In Contention

Tag: The Dark Knight

  • Campea on ‘Knight’

    Our pal John Campea over at The Movie Blog is back in Los Angeles after some time back home in Toronto this summer, and right out of the gate he’s slapped up a review from last night’s screening of “The Dark Knight.”

    It’s a glowing assessment to say the least, and at one point John says he was ready to call the film one of the best cinematic endeavors of the last three or four years.  But John’s getting old, what can I say — and the length of the film kind of got to him a bit.

    To each his own.  But I doubt there will be too many people upset with the apparent direction the final act takes (in the way of bridging over to the eventual third film).

    It’s worth noting that John structures his reviews in a very accessible way.  His site is and has always been a film site, a great community of movie lovers with no pretensions.  Keep that in mind as I offer his load-busting assessment of Heath Ledger’s performance:

    One of the things I was preparing myself for was how over hyped the performance of Heath Ledger was going to be. Since he passed away, I knew he’d be getting rave reviews out the ying (sic) yang no matter what and I’d be frowned upon if I said any different. But holy mother suck puss face… HEATH LEDGER DESERVES AN OSCAR NOMINATION FOR HIS PERFORMANCE AS THE JOKER… no… I’m not even kidding in the least. I was totally, 100% blown away like nothing I’ve ever seen in a comic based movie before.

    And the closer:

    Holy crap did Two Face look WICKED!!!

    Then he gets into why the length bothered him, etc.  Check out ther rest here.

    I haven’t seen any other reviews drop yet, but I’m sure we’ll start seeing them throughout Friday and into the weekend, when the junket screenings start to land.  Be on the lookout.

  • Battersea featured in ‘Dark Knight?’

    This one is a stretch, I know — and many of you could care less.  But I can’t escape “Dark Knight” news no matter where I turn.  Seriously, I just click on a link to a random news story about the revitalization of London’s Battersea Power Station, and there it is, staring me in the face.

    The Batman films are always valuable for their design elements, but I didn’t know this monolith — perhaps best known from the cover of Pink Floyd’s “Animals” (an image replicated two years ago in “Children of Men”) — was going to be featured in the film.  But it seems that’s the case.

    I can, like, see Battersea from my kitchen.  Very cool.

    Carry on…

  • Exclusive ‘Dark Knight’ set piece footage on ET

    I know, I know.  The Batman stuff is coming fast and furious.  Being out of the loop in Britain (re: press screenings) is pushing the site’s coverage of the film into the fanboy anticipatory realm, but I’m okay with that.  Kind of reminds me of the old days.

    Here’s a look at one of the big action set pieces of the film, which Entertainment Tonight showed exclusively last night:

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVWg0KHZl4E

  • Letterman’s top 3 reasons to see ‘The Dark Knight’

    1) Everyone dies in the end.
    2) The motorcycle.
    3) Heath Ledger.

    Yes, it seems late night king of comedy David Letterman got an early look at “The Dark Knight,” and while he pokes fun at the anticipation and, of course, the “keep it under wraps” mentality of the studio, there seems to be some genuine adoration for the effort in there.

    Money quote for Ledger:

    Heath Ledger…oh my God is he great in this one…I’m telling you, this is a tremendous performance.  That’s the reason people ought to go see this film.

    Check it out:

    httpv://youtube.com/watch?v=6-sXBkQ13EQ

    The new TV spot, featuring spooking Joker narration (after the jump):

    (more…)

  • ‘Knight’ falls in L.A. tomorrow (and Travers jumps the gun)

    FYI.  Keep those lids peeled for reviews coming form tomorrow’s Los Angeles screening.

    In the meantime, Peter Travers has the first official review up at Rolling Stone.  Here’s a taste:

    Heads up: a thunderbolt is about to rip into the blanket of bland we call summer movies. The Dark Knight, director Christopher Nolan’s absolute stunner of a follow-up to 2005’s Batman Begins, is a potent provocation decked out as a comic-book movie. Feverish action? Check. Dazzling spectacle? Check. Devilish fun? Check. But Nolan is just warming up. There’s something raw and elemental at work in this artfully imagined universe.

