Dark Knight Rises
The impact of the late Heath Ledgerâs Oscar winning performance as The Joker in The Dark Knight was incredibly monumental, as Ledger had not only successfully redefined an iconic character, but he had also laid out that same character with a seemingly fresh new philosophy and ethos that had come to embody the entire Nolan / Bale epic reinvention of the franchise and what it really was that Batman / Bruce Wayne was fighting against the whole time: the implementation of violent anarchy that would guarantee âfreedomâ for anyone ruthless enough to take what they feel is theirs, but at the cost of public safety and enough strategized order to protect children and those who could not fight for themselves (which is where The Batman came in). Tragically, Ledgerâs untimely death would force the breaking of his infamous promise to Batman at the end of Dark Knight (âYou and me are destined to do this forever.â) which definitely promised more encounters between the two of them in the future as they had for years in the comic books where Joker would always be a thorn in The Caped Crusaderâs side. Director Christopher Nolan made it official that Ledgerâs passing would not result in a recasting of the role (at least not for HIS series, as Jared Leto would take it on later down the line) for his third and final chapter in the trilogy, nor would the third film have any direct reference to The Joker at all out of some supposed ârespectâ to Ledger. So when this sequel was released in 2012, it was interesting to see just in what direction they would take it. Aaron Eckhardt happily offered his services to return as Harvey Dent / Two Face so that he could now be played as a ârealâ villain and not so much a tragic figure whom had fallen from grace, but Nolan said no to that and emphasized that Dent was indeed dead, even as the film opens with Gary Oldmanâs Gordon giving a memorial to him and Dentâs name IS brought up a number of times in relation to his covered up murderous rampage as Two Face. When it came to adding new villains to the mix (who had not been featured in The Nolan Bat Universe before), it would seem obvious that Selina Kyle / Catwoman was a no brainer (always considered amongst the âBig 4â in the past and already immortalized with Michelle Pfeifferâs legendary turn in Burtonâs Batman Returns) and admittedly Anne Hathaway was a near perfect choice here, embodying slinky seduction along with the more modern element of having mastered the art of manipulation of men not just through incredible beauty but by being exactly what men want her to be in order to get ahead in this world. The ârealisticâ tones of Nolanâs Bat World also come into play with Kyleâs background, a beautiful girl with a criminal record that she canât ever seem to escape in order to move ahead in life, so she does her thing as a cat burglar in order to keep food on the table for both herself and her best friend / roommate (possibly her girlfriend) while thankfully keeping her usual love / hate relationship with Baleâs Bruce Wayne just a tad on the more ambiguous side. Hathawayâs Kyle seeks access to a highly sought after app called the âclean slateâ, one that would expunge and wipe away her criminal record and allow her to start life anew, even as again, Nolan eschews Burtonâs approach of examining the psychological connection between her and Wayne and having it seem like theyâre just drawn to each other on the fly. All this is well and good other than the fact that itâs just not substantial enough for a three hour Batman movie, so with Ledgerâs Joker sadly not making a return (and the Dent character dead), Nolan decided to dip into the well that was the original movie of his in this series, 2005âs Batman Begins, and more or less make this a direct sequel to that film instead, with a plot involving The League Of Shadows (led by Liam Neesonâs Ras Al Ghul in the original) coming back to Gotham City eight years later and gunning for revenge in finishing Rasâ work. To that end, they are now led by the masked mercenary named Bane (previously portrayed as a near retarded figure in the notorious Batman And Robin which belied his comic book origins of being an intelligent, articulate badass) played by Tom Hardy in a performance that requires him to have an elaborate mask covering most of his face for the entire film all while speaking in a muffled yet cultured sounding voice that can be hard to understand at times. The gist of Baneâs âgimmickâ so to speak is that he is more than just a badass wearing a mask as we are also given an elaborate backstory on him where he apparently grew up in a horrific prison environment where terrible beatings from the other prisoners had left him in so much permanent pain that his mask also serves as a conduit for a constant influx of painkilling drugs that serve to actually make him seem invulnerable to any physical damage which he sustains and serves him well in his first fight with Batman even as the overall impression that we take away from him is that he is actually a bit of a fraud who only appears to fight tough because the drugs make him immune to pain. Nonetheless, he and The League have concocted an elaborate, twenty step plan to bring Gotham to its knees (with Selina being more of an independent contractor unknowingly helping them with certain aspects of their plan through some of her own burglaries) and thatâs where Nolan in dropping The Joker angle while then throwing everything and the kitchen sink into The League Of Shadows plotline officially goes into overkill with a convoluted storyline that leaves some other strong series elements in the lurch, including Gary Oldmanâs Gordon spending half the movie in a hospital bed before coming back into the story and getting almost nothing to do anyway while Morgan Freemanâs Lucious Fox having little more than an extended cameo before the final act when his character finally does something that resembles being of any importance.  Only Michael Caineâs Alfred (who was treated as being more of a throwaway standby character in the two previous films) is allowed to step into the fore in a couple of deeply emotional scenes with Bale that underscores his role of being more of a deeply concerned father figure than at any other time in franchise history. For the newcomers, we get Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a young rookie cop who it turns out has not only always idolized Batman, but also has figured out completely on his own whom his secret identity is and Marion Cotillard as a female business owner looking to invest in Wayne Enterprises, plus thereâs also Matthew Modine (back from the dead in his once stagnant career) as the deputy commissioner looking to put a dent in the Batman legend. As for Bane and his master plan, it appears that both he and The League are looking to send Gotham City into utter chaos (as usual), only here they actually succeed after blowing up a football game (and threatening a nuclear bomb) whereupon Bane himself (with the police buried in the sewers after a cave in) declares himself to be a (false) revolutionary leader âfor the peopleâ and encourages everybody to just do what they want without having to worry about police interference. This leads to the idea that itâs now open season on the rich and powerful of Gotham, but as the anarchy spreads so does much of the story focus here, as we go from having all of the criminals that Harvey Dent put away being suddenly released to the rich and corrupt being dragged into a kangaroo court (presided over by the welcomely returning Cillian Murphy as Scarecrow) while their homes and belongings are trashed to a squadron of cops clashing with the criminals gangland style as The President (William Devane haha of course) goes on TV to declare that The United States will not negotiate with terrorists to yet another situation (like in Begins) where a major villain has managed to keep their identity a secret the whole time until the end. Pandemonium though it might be, it all still fails to stay as tight and focused as the first two films were and comes off instead as being more of an everything must go fire sale of the Nolan / Bale legacy where Batman was never meant to have an actual rogues gallery because the few real villains he did get were just too much for him to deal with anywayâŚ
7/10