The Dark Knight - Grading & Discussion

Thanks. I'm watching it now.

 

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I couldn't remember that "scene" at all. It wasn't there!

 

Nolan has said they actually scaled back the effects of Two-Face's scarring - because they didn't want the audience to look away every time it was on screen.

It seemed to have something to do with discovering which kind of bullet was used, and how it shattered so they could recover all the pieces in the reconstruction. In looking for a fingerprint, you'd need to recover a good deal of the information.

Joker must have let him out first. Maybe he's sanitiing his hands after helping Harvey up.

Someone asked about Batman the Detective - we see Bruce do the ballistics testing and recover the fingerprint. He creates the plan to use the irradiated bills in order to identify the mob banks. During Loeb's memorial as he leaves he tells Alfred, "I have four possibles." and then instructs him to find the apartment overlooking the street that would be most likely to hide a sniper which leads to him finding the kidnapped cops. The film didn't waste too much screen time showing every little thing he did, but there are plenty of drops that indicate his detecting.

Someone else asked about Gordon's final lines - this isn't exact but, in response to his son's asking, Why is he running?

Because we have to chase him. Because he's the hero Gotham deserves but he's not the hero it needs right now. (There's a line here I can't remember) He's the silent guardian, the (something - invisible?) protector - the Dark Knight.

Sorry - maybe someone else can fill in some more.

 

This movie is freaking me out even now. I was looking over my novel that I wrote a few years ago, trying to do some editing tonight when I found the following passage:

Desperation worked in and of itself, like it was its own little world. It had its own natural laws, and they were similar but not quite the same as those everyone else is governed by. Gravity is a stronger force in desperation; things fall faster, the very things that are needed the most, and there’s never time to catch them before they hit the ground, and those very things always fall in unpredictable ways, unpredictable places, somehow always out of view, and maybe later they’ll be found, all the way over there, on the other side, long after they are needed.


That passage, which I hadn't read in a long time, reminded my of the Joker's "Madness is like Gravity," bit, "all you need is a little push."

 

That was me. Thanks, Lapis; I did find it somewhere: "Because he's the hero Gotham deserves. But not the one it needs right now. So we'll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he's not a hero. He's a silent guardian. A watchful protector. A dark knight. "

Now I just need the rest of Alfred's "some men just want to watch the world burn."

 

As others have already pointed out, he does quite a bit of detective work in this film. However, I think if the next film features The Riddler as I hope, he'll be on full detective mode for the whole thing which would be very cool.

Fantastic! I hate that lame attempt of Peter Parker by Tobey Maguire. That picture is very satisfying.

 

I just got back from an IMAX showing of this movie and this is how I rate The Dark Knight: Excellent.

IMO, this is a perfect film. Every actor played their part brilliantly, I was especially surprised by Aaron Eckhart, and the script was full of twists and surprises.

Bring on the next Batman movie!

 

“In their desperation they turned to a man they didn’t fully understand. Some men aren’t looking for anything logical. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.”

 

Oddly enough, The Dark Knight was rated PG-13. Fancy that.

 

Awesome. Thanks!

 

Thank you! That's a great line, so I'm happy to have it correct too.

 

Yeah when we finally got a good look at the cowl in the light of the interrogation room, I was struck by how... odd the shape was.

Nolan definitely needs to get a better art designer for the next movie.

 

Yeah I guess there was a lot of detecting in this movie after all.

I still think he relied too much on gadgets and technology though. The Batman of the comics (at least the ones I read as a kid) didn't need technology to do every little thing; most of the time he would swing around the city on a simple rope, wait on rooftops, and use his own, more attuned senses to find and stop criminals. Only rarely would he need to pull something out of his utility belt.

He was also almost completely self-sufficient, where in Nolan's movies it's basically a team made up of Bruce, Alfred, and Fox that makes the whole thing work. There might be something to that thematically (and of course the actors are a lot of fun to watch in the movie), but I still prefer the loner Batman of the comics who relies almost completely on his own wits and skills to get the job done.

 

I like the idea of a loner Batman--and, emotionally, Bale's version of the character fits that bill--but, realistically (and this series, despite many fantastical elements, does try to ground itself in realism), there's no way Batman (especially this Batman) could be the product of just one man.

Although, perhaps, a third film might preoccupy itself with that idea, depending on how Fox and Alfred deal with Batman's "murders."

 

In BB, Fox says that they were built as bridging vehicles; Two of these would tow cables...these babies work just fine.

There is at least one more.

Dick Grayson is the one that comes up with the dandy names for Batman's stuff.

Scope creep from the government contract maybe? Agreed, the firing position was unnecessary.

Hopefully he'll drop the armor altogether.

 

Yo can't write that in a movie where you have no narration boxes to tell the audience what's going on in the main character's mind.

A lot of the "team" exists so Batman can have conversations and the audience can follow what's happening.

And I'm not sure the loner of Batman of the comics was really around as much as you might think. Jim Gordon was in Detective Comics #27, debuting right alongside Batman. Robin was introduced less than a year after Batman premiered (specifically so Batman would have someone to talk to to explain his thought processes). In 1967 Batgirl joined the team. By the modern era, Alfred was an ex-spy (or ex-actor, or ex-military pilot), who was pretty active in the solving of cases. Nowadays, there's Robin, Nightwing, Alfred, Batgirl, Oracle, and Jim Gordon.

Batman acting as a loner actually doesn't happen very often at all. There's a few stories, but they are pretty rare.

The firing position was shown in TDK to protect him in the case of catastrophic damage, and allow him to eject on the Batpod.

 

True, it works for The Dark Knight, but for the purposes of Batman Begins, it's ludicrous. There's one point where Batman goes down into the firing position for about 20 seconds and then returns back to the normal sitting position for no reason at all.

 

ya know, if Rachael and Dent were suspended over a deep dark watery grave batman could have saved them both >_>

 

I don't disagree with the use of armor for particular missions. In the comics armor was used in very specific missions for very specific purposes (I can remember armor being used, by Bruce Wayne's Batman, twice). But the general use of armor removes the need for fighting intelligence and just makes Batman a thug. Without the armor, Batman must rely on careful planning (days - weeks of planning) and more intelligent fighting (or escape).

OK, I'll buy that. Was there two escape pods then?