Lucy (2014)

Title: Lucy (2014)

Director: Luc Besson

Cast: Scarlett Johansson, Morgan Freeman, Min-Sik Choi

They are calling Lucy a “Stoner Film” and I would have to agree, the film does have an emphasis on abstract visuals, sometimes goint into what I like to call “trippy territory”, or what a more eloquent reviewer would call “surrealism”, these are dream like sequences in the film that don’t necessarily adhere to logic or reason. Luc Besson, the French director/producer/writer behind Lucy has always been a very eclectic type of director, and one of my favorites. He’s made all kinds of films throughout his career, for example, just recently he directed Robert Deniro and Michelle Pfiffer in The Family (2013). He’s also done dramatic films like Leon: TheProfessional (1994), which I still think is one of his best. The one film in Besson’s repertoire that made me think he was the right director for a film like Lucy was The Fifth Element (1997) primarily because The Fifth Element is such an effects driven film, and Lucy is most certainly an effect heavy film. The previews for Lucy got me excited because I love it when Besson does sci-fi, he always strives to show us something we’ve never seen before. He takes his imagination to new frontiers in his films, and I love that sense of escapism he infuses in some of them. So did Besson ‘wow’ us once again like he’s done with his previous films? 

Lucy is all about a woman who is suddenly thrust into a world of drug trafficking, a world she knows nothing about. Yet as fate would have it she ends up as a courier, transporting an extremely powerful experimental drug that makes your brain function at 100% capacity. Problem is that the packet she’s carrying burst open inside of her body! Almost immediately the drug gets into her blood stream and it isn’t long before Lucy begins to experiment what it means to have your brain functioning at full capacity. She soon starts learning everything that the mind can achieve when it is in full power! She starts developing these amazing abilities that she didn’t know she had!

So this film has many good things going for it, first off, it’s all about the visuals, Lucy acquires amazing powers and starts using them, with each passing moment she becomes more and more powerful, which offers us these awesome moments where she displays her new abilities. That’s where the strength of the film is at, in the visuals. Lucy acquires amazing powers like telepathy and telekinesis! Also, in Lucy we go back in humanities history, we analyze humanity, where we began, what we’ve evolved into, why have we done what we’ve done with the planet and all that, which was cool, and of course, all these themes lend themselves for awesome effects that brought to mind scenes from Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1969), actually in more ways than one. Sure, there’s the surreal element, but also because it has to do with collecting all of humanities knowledge in one super computer, which immediately brought to mind the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey, which is also a super computer. Lucy’s plot about the experimental drug that enhances your brain brought to mind Limitless (2011) because both films play with the same idea, the only difference is that Lucy goes a bit further with the idea by entering into the realm of time travel and telekinesis.

The only real let down for me with this movie is that since it comes from Luc Besson, the director of The Fifth Element (1999), well, I was expecting something as epic and huge as The Fifth Element, but in reality, Lucy is actually a ‘small film’ with big ideas. As it is, I was expecting for the film to end with a bang, instead it ends with a whimper, and a promise of future films. It has that kind of open ending that leaves you with a huge question mark in your head. But overall, I had a blast with it, it just needed something extra to make it truly awesome. The ending leaves you wondering what’s next? Kind of like the ending for Highlander (1984) where you are left wondering what the main character is going to do with his new found powers and knowledge. What I’m saying a Besson fan might leave the theater feeling underwhelemed, but overall, Lucy’s an action packed film, with car chases, shoot outs, telekinesis, surreal imagery and thought provoking themes. Plus we have the ever beautiful Scarlett Johansson, who continues to amaze with her beauty and as a performer. I’m hoping they do make a sequel, I’d love to see where else they can go from here because I was left wanting more, which I’m sure was the filmmakers purpose from the get go.

