The Darkness Rises, The Knight Falls … Will Gotham Endure?

The Dark Knight Franchise has come to an end.  That alone is the unadulterated truth.  Or so I hope.  Did it deliver on all the unsaid promises aggressively doused in certain, expected, almost inevitable glory?  Quite Possibly!           

There are several kinds of movie enthusiasts in this world, and I am irrefutably familiar with two of them… or so I choose to be.  The ones who find contentment or lack thereof in a cinematic experience.   And others, who embrace the impact of a movie and grudgingly acknowledge the impending end as befitting and necessary on certain very crucial levels, but are genuinely greedy for more.  In my opinion, the latter turn out to be very good movie critics, while the former, great!  I myself fall in the latter category.  And if you have not yet guessed, modesty is not one of my many fortes’; redundancy, on the other hand is my playground! 

Now I shall mercifully come to my point.  The Dark Knight Rises is undoubtedly a charismatic end to an exceedingly refreshing Trilogy.   It succeeds in culminating a fantastic vision from an innovative director.  It boasts superior performances from actors we all love OR respect; it has a smart, well-written, cliché-laden script that is seamlessly engaged in a passionate embrace with sheer visual excellence and severe thrills.  Do not worry, it also wraps a nice bow around all these things and manages to eliminate all loose ends.   For most people though, it will not compare to its superior predecessor.  But that, mi amigo, is not only impractical; it is also an insult on how these three movies stand independently. 

Paradoxical, you say?  Well, my friend, riddle me this…

When was the last time you recall a superhero movie franchise demonstrate such exuberant consistency in acting, directing, script writing, visual imagery, and editing?  It’s like Alfred would say in a seething English accent – NEVER!

The precedent set by this Trilogy will not be broken for a long time.  It may be emulated, in fact, it definitely will be emulated, but duplicated – I think not!

That said, the movie is not without its faults.  There are certain sequences and characters that I desired a more unique conclusion for in this final chapter.  Part of it may be because I hold this director, among very few others, to much higher standards than the rest of the industry.  Let me give you an example, Alfred, the esteemed butler, deserved a lot more appreciation in this movie and his closure deserved a great deal of delicacy.  He got some of it in the end, but not nearly enough.  Marion Cotillard deserved a more fleshed out role, and much more screen time, which would’ve made her final act incredibly juicy.  But alas, when you introduce so many new characters in the culminating part of a franchise; the balancing act gets supremely complicated.  As my dear butler, Alfred, would say, “Know your limits, Master Wayne!” 

See!…not at all redundant!

And now, in showing great restraint, I will NOT proceed to further dissect this movie in pieces of the good, the bad, and the ugly.  It had all those moments, but in the end it comes out with flying colors.  It does everything it said it would do and more.  It simply works!  The End!

       There’s the bell, Nolan comes out swinging.  He loops around, trying to get a feel for his opponent.  One ... Two...Three...                                         

      Ain't No Thing!  

     He lunges … Head/ Body, Head/ Body, Head/ Body and the Final Knockout Punch – BATMAN OUT!

  

Deliciously Complicated




                           V/S

                                                            Highly Functioning Sociopath

 

  Go Nuts!

(Coming Soon)



Sleep, Dreams … Espionage!

It’s been quite a treat following the career of one Christopher Nolan.  The real man behind the Bat mask.  Today we take a look at the well-deserved break he took from the D.C. Universe to make a small movie called Inception.  “Your mind is the scene of the crime”, blurts out the teaser trailer, and then it violently grips you and never lets go.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays Cobb, an “extractor” extraordinaire. He can steal your deepest darkest secrets while you lie asleep in the comfort of your own home.  I know how it sounds but I assure you that this is no ordinary thief with an affinity for the forbidden fruit.  This man is a carnivore who will steal your secrets by penetrating your psyche while you’re dreaming and irrevocably take what’s yours.  Cobb is a brilliant thief, and like all brilliant men is emotionally conflicted, plagued by internal demons, and exudes unforgiving intensity in every single shot.  He is a notorious criminal and a wanted man, and all he now desires is to return home to his children.  And so begins a high stakes game, with a dangerous proposal by a powerful and mysterious business tycoon, Saito (Ken Watanabe), who wants to acquire the services of Cobb to perform the improbable task of Inception. In return, Cobb gets to have a new life with his family.  And Guess what?  Cobb takes the plunge!

DiCaprio does a great job capturing Cobb’s emotions, his motivations for his actions, and his own damaged psyche in lieu of the death of his wife Mal, played by the beautiful Marion Cotillard.  Mal has a bad habit of prancing into Cobb’s missions and deliberately sabotaging them.  Cobb, in all his infinite glory, is still helplessly in love and grieving for Mal but haplessly incapacitated to do anything about it. 

Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Arthur, Cobb’s partner and friend and as the movie progresses….admirable action buddy.  Gordon-Levitt nails the part of the confidante, the voice of reason, and at times the compass that guides Cobb.  Ellen Page is Ariadne, a University student recruited by Cobb to assist him in his unattainable task.  Our lovely cast rounds up with Tom Hardy and Dileep Rao joining in on this very volatile game where one’s mind can be used as a weapon in order to claim another’s mind as the prize.

In a cinematic landscape where the words original screenplay have been erased from the dictionary, Christopher Nolan comes forth and makes you believe.  There is fruit in innovation and the art of storytelling is not dead.  Inception is a recipe both delightfully complicated and ruthlessly ambiguous.  It leaves you content with a well narrated and clever storyline, razor sharp direction, supreme cinematography, and extraordinary editing.  However, you still experience an inkling of hunger within, which is swiftly accompanied by a realization. A shattering truth that there is still a momentous flow of un-seeming and untapped creative potential in this industry and it must be channeled properly.  It desperately needs an outlet to grow on, a platform to surge through, and I guarantee you that the results will be astounding.  The possibilities will be endless!  To quote Mickey Rourke in Iron Man 2, “There will be blood in the water, and the sharks will come.” 

With Inception, Nolan has declared to the entire cosmos, that the viewing audience is smart, and if you treat them as such, you will be rewarded in kind.  I wish with all my heart and a bit of careful optimism that the conception, arrival and subsequent reception of this movie will succeed in facilitating the revival of creativity.

I shall conclude my rant by saying this: some people make movies because they have a story to tell; others make movies simply for entertainment value and the commercial success they will inevitably garner, and a few rare people make movies for love of the art itself.  Nolan as yet does not completely fall into any one of these categories.  He hasn’t established his niche yet and that perhaps, in an equivocal way, is the secret to his ingenuity.  He has delivered exciting new entries in a diverse genre of movies ranging from Memento to Insomnia, and The Prestige to The Dark Knight, and I wish him tremendous success in the future.  But as of now, I demand that Christopher Jonathan James Nolan keep making movies only and only because he is just so damn good at it!