Batman picked up the Penguin, and Gordon won’t arrest Batman. Even if Penguin was arrested, he could bribe his way free easily due to the corruption in the GCPD. And unless Gordon tells the GCPD, they don’t necessarily know it’s Batman chasing the Penguin, as the Batmobile is a bit more low-key in this version.
I finally had a chance to watch The Batman and can now respond to your review : )
Even after reading your review, I forgot Colin Farrell was in this movie. Even after watching the movie, I was not aware of this. It was only just now that I realized it again and had to look up who he plays. He is totally unrecognizable to me and really pretty good in a kind of thankless role. I give him and the director huge props for not camping it up. I hate campy superhero stuff, though.
I agree with you about the movie being a tad longer than necessary, At the same time, I was happy to be in that world for three hours and would have happily stayed there another 30-60 minutes, as long as there were no more Andy Serkis scenes. I give the guy a ton of credit for parlaying a career out of playing a goony role in some movies 20 years ago, but I also am puzzled as to how he continues to get cast. And gets cast in the most huge franchises of our time. I look very forward to Peter Dinklage as Alfred.
The main plot is a bit of a reach, I agree. But I mean, it’s good enough. It wasn’t glaringly bad or even “bad” honestly. I liked the use of darkness in most scenes, and I liked the sense of fear you got from some of the criminals and even the police at times. You remarked on the horror aspects, and I agree with wanting to have seen more of that. That said, I felt like I wanted The Scarecrow to be the villain rather than the Riddler, given the emphasis on that theme. Dano was very good in the role–about 8 million times better than anyone else who’s ever played that character.
Patinson was fine, as you wrote, and I didn’t mind him as Bruce Wayne at all, mainly because he almost perfectly embodies the Bruce Wayne/Batman of the Frank Miller comic Batman Year One, which remains one of the best Batman comics of all time (to me). Zoe’s Catwoman/Selina is also taken pretty directly from that comic as well, and it completely worked for me–I think she’s the best Catwoman we’ve seen. A couple of set pieces also echoed scenes from that comic too; I was kind of expecting Miller to have gotten some sort of co-writing credit.
Wright was awesome as Gordon, given the sort of short-shrift the script gave him. I mean, that role on paper would have looked like static nothingness, and he made it interesting and likeable. I would have been happy to see more development of that character. As it was, there was almost no back story for anyone and little in the way of development (like Batman: Law & Order), and that mostly worked, honestly. The time has come for us to dispense with backstory for superhero movies. No one cares.
The one time I disliked Patinson as Batman was when he took his shirt off, and we saw how lean that kid is. He does not look at all like Batman would look. There were also no scars or bruises. That broke the suspension of disbelief to me, though I’m sure lots of people were pretty excited about that scene.
I also found the setting confusing. Lots of gothic stuff, yet also lots of high tech stuff, yet almost none of the environments inside or out looked clean. I also had no idea where Wayne Manor was in relation to the city until the long shot late into the film where something is on fire, and then I was like, “Oh, it’s a high rise in the city??”
In all, I look forward to the next one with this group. No Robin, please. Batgirl would be fine, but no Robin.
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There is one brief scene where you see him and he does have some scars, but as this is basically Batman: Year Two, I don’t mind that so much. I love the Year One comic stuff, he’s still finding his feet, and doesn’t have many years of wounds to show.
The main plot is a bit of a reach, I agree. But I mean, it’s good enough. It wasn’t glaringly bad or even “bad” honestly.
I don’t think the plot is bad, it’s just completely derivative of Seven. Down to details like the killer giving himself up, and finding his place full of journals.
I also found the setting confusing.
The more you think about the setting the worse it gets. Lots of shitty areas in the city, except in panoramic shots, where it looks great. Dingy interiors everywhere except one or two scenes.
I also had no idea where Wayne Manor was in relation to the city until the long shot late into the film where something is on fire, and then I was like, “Oh, it’s a high rise in the city??”
It kind of shows you where it is when he bikes home early on, and there’s an almost Empire State Building-looking thing in the centre of the shot, albeit it has two spires like bat ears (guffaws forbidden).
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The Night House. The main reason it works is Rebecca Hall, since the film is all about her character. There’s some real darkness and grief in this story about a woman widowed by suicide, and she smashes it. There are scenes of instability, talking and behaving inappropriately, a little too much drinky-drinky, and the swings between being maudlin and aggressive and rude as she grieves are excellent. There are some small, effective effects, and understated horror.