Rating: 4 out of 5      

  

Transcendence (2014)

Title: Transcendence (2014)

Director: Wally Pfister

Cast: Johnny Depp, Rebecca Hall, Paul Bettany, Cillian Murphy, Morgan Freeman

Funny story with this movie: I went to see it on what Catholics call Holy Friday and on that day, actually that whole weekend, well, theaters where flooded with church religious folks going to see either God is not Dead (2014) or Heaven is for Real (2014). So I felt out of place going to see Transcendence which touches upon the dangers of religious fanaticism, from a more philosophical angle. Transcendence is a movie against religion, not for it. Funny part is that the theater that was playing God is not Dead was right next to the one playing Transcendence and both films were starting at the same time. The interesting part is that I could  see people entering in droves to God is not Dead while every once in a while, somebody would go into Transcendence and my first thought how this was all so symbolic of what goes on in the world. So very few people are inclined towards the philosophical, the thought provoking. 

I’m of the mind that religion is dying off little by little and that thanks to the help of the internet and social media, people are slowly realizing just how much of a fairy tale religion is. The powers that be know this, which explains the avalanche of religious flicks we’ve being seeing lately. It almost feels like a desperate attempt to inject society with religiosity again. The powers that be also control Hollywood and they know how to use it well. I mean, even Hitler realized the power of cinema to transmit his ideas! So anyhow, this avalanche of Christian movies is to me, the lowest type of religious propaganda, so sleazy, so obvious in its desperation. There could be another explanation for the recent onslaught of religious flicks: money. Religious people don’t need much to get all fired up and Hollywood knows it. This explains why a prejudiced film like God is not Dead is making money. Hollywood knows this is an untapped market, and it seems they now want to exploit it as much as possible. I mean, this month alone we had 3 religious themed films! And they all have these titles that make it obvious they have an agenda. God is not Dead….Heaven is for Real…I'm in Love with a Church Girl….these titles let us see the kind of ideas that they want to infuse into society. God isn’t dead no matter what your university teachers tell ya! Heaven is Real, look at this little kid who went to heaven...and when you marry, make sure she’s a church girl! What the?! What’s next? A film called Science is the Antichrist?  

I mean, it’s not like films about ‘not believing’ are so obvious with their titles. Just look at a film like Transcendence; there’s nothing to tell you that it’s a film about religious fanaticism, the themes are not blunt or in your face. The themes are not even implied in the films title! Nope, the films themes are hidden behind meanings and symbolisms; you don’t feel like you’re being preached to. With films like God is not Dead and Heaven is for Real, I feel like am being preached at from seeing the previews alone! So anyways, there I was, doing my part in supporting a philosophical film with interesting themes and intriguing cyberpunk elements which I am a sucker for, unfortunately Transcendence wasn’t a very exciting film. Sure it was philosophical, and sure it had interesting concepts which I was diggin’ for the most part, unfortunately it all builds up to nothing. I wanted a bigger bang for my sci-fi buck! Unfortunately the filmmakers weren’t all that interested in showing us anything amazing or mind blowing.

The thing with this movie is that it had all the appropriate elements to deliver something thought provoking and cool at the same time. The concept of artificial intelligence becoming sentient, fully aware of its existence is incredibly interesting to me. It presents us with the terrifying notion that computers might one day think, like us, or for us. It goes even further and plays with the ideas of transferring our consciousness into an artificial intelligence, so that it might duplicate us in a way, so that we might, in a way, live forever. Of course the logic behind it is a lot of bullshit science, the kind of science that they show us in films where complicated scientific procedures are explained away with a simple sentence. And that’s fine as far as I’m concerned, I don’t need things to be explained to me, this side of the film reminded me of the dream traveling technology in Inception (2010) which is never explained in the film. It’s like the famous ‘McGuffin’ , you don’t really need to know what it is, or how it works. What matters is how we go from point A to point B. Unfortunately point B in Transcendence takes us nowhere. Interesting concepts are presented but never taken to their full potential, I feel they could have pushed things a bit further, they played it too safe in my book.