    And praise for Ledger, as if we weren’t expecting it:

    I can only speak superlatives of Ledger, who is mad-crazy-blazing brilliant as the Joker. Miles from Jack Nicholson’s broadly funny take on the role in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman, Ledger takes the role to the shadows, where even what’s comic is hardly a relief…It’s typical of Ledger’s total commitment to films as diverse as Brokeback Mountain and I’m Not There that he does nothing out of vanity or the need to be liked. If there’s a movement to get him the first posthumous Oscar since Peter Finch won for 1976’s Network, sign me up.

    The rest.

  • Just do it

    Many thanks to reader Mr. Gittes (perhaps as much a Bat-fiend as yours truly), who pointed me to this Wired story detailing director Christopher Nolan’s torrid love affair with all things practical in the world of action cinema.

    Much has been said and written of Nolan’s preference for saving the CGI drama for your mama and having the cojones to go out and actually do the stunts, prepare the gasp-inducing set-pieces and thereby root the new Batman franchise in the reality it deserves and, in a sense, begs for.

    There are so many quotable lines in Scott Brown’s incredibly thorough piece that I find myself anxiously picking and choosing.  But I suppose it’s worth it to start with the basic leader:

    While today’s action heroes routinely come dressed in shades of the giddy synthetic (à la Spider-Man and Iron Man), movie fans have gorged on digital eye candy — and, perhaps fearing retinal diabetes, now they’re cutting back (Speed Racer, anyone?). Still, gritty naturalism is no small leap for the spandex genre. It’s a mood more identified with art noir and the prestige pic, the kind of cinema built to attract Oscars, not mass audiences…

    …Nolan has a cogent Theory of Applied Batmatics: Insist on reality — no effects, no tricks — up to the point where insisting on reality becomes unrealistic. Then, in postproduction, make what is necessarily unreal as real as possible. “Anything you notice as technology reminds you that you’re in a movie theater,” Nolan explains. “Even if you’re trying to portray something fantastical and otherworldly, it’s always about trying to achieve invisible manipulation.” Especially, he adds, with Batman, “the most real of all the superheroes, who has no superpowers.”

    Then perhaps segue into the most refreshing news yet (news to me, anyway), regarding ADR on the film:

    Nolan would rather fix it while everyone’s still on the set. He hates to loop. “I just think separating the voice from the face and the body is very tricky,” he explains. It is, after all, blatantly unreal.

    So did the director get everything he needed from Ledger before his death? He says yes: Ledger nailed it in principal photography. Thomas adds, “Everything you see onscreen is his performance.” (In other words, there’ll be no clunky digital resurrection, aural or visual, no morbid echoes of Oliver Reed’s posthumous performance in Gladiator.) Besides, Nolan doesn’t believe in bringing an actor back six months later and expecting him to re-create the nuances of a character, any more than he believes a computer can re-create the quality of human camera work on its own.

    But I can’t resist offering up the line Mr. Gittes chose, the line that’ll force the hairs on any fanboy’s neck to stand at attention:

    He was moving on. But there was one small problem with leaving Batman behind: He knew how he wanted it all to end. He had something Godfather-ish in mind, a saga of dark doubles and transfiguration — big, dense, and novelistic.

    It’s quite an absorbing piece, with more than its fair share of tech-talk, from the realities of shooting with giant IMAX cameras to descriptions of filming Christian Bale actually standing on top of the Sears Tower.

    Check it out.  You know you want to.

  • Edward Norton and the not-so-jolly green giant

    What can be said of the fearless Edward Norton, who recently became an on-screen comic book hero?  I never understood his choice to take on the role of Bruce Banner, a.k.a. The Incredible Hulk.  And now, post-release, I’m still puzzled.

