told
jade_okelani she was like, "Well now when are we ever going to do anything else?") It's kind of clunky and not as satisfying as actually playing with the actual pieces, but still, it totally works. The only thing is that it's a German site, so it's half in English and half in German, which makes for a somewhat confusing/frustrating experience getting started, lol. But yay that I can brush up on my (nonexistent) German? akscully was a very good sport and helped me figure it out, even though by the time we finished playing a couple of games with Jade it was like 4 in the morning for her. :))Two hilariously funny things from Tumblr recently:
1)
Best response to a typo ever. Seriously, this makes me laugh so hard every time I see it. It's just so ridiculous. I think I might have to frame it and put it up somewhere in the house, because every time I encounter it, it's going to cheer me up.
2) "Scary Smash" - Kids make up a story, adults act it out. This one stars Joss Whedon. It's awesome.