The film kind of contradicts itself because it presents us with Will Caster, a scientist who has successfully transferred his consciousness into the internet. He follows all the steps that a cult leader follows in order to build his empire. He buys land, he builds a society apart from the rest of humanity, and then he starts attracting parishioners by promising them paradise. I couldn’t help but think about David Koresh and his shenanigans in Waco, Texas, or Jim Jones and his Jonestown in Guyana. The problem is that the character of Will Caster isn’t really evil; he creates technology that actually helps humanity. His creations would make the world a better place, so then why does the film make it a point to portray him as an evil religious leader? So which is it, is he the leader of a zombie religion, or is he the savior of humanity? It’s not just that this character has that duality to it; it’s just that the character contradicts itself. The film is a jumbled mess in my book. It’s one that wanted to play with heavy themes, but ultimately didn’t know how to develop them in the best way possible. I mean, we're even presented with the idea of living in a world where technology has dissapeared from the face of the earth, which would have made an even more interesting film, but alas, they only hint at it. 

Ultimately, the biggest sin this film has going for it is that it was not entertaining. The ending is so incredibly dull I was literally fighting to stay awake. I guess a lot can be explained by the fact that this film was directed by cinematographer turned director Wally Pfister. The problem with technical guys becoming directors is that they just don’t have that vision necessary to tell a story in an entertaining or visually interesting fashion. Just because you’ve worked behind the scenes all your life, doesn’t mean you’d make a good director. Sure there are exceptions, but more often than not, technicians and writers don’t always make good directors. Examples of this are Blade Trinity (2004), Virus (1999), Spawn (1997), Eragon (2006), all directed by writers and special effects guys who suddenly wanted to take a stab at directing. I’m not saying that Transcendence is a terrible film because it does offer us interesting concepts and at times interesting visuals, but aside from being dull beyond measure, it even has great actors in roles that go nowhere! Cillian Murphy and Morgan Freeman are next to useless here. To me, Transcendence feels unfinished or half assed; it didn’t push its concepts all the way. And those are some of the worst cinematic sins in my book; a missed opportunity every step of the way.

Rating: 2 ½ out of 5   

Johnny Handsome (1989)

Title: Johnny Handsome (1989)

Director: Walter Hill

Cast: Mickey Rourke, Ellen Barkin, Elizabeth McGovern, Morgan Freeman, Forest Whitaker, Lance Henriksen  

Review:

I did an article a while back called 16 of the Top ‘Revengiest’Revenge Movies; in it I included these films where something awful happens to the main character, but then things turn around and eventually the main character gets his or her revenge, usually in pretty gruesome ways. I didn’t include the film I’ll be reviewing today because I had not seen it in such a long time. When I first saw Johnny Handsome I must’ve been about 13; all I remembered about Johnny Handsome was its basic premise and the fact that I liked the story a lot. There’s something gratifying about revenge tales, they always start out with something awful happening to the good guy of the film, then in the end whamo! That sweet, sweet revenge. The bad guys get what they deserved and the good guy gets his revenge. Though in this sense, Walter Hill’s Johnny Handsome is a bit different than most revenge films, Johnny isn’t your typical good guy, he’s actually a crook.

In Johnny Handsome we meet John Sedley, moments before he pulls off a diamond heist. John is not just any crook though, he is a mastermind in pulling off robberies. Also, his face is severely disfigured due to an anomaly in his genes. His deformity doesn’t stop him from doing what he has to do. Johnny is pulling off this diamond heist with the help of two individuals. One is a tomboyish lady called Sunny Boyd (Ellen Barkin) and the other a low life called Rafe Garrett (Lance Henriksen).  The three stick up the diamond store, and as we might expect in this kind of movie, things get ugly. The cops are called upon and at the last minute Rafe and Sunny decide to double cross Johnny and shoot him and the owner of the store, their idea is to keep the loot to themselves. Rafe and Sunny leave John for dead, unfortunately for them, John doesn’t die. Instead, he is rescued by the police and taken to a hospital where he is given the opportunity to jumpstart his life. You see, the doctors want to perform a surgery on him that could give him a normal face again. Will he take this opportunity to begin again? Or will he go back to his old ways?