    He walked into a franchise that became a fast mess just five years ago.  And according to IMDb, he turned the role down back then. Given the actor’s commitment to characterization in his performances, it makes sense that he would turn the other cheek.  After all, so much of Bruce Banner, or at the least what audiences might want to see, is a technological creation. Unlike any of the characters in “Iron Man” or in the upcoming “The Dark Knight,” Mr. Norton doesn’t get to sport a good makeup job and put his true talents on display. He has to disappear all together.  It seems so unlike him.

    (more…)

  • Holy bitchslap, Batman!

  • ‘Dark’ weekend coming up

    Alright folks…we’re getting close.  Judging by that poll a few weeks ago, “The Dark Knight” is far and away the most anticipated film of the summer with the IC readership, so I expect you won’t mind my further indulgence in the lead-up to the release.

    But there’s actually something to talk about now.  The film is junketing this weekend in Los Angeles and I expect there might be an embargo in place, but if reviews and/or opinions start to drift out into cyberspace by this time next week, you’ll know they are legit.  There was already a supposed review at this UK outlet, but I can’t be sure of the veracity given how vague the copy is.

    (I’m still trying to line up a London screening, but dealing with WB’s international publicity has been a painfully slow process.  You’d think being such a friend to the franchise MIGHT count for some diligence and/or returned emails.  Oh well…)

    In the meantime, here’s a clip featuring some of the new score.  It’s pretty dark, expectedly taking off from the themes of “Batman Begins,” but with a harder, more immediate and eerily agressive edge.  I can’t wait to hear the stuff cooked up for the Joker.  Have a listen:

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehSAqruwRtQ

    (More neat-o YouTube DK discoveries after the jump.)

    (more…)

  • Caine: “Heath might win an Oscar”

    From People magazine, an excerpt from an interview with Michael Caine concerning “The Dark Knight”:

    Caine, contemplating his co-star’s loss, goes so far as to predict Ledger might win an Oscar from beyond the grave for his role as The Joker in The Dark Knight. “He was just so scary. Everyone was worried beforehand, because we knew he was going to be compared with Jack Nicholson’s brilliant Joker in the 1989 Batman. He surprised the life out of us all.”

    Not surprising coming from a connected source and all, though truth be told, all of the awards talk for Ledger really began to heat up nearly seven months ago when Caine began singing the highest praises for the performance.

    Also worth noting: An individual who saw the film a week ago didn’t hesitate on these matters when she said, quite confidently, “He’ll when an Oscar.”  Take it with a grain of salt, but just that such comments are making the rounds…

    Oooooh, boy.

  • Teasing it out…

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LirIKbsVCkM

    Tune in 2011, same Bat-time, same Bat-channel.

  • Oh, and FYI…

    I swear I’m done with Batman talk after this, but I know there’s an insider screening of “The Dark Knight” happening tonight on the Warner lot. If any sort of “review” pops up somewhere, it’s going to be from someone who gets checks signed by studio brass. That said, I’m anticipating a report from a trustworthy acquaintance and my fingers are SO crossed.

  • Favorite shot yet

  • Rachel Dawes believes in Harvey Dent

    You’ll have to forgive me, folks.  I’m on one of those obssessive “Dark Knight” kicks today.  Back to normal soon, I assure you.

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D15iHxCvjBs

    By the way, this site has an exhaustive analysis of the news bits, viral marketing and studio promotion of the film that reads like a full blown discourse revealing major secrets throughout…and with nothing in the way of “inside” information.  I like the way Michael Moran put it in his link here at The Times: The film ruined for your pleasure.

    There are also some sweet new banner images that hit a little over a week ago, but I’m only seeing for the first time today for some reason.

    Also, “Batman Begins” and “Dark Knight” production designer Nathan Crowley is apparently behind the set designs of a superhero costume exhibit that has been at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute in New York.  Very cool.  Meanwhile, the milk people are up to it once again with “Dark Knight” marketing.

    And I want this motorcycle.  Bad.

    Alright…I think I got it out of my system.  I think.

