The Dark Knight Rises. There be SPOILERS here.

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

I don't want to just focus on the "confusing" part. Even the parts that weren't confusing were not good storytelling.

How can Saito make Dom's legal issues disappear with a phone call?

The stakes of the mission aren't high enough.

The dead wife cliche is tired.

Again: The exposition. Holy shit, the exposition.

Even if you can understand everything that's going on, I think that the simultaneous plot lines drain the tension out of the story. The sum is less than the parts in this case.

The bad guys are anonymous.

The good guys are just types to move the plot along. There is almost no characterization. Dom is the exception, and missing kids and dead wife is contrived and a cliche. C'mon, Nolan. You couldn't do better than that?

Her name is "Mal"? Are you fucking serious? Nothing more irritating than an artist who lets you know, on the nose, that he is capable of addressing BIG THEMES. I love John Lennon, but the fact that he named two songs on his first solo effort "God" and "Love" tell me all I need to know about his ego.

Terrible, on-the-nose dialogue: "Cobb has some serious problems that he has buried down there." “You’re going to have to forgive yourself and confront her”

The father-son plot line is so buried in all the mayhem that the moment that is supposed to be this emotional center of the film is pretty much completely lost.

For my money, the best science fiction movie in the last few years is, "Never Let Me Go." Addresses the biggest of the big themes: Mortality. Does so without a single special effect. It's powerful and magnificent.

For spectacle that is a swing and a miss at times, I'll take "The Tree of Life" over "Inception."

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Uh, no.

I think the Coen Brothers are probably the best of this generation. Maybe Tarantino.

Scorsese if you count him since he's getting up there and has been around. Spielberg. Soderbergh. Malick. Von Trier. P.T. Anderson. I think Alexander Payne is moving up the list. Ang Lee. Fincher. Gus Van Sant. For guys to watch, I nominate Tom McCarthy.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

As do PT Anderson, Guillermo del Toro, Ang Lee, Hayao Miyazaki, David Lynch, Pedro Almodovar, Wes Anderson, Brad Bird, Tarantino, et al., etc, etc., etc., ad inf.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Azrael, speaking of Almodovar, have you seen "The Skin I Live In" yet? Looks excellent.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

I have not*, but look very much forward to it. He's a family favorite. (*We've been a little housebound lately.)

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Us, too. It's all DVD's these days, except we try to make it out once a month or two. Going to try to hit "The Descendants" and "The Artist" over the next couple weeks.

But I digress.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Aronofsky.

Shit, how did I forget him?

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

The DVDs have been a great salvation this fall.

Some more names -

Spike Lee, Ridley Scott, Tim Burton, Martin Scorsese, Wong kar-Wai, Spike Jonze, Peter Jackson, Lars von Trier, David Fincher.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Wow, couldn't disagree with this post more.

Terrence Malick? I haven't seen "Tree of Life" yet, but if you want to talk about a director letting you know on the nose that he can address BIG THEMES, I suggest you rewatch "The Thin Red Line." And "The New World" couldn't sniff the jock of Nolan's worst movies. Both men have 10 film credits as directors. It's not even close who has made the better films.

I, personally, can't get into the Coen Brothers. I love "The Big Lebowski," "True Grit" was very good and they've got a few other movies I liked but didn't love. I think Nolan is a better director, but I acknowledge the Coens' talent. That said, they certainly don't shit all over Nolan.

Cuaron is talented as well. I loved "Children of Men" (the long take was worth the price of admission alone), hated Harry Potter (though that was hardly his fault). But again, his list of credits isn't nearly as impressive as Nolan's, "Y Tu Mama Tambien" notwithstanding.

Inarritu's "21 Grams" was great. "Babel" was shit (and is victim of the same thing you criticize Nolan for). "Biutiful" I just couldn't get into. Again, his resume has nothing on Nolan.

Soderbergh is probably the only one on your list who can hold a candle to Nolan's resume and he hasn't done anything really good in a decade (I actually am looking forward to seeing "Contagion," but I haven't heard very good things). He's also got three times as many credits as Nolan.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Note: That's not my post.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises

Old Miyazaki maybe, but Ponyo was damn near unwatchable and Howl's Moving Castle wasn't a whole lot better.

 

Re: The Dark Knight Rises



We're talking about the same Christopher Nolan that directed 'The Prestige?'


And the "seminal" Hollywood "filmmaker" of "our time" would have to be Spielberg or James Cameron, wouldn't it?