It occurred to me that Johnny Handsome plays out a lot like a ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’ story where the main character has a duality about him. He has his good natured/kind side, and he’s got his evil side, which he is at battle with. Johnny used to be a crook, because his looks led him to become an outcast, ridiculed and made fun of all his life. But what happens when he gets his face back and he no longer looks like a monster?  What kind of battle will be waged with the demons inside of him? This is what is at the center of this story. Johnny is even given a chance to fall in love with a beautiful woman, and lead a normal life, unfortunately, his former life calls him. Revenge calls him. Should he heed its call?

This is a Walter Hill film, so it’s not just any director we’re talking about here. This is the guy behind such action packed 80’s classics as 48 Hours (1982), Extreme Prejudice (1987) and Red Heat (1988). Hill’s a director whose films are very male oriented, he makes films for guys to holler and cheer at, they are about tough dudes, shoot outs, guns and explosions; tough dudes and sexy ladies. This time around things are a bit different though; not that Johnny Handsome doesn’t have its fare share of action and shoot outs, but the story is told in a more film noir style. It’s darker, grittier, more character driven. The film starts with a shootout and ends with a shootout, the middle of the film is the whole process of Johnny going from looking like a monster, to looking like Mickey Rourke before he turned to boxing. Funny how in real life, Rourke know looks like Johnny before the operation, oh the irony of life!

Hill invests a good amount of time getting you to know Johnny, getting you to feel for him. Rourke does a good job here, he plays the tormented soul, you feel like he’s the Frankenstein monster or something; a misunderstood creature who’s just looking for some love. At first, when we first meet Johnny he looks like a deformed monster, similar to the character that Eric Stoltz played in Peter Bogdanovich’s The Mask (1985), someone deformed because of genetic defects.  The character of Johnny also reminded me of Marv, another beat up character that Rourke played in Robert Rodriguez’s Sin City (2005). During the first half of the film, Rourke plays his character through heavy amounts of makeup. But half way through the film, after the operation, he transforms, and then we get the real Mickey Rourke, the mind boggles at how much Rourke has changed through the years! The rest of the film is populated by an excellent cast of supporting characters. Ellen Barkin has always been great at playing these rough, tom boyish ladies, on this show she plays a woman with no moral values whatsoever, she hangs out in bars, being a whore, stealing, killing and double crossing. She hangs out with low lives like Henriksen’s Rafe Garrett. Henriksen has always been great at playing villains, here he plays the main baddy, not much of a stretch acting wise, but he gets the job done. Rounding things up are Morgan Freeman as a cop who knows Johnny’s true nature, and Forest Whitaker as the doctor who operates on Johnny. Whitaker plays the guy who wants to give Johnny that second chance to improve himself, the guy with hopes that we can all change.

Johnny Handsome is a very underrated Walter Hill film. The film didn’t hit it big in theaters, in fact, it was a downright flop. It cost 20 million to make but only raked in 7.2 at the box office. I guess the film really didn’t connect with audiences for some reason. A pity because the film is a good revenge tale, and it has an excellent cast, this is the kind of film that makes you wonder why exactly did it slip through the cracks? Maybe it was due to the fact that it had some hefty competition at the box office. Upon it’s release it went up against Ridley Scott’s Black Rain (1989), which by the way was the #1 film that week, and it also went up against Sea of Love (1989) which starred Al Pacino. Also a bunch of successful family comedies like Uncle Buck (1989) and Parenthood (1989), so I guess a dark, brooding film about a deformed dude wasn’t at the top of anybodies list that weekend. But whatever, those that know, know; and on my book, this is a solid revenge tale with good performances and a dark, grimy look. If you’re ever in the mood for something like that, then this is the film for you.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Oblivion (2013)

Title: Oblivion (2013)

Director: Joseph Kosinski

Cast: Tom Cruise, Morgan Freeman, Olga Kurylenko, Andrea Riseborough

Review:

Joseph Kosinski proved himself to be a very stylish director with great command over the look and design of a film with TRON: Legacy (2010) a film that at first I wasn’t a big fan of, but has sense grown on me. There’s just no denying its visual splendor and the awesomeness of the designs involved in that picture. The look of the sets, the vehicles…the wardrobe, there’s no denying it all looks very slick, very avant garde. So of course, I was extremely curious for his sophomore project, the sci-fi film Oblivion, a film that first started out as a graphic novel written by Kosinski that never got printed. Still, he used that unprinted graphic novel as a sales pitch to studios. Disney didn't bite (they wanted the film to be PG) but Universal did. So as you  can see, we’re talking about an extremely talented individual here. This Kosinski guy isn’t just any run of the mill director, he not only writes graphic novels, and directs films, he’s also got a background in 3-D architectural design, which probably explains why the sets on his films look so freaking awesome and futuristic. It’s pretty obvious that Kosinski siphons all that knowledge into the look of his films. What worries some people is that his films might be stronger on the visual department then on the story or depth department, is this true?

Well, if TRON: Legacy and Oblivion are any indications, Kosinski’s films are solid on both counts, visual and thematic. TRON: Legacy was a film that criticized oppressive governments that want to turn everyone into a robot in their attempts at creating a “perfect society”. This is no light subject matter; in fact, films of this nature have a strong subversive tone to them. I included TRON: Legacy in an article I wrote about SubversiveCinema a while back. Actually TRON even went as far as commenting on how the system controls the media, the entertainment of the people in order to send out a certain message or point of view. Oblivion is the same type of subversive film, it hits on the system and the way things are set in our way of life. So if you ask me, Kosinski is setting a patter as a subversive filmmaker, which is something I love. You gotta have guts to stand up to the system and tell it like it is in this world. Too often people prefer to live life ignoring the realities of the world we live in and “not asking too many questions”. So this isn’t just an empty special effects heavy film that looks pretty. Nope, this is the kind of film that says hell yeah ask questions! In fact, ask as many as you have to and get to the truth. Look at the other side of the coin, not just the side “they” show you.   

First up we meet Jack and Victoria, a couple which typifies the American marriage. Victoria for all intents and purposes is the house wife who stays at home while the man, played by Tom Cruise, goes out to get the job done. Their purpose is to be “an effective team” in service to the system so they can retire and go on to live in paradise, enjoy the good life. This couple has all the comforts of modern technology, but no connection with nature or the planet they live in. In this way Kosinski comments on how technology has distanced us from the finer, simpler pleasures that our world offers us like sitting on a field of grass, basking in the sun, listening to good music, reading a good book. Jack is a character who longs for these things in a world that denies them to him. The system wants to keep him busy, producing, being “effective”, while truthfully, Jack longs for baseball games and a homey, warm cabin by the lake. He wants to live life next to his loved one. In this sense, Oblivion really connected with me and my personal view of life. I, like Jack, and many of you out there I’m sure, long for a life with less buildings, less cars, less machines and more contact with nature, more freedom to enjoy the wonders this world holds for us. But getting the “job done” and surviving in this world always gets in the way.

But there are lies in this world. This is one of those films in which the main character is not who he thinks he is, his entire life is a lie. There’s a bunch of these movies out there that have a main character whose whole life is a lie. I’m doing an article on these types of films so keep an eye out for that, but basically, the message is that you are being lied to by the system, and when I say the system, I mean the powers that be, the media, the government, the big companies that rule everything, big money, the man, you know what I’m talking about. It’s the idea that we’ve been taught one thing, when in reality, things are entirely another way. Take for example the idea of god, as the being who created us, religion as a whole. Is it all real, the idea of an old man floating up in heaven, sitting on a golden throne room with a bunch of angels flying around singing songs to him? The film also addresses this issue, and blasts it into Oblivion. This is a film that is tired of the lies, and wants to unmask them, it longs to unmask the powers that be and show them for what they are.