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I hope the movie ends up being well received. I am minor acquaintances with one of the writers, and I’d love to see him catch on big after all these years of him and his family trying to make it in. I know they’re doing a new Hellraiser, which seems like a potentially notable opportunity even if the franchise has lost its relevancy of late.
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It should do, it is excellent. I know it doesn’t have any of the traditional attributes that make for enormous commercial success, but it’s a quality film. I’ve recommended it to friends and they’ve all enjoyed it.
Gonjiam. A fairly standard found footage horror. Some disturbing effects, but that’s about it. Competent but predictable.
Encanto. It was okay I guess? Some good musical numbers, visually vibrant, but I didn’t feel anything much at any point.
Exhibit A. Another found footage horror, but this one is the grim story of a household self-destructing under strain. One of those horror films that is effective and depressing into the bargain. Grim.
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I bounced off Encanto too. They had a couple catchy songs all over the internet, but the film itself didn’t interest me.
Maybe I’m not the demographic for it, and other people may enjoy their culture being represented
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I did too, and if I didn’t have kids that would have been the end of it. But they watched it again, and got the CD, and I have to admit those songs have earworm powers that grow in the repeating. Now I struggle to free my mind from their flowery grasp. Sigh.
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There is something about the structure of Lin Manuel Miranda’s music that doesn’t work for me. I’m not a music critic so it’s not easy for me to describe but it is like his songs are conversations that bounce between tempo and don’t match the more traditional verse/chorus structure that I am used to. I won’t deny that he’s written catchy tunes and Encanto is no exception but for some reason I can’t easily explain they also rub me the wrong way.
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A lot of my colleagues in opera or friends who admire traditional musicals are just stopped dead in their tracks by his songs. I think it’s the lack of lyricism or legato that so many of us have gotten used to. So many of his songs yammer for your attention and are rhythmically complicated, so yours is a typical reaction as far as I have experienced.
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It sounds a bit like sour grapes that way. I don’t like all of his stuff (the lamplighter song in Mary Poppins was straight trash), but going after his songs for their musicality seems like the people who deride Marvel so obsessively. An element of envy over someone who pierced the cultural zeitgeist so thoroughly.
I really don’t think that’s what it is. I took a LONG time to “grok” Hamilton, but once I did, I quite appreciated what LMM does so well while still having issues with his other material. I simply don’t think some others can grok what he’s doing, and I get that. I don’t think it’s envy, it’s bewilderment. “What are these people going crazy about??” And since I’ve been there–my kids were listening in fascination while I was sonically bored–I think that’s a legitimate reaction.
And I think it’s unfair to compare LMM and Marvel. I’m a huge comics fan but I’m solidly in the Scorsese and “Marvel is Disney for grown-ups” camp. You’re absolutely right that LMM has pierced the cultural zeitgeist–he’s a true innovator and Hamilton was a meteor–but that’s not what Marvel has done. Marvel movies and series are popular because they make a complex world easy to navigate.
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The Northman. A great cast stacked behind a tale that could easily be an actual Viking saga. I don’t think much of the fights, they’re far too simple and unsophisticated, ignoring any of the realities around things like armour and how bladed weapons work, but that aside, the film is an incredible vision of a very different people in a very different society, and so much of the setting and visuals are perfect, even ignoring the CGI (which is usually good, and often genuinely excellent), the film is beautiful. The landscapes and locations are particularly choice. There is some real, uncompromising violence and cruelty depicted, alongside a compelling sense of fate and fatalism. The attention to detail and dedication created a film with a unified vision, and actors like Kidman and Dafoe steal scenes in service of it. Skarsgard plays his role to the hilt, and he does well with a role that does not have a lot of subtlety to it.
Everything Everywhere All at Once. Much stranger than I expected, and a bit of a marvel as well. Yeoh is brilliant, of course, but so is Ke Huy Quan, and so is James Hong, and so is Jamie Lee Curtis. I don’t think a lot of the fights feel kinetic enough, there is some really dubious editing, cuts, and effects, which dilute the feel, and rob many impacts of, well, impact, but the film as a whole is very good, and imaginative in a way most films aren’t.
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Anyone check out Night Sky yet? Spacek and Simmons seem like a good cast, and the concept … could be good? But it could also plant a nonsense tree that’ll grow like kudzu.
Come on, now. That’s not just Ke Huy Quan. That’s Short Round!
“Okey dokey, Dr. Jones! Hold on to your potatoes!”
Is it a film.
Night Sky looks like an 8-episode series. Not sure if that’s all there’s intended to be.
I may have failed to notice, despite posting in both threads and reading them for years, that our TV and movie threads are not actually the same thread.
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