Director: Christopher Nolan
Screenplay: Jonathan and Christopher Nolan
Characters: Bob Kane
Starring: Christian
Bale, Tom Hardy, Gary Oldman, Michael Caine, Anne Hathaway, Matthew Modine, Marion
Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Morgan Freeman, Brett Cullen, Cillian Murphy, Ben
Mendelsohn, Tom Conti, Burn Gorman
MAJOR SPOILERS inside!
The final movie in director Nolan’s trilogy, the stoic Batman
of a new age, left me with a sense of disappointment. Although it is definitely
a film worth watching, it did not live up to the promise or the expectations
that the previous Dark Knight tantalised us with, and where Heath Ledger gave
the performance of his life as the sinister new-generation Joker.
We find our Batman now a virtual recluse eight years after
the devastating events of part two. There are no heroes to save Gotham except
for the local police force, and the city is looking a shade greyer. Wayne
Enterprises is in financial trouble and the stock markets are about to suffer an
apparent terrorist attack. Can Batman find his way back to the cave and
rekindle his sense of justice one last time?
Well, the trailers spoke of a battle of cataclysmic proportions
and a foe of tremendous strength. Again I find myself saying what a shame that
such a fantastic ensemble cast of favourite faces should lead us down the road
to disillusionment. We sure can ‘relate’ to this year’s Batman – it’s dark and
gloomy, with an apocalyptic edge.
Christian Bale, along with Joseph Gordon-Levitt seem to
improve with age, and they both really played their parts to perfection as
Bruce Wayne/Batman and Blake/Robin. Anne Hathaway’s Cat Woman was suitably sassy
and less of a caricature than previous embodiments. She deserves the calls for
her own franchise.
It was also a delight to see Matthew Modine (Foley) turn up,
and in uniform, along with an underrated Brit actor Burn Gorman (Stryver). There
were a lot of familiar faces, including Ben Mendlesohn as Daggett, a thorn in
Bruce Wayne’s side, and the reason for all the chaos in Gotham.
Tom Hardy as Bane,
the creepily sadistic bad-guy of the piece, stole the show for me. I had wished
for more of his character to be revealed, and to hear more of his Lawrence Olivier
style delivery of sadistic one-liners. 
There are moments of humour – chief among them a genius
appearance by Scarecrow aka the instantly recognisable Cillian Murphy.
There are a few bugs that spoilt the film, it was badly
edited, which is a crime for a big budget tent-pole like this, disjointed in many
places, and occasionally our hero and nemesis spoke with voices barely
comprehensible. Perhaps this is not the fault of the movie, but the digital
rendering. IMAX is apparently to blame – see link at the bottom of this post.
Nolan has fallen foul of the trilogy ‘curse’, tying up loose
ends and packing far too much into a film which ultimately felt over-long and
yet lacking at the same time. Amazing scenes reminiscent of 9/11, and with a
premise raising the spectre of nuclear terrorism to new heights, this final instalment
of Batman comes to a predictable and somewhat mediocre ending.
Why do all our superheroes have to ‘die’ in this way?
http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/watch-before-and-after-comparison-of-banes-voice-plus-deleted-scene-details-20120728
"Now is not the time for fear... that comes later!'