Take for example war, and the way the media will immediately make you think that people from a certain country are evil or your enemies. I’ve never agreed with this because there is a distinct difference that we as people need to realize, governments are not the same as the people they rule. Sometimes a government will do something which its people do not agree with, but we cannot vilify an entire ethnicity, an entire country for the madness that their government commits. Oblivion speaks of these themes saying if we look at things closer, if we search for the details, for the truth, we’ll realize that we are them, and they are us. Like that scene in Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket (1987) where two enemies at war with each other, end up in close hand to hand combat and end up looking at each other in the eyes and suddenly realize: what are we doing here? Why are we killing each other? Who has programmed us and put us here?  Most of the time, soldiers go to a war and they don’t even know why they are there, same as the character of Jack in Oblivion, who does his job, but doesn’t even know for what purpose. He’s just here to get the job done. Like a soldier who simply follows orders, without knowing why he's doing what he's doing.

As you can see, Oblivion is a pretty deep movie. Yet, its strength in design is not to be ignored. I mean, visually, conceptually, the film is a wonder. Hell, yes, this movie is cool looking! I personally enjoyed these robot drones that appear on the film, they look so robotic, and the sounds these robots emit make them come off as so evil, so cold and inhuman! I’m pretty sure this is exactly what they aimed to project with these drones and in my book they achieved it. True, Oblivion does have themes and situations that will remind you of other sci-fi films you have seen. Some moments reminded me of The Matrix (1999) and The Terminator (1984) others of Wall-E (2008) and Independence Day (1996). It even pays homage to 2001: A Space Odyssey (1969) in some points, but at the same time, Oblivion is a film that gives you lot’s of surprises, new ideas and twists keep popping up all the time, so while it does have similarities with older films, it keeps things interesting and flowing. This was a well made movie, it’s brainy, intelligent sci-fi, with great effects, great moments of action, and heavy themes. A grade A sci-fi film with a rebellious streak to it and lot’s to say, highly recommended.

Rating:  4 out of 5   

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Title: The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Director: Christopher Nolan

Written By: Christopher and Jonathan Nolan

Cast: Christian Bale, Anne Hathaway, Marion Cotillard, Tom Hardy, Gary Oldman, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Matthew Modine, Cillian Murphy

Review:

The Dark Knight Rises is an event movie, the kind that comes along rarely, not only because of the excitement behind seeing this final installment of the film, but also because of the tragic events that surrounded the premiere of the film. As most of the world already knows, On July 20, 2012 in a Century 16 Cinema in Aurora Colorado, a psycho by the name of James Eagan Holmes entered a theater during the premiere of the film and while wearing a gas mask, threw a smoke bomb into the theater and started shooting randomly at people who where there simply to enjoy the latest installment of the Batman franchise. He managed to kill 12, and injure 58 others. What was he trying to say by doing this? What was his purpose? Did he hate movies or people going to see them in droves? Whatever was running around that guys head, he was seriously disturbed. Did he feel he was one of the villains in the Batman films? Did he not learn to differentiate between reality and fiction? Between entertainment and real life? Whatever the case, this disturbed individual probably had a half-baked idea of what he wanted to say swimming around his brains; all villains do.

James Eagan Holmes; getting what's coming to him

You see in films, the villain is commonly used as a way of pointing towards something that is seriously wrong in the world we live in, and the results that this ailment can bring upon society. Take for example ‘The Joker’ in Nolan’s The Dark Knight (2008). In that film the character was angry at the importance that the world gives to money, and how the society we live in revolves around it. One scene has the joker burning a mountain of money simply to show how little he cares for it; and he burns it with gasoline, just to be poetic and comment on how oil and money are entwined in the world we live in. The Joker pitted people of Gotham against each other just to show that humanity is selfish, that in the end, all we really care about is ourselves. Villanous? Sure, but you have to admit the character is making a point. This guy who killed 12 people in the theater, what point was he trying to make? By telling the police he was The Joker, he’s saying that he saw himself as a villain trying to make a point. Was he commenting on societies obsession with movies and entertainment? Was he saying films blind us from reality? That we are not living our lives and instead we are wasting it in a movie theater? 