  • ‘Dark Knight’ soundtrack listing

    1. Why So Serious? 09:14
    2. I’m Not A Hero 06:34
    3. Harvey Two-Face 06:16
    4. Aggressive Expansion 04:35
    5. Always A Catch 01:39
    6. Blood On My Hands 02:16
    7. A Little Push 02:42
    8. Like A Dog Chasing Cars 05:02
    9. I Am The Batman 01:59
    10. And I Thought My Jokes Were Bad 02:28
    11. Agent Of Chaos 06:55
    12. Introduce A Little Anarchy 03:42
    13. Watch The World Burn 03:47
    14. A Dark Knight 16:15

    Source

    By the way, Warners is releasing this thing on vinyl (!). It’ll actually be landing in four configurations, one of them being a collector’s edition with exclusive artwork post-release.

  • Will there be any other format worth watching this thing in?

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6bCIMccbwQ

  • REVIEW: “The Incredible Hulk” (***1/2)

    When Ang Lee set out to direct the first feature film adaptation of Marvel’s Incredible Hulk property five years ago, some things were…different.

    Lee was coming off of the major awards success of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” which led audiences – many of them skeptics – to ponder what he might be able to accomplish with the psychology of another action-oriented effort.

    However, Marvel had its hands tied. Unlike Detective Comics properties, which fall under Time Warner ownership and therefore receive continual distribution out of Warner Bros. Pictures, Marvel was still at the whims of studio discretion, its properties scattered to the winds despite having the consistency of an Ari Arad behind the scenes.

    Nothing could be said less of Lee as a filmmaker when the finished, disastrous product was unveiled. He took a gamble and hit craps…hard. And he bought back in two years later, bouncing back with a Best Director Oscar to show for it. But Marvel was left with a serious consideration that had likely lingered for many years: how to get a developmental handle on a catalogue of material that was bursting at the seams with cinematic potential.

    The difference now is Marvel Studios, which saw its first production “Iron Man” held on high by critics and audiences alike just one month ago. It was a home run for an unexplored property on the big screen, but could it be duplicated? And via a franchise that wasn’t nearly far enough removed from it’s immediate past to be considered stale by any means?

    Apparently so. Because Louis Leterrier’s “The Incredible Hulk” is not only likely to be the biggest, most exhausting (in all the good ways) film-going experience you’ll have this year, but it also holds the second turtle dove of a young studio’s seizure of what promises to be one of the greatest cinematic roll outs the genre has, or perhaps will ever see.

    (more…)

  • Zimmer taking the Joker ‘punk?’

    Todd Martens, who always does a fine job of rounding up news and talking points regarding the year’s film music compositions (especially around the Oscar season), sat down recently with Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard. The composing duo of “Batman Begins” and the upcoming “The Dark Knight” are enjoying a nice publicity push, including a press day last week in Los Angeles solely for the pair.

    Martens was able to listen to about 10 minutes of the new score (jealousy isn’t a strong enough adjective at the moment), and he managed to get some details on the way the two composers are splitting duties. It seems Zimmer is on Joker duties, while Howard is fleshing out the aural rhytms of Harvey Dent.

    Zimmer had some interesting things to say on his approach to the Caped Crusader’s latest foe:

    Yet some early signs show “The Dark Knight” departing at least a little bit from the more subtle tones of “Batman Begins”…the theme Zimmer wrote for the Joker, played in the film by the late Heath Ledger, is a damning piece of music. It’s an intense eight-minute piece that comes off like an orchestral interpretation of a something created by Trent Reznor’s Nine Inch Nails. Zimmer says the work is only two notes, but the two notes are twisted and manipulated into mimicking the sounds of thunder, razors and all sorts of clatter heard in alleyways probably better left unexplored.

    Though that description may not make it sound like music to the ears, it’s still immensely listenable. It plays out like something from a horror film, with many a shift in direction and a nod to “Psycho.” But all of it is tied together by a striking blow of strings that keep it from falling apart, and Zimmer said it bears a punk influence.

    Check out the rest. And here’s a glimpse of what might be some of the new score, by the way.

    Anticipation is killing me by the day on this.