If that was his point, then he was wrong. Sure Hollywood can be shallow and is often times filled with empty spectacles, but The Dark Knight Rises was not one of those films. This film had a lot to say, it is in my humble opinion a very important film. Same as The Dark Knight, The Dark Knight Rises says a lot about the way the world is NOW. Thematically speaking, The Dark Knight Rises is all about the class war, a very heated topic these days, considering how middle class in the world is quickly fading away. Currently, you are either ridiculously rich or obscenely poor and that’s the way the powerful like it. Through the dynamics between Batman and Bane the film speaks about the struggles of the working class, the oppressed and the ever going hatred for the dudes running Wall Street. The status quo of the world today shows us that it’s true, a part of humanity is selfish instead of giving. It thinks only of itself and not of the needy, the less fortunate. Sadly, the rich and powerful are not currently thinking about making this world a better place for everyone, they think about making it a better place for them, and how those who have less then them can serve them. These are the themes that The Dark Knight Rises tackles with great precision and assuredness. This film knows what it wants to talk about, and it says it very clearly, through its villain, Bane. So this isn’t just any stupid little comic book film, nope, this film is bombastic, epic; a mesmerizing film that  has important issues to adress.

Christopher Nolan in my opinion has made his best film to date with The Dark Knight Rises. Technically speaking, his films have always been top notch and this one is no exception, but what I loved the most about The Dark Knight Rises is how fleshed out the characters are. I was missing the time when great villains dominated a film, Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger are good examples of the kind of performance I like to see from a villain in a film; and I have to thank Nolan for making that special effort to build these memorable villains. Case in point: Tom Hardy’s Bane can now proudly stand next all those great villains of cinematic history. We hardly see Tom Hardy’s face in this film, save for a small flashback scene, his face remains hidden behind a mask for 99% of the films running time, yet Hardy’s performance shines through none the less. The character itself is extremely fleshed out, his back story is a very satisfying one. As a comic book fan, I was particularly thrilled to see moments from the storylines Knightfall, Knights End and No Mans Land on the screen.

DC Comics Batman # 497, one of the comics that inspired the storyline for The Dark Knight Rises. 

This is the third time Christian Bale has played Batman, I enjoyed how this time around he is a beaten, reclusive character, hiding away from the world in his mansion, like Mr. Kane in Orson Welle’s Citizen Kane (1941), the rich old guy who doesn’t want to answer to the world outside. It was great of the filmmakers to use the Bruce Wayne character to criticize the rich and powerful. If you have so much power, so much money, why not do something worthwhile with it, something that will improve humanity and the world we live in? Loved it how the movie tackled those themes through Bruce Wayne. It was a very intelligent move on the filmmaker’s side to comment on classist issues with the character, considering how the rich are viewed by the working class that’s struggling to get by on a day to day basis in this greedy world we live in. Anne Hathaway as Catwoman was somewhere between sexy and deadly, but nothing as overtly sexualized as Michelle Pfeiffer’s take on the character in Batman Returns (1992). The rest of the amazing cast does an amazing job, Michael Caine turns in an emotional performance on this one.

On the fun side of things the film delivers in spades. It was great to see a film that balanced action set pieces with story development so well; this really is a well though out picture, Mr. Nolan went up a couple of notches in my book with this one. Where the first two Nolan Bat films seemed a little on the talky side, this one balances fleshing out its characters and wowing us with amazing action and visual effects to perfection; kudos to Nolan for achieving that so well. So that’s it ladies and gents, I say don’t let the whole shooting thing scare you from seeing this one. It truly is a great film that touches up on important themes. This is an event picture, the kind you want to go to the theater to celebrate the fun of watching movies; don’t let the isolated incident with the crazy kook scare you out of that my friends! There was a special kind of electricity in the theater before and after the film started, people were genuinely excited to see this one. From what I can gather and from the resounding round of applause that I heard after the film was over, this one has won audience approval. The momentum these films have captured since the first film premiered has exploded on the screen with The Dark Knight Rises, the final film in Christopher Nolan’s Bat Saga; don’t let what that psycho did in Colorado scare you away from enjoying this awesome film.

Rating: 5 out of 5