PT The Blockbuster Double Standard

Yeah, it going to be interesting to see how Nolan tries to wrap up his Batman Trilogy. I'm really wondering how you can have a definitive ending to Batman thought. It would be a downer if they killed him, and it would be odd to see him retire from the role as Batman after only a few years. I hope Nolan knows what he's doing.

I'm a big fan of Burton as well. RETURNS (disregarding the fact it is a sequel) and SCISSORHANDS are good films. The only one of his films I didn't like was (as you said) Planet of the Apes. From what I understand there was a lot of behind the scenes problems with that one. A lot of people hate his CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTOR and ALICE IN WONDERLAND films, but I thought they were just meh. And I agree about BIG FISH being really good, and I might even agree it is his masterpiece.

And I also agree that REVENGE was a great conclusion to the series (I personally even rank it second overall after EMPIRE). It was very powerful in its themes, story, and characters. I personally thought Jackson provided a good strong powerful conclusion in RETURN OF THE KING. Off the top of my head I can't think of any major issue I personally had with it. And if we're talking series conclusions I thought that the latest Harry Potter movie was also quite good. I'm not the biggest fan of that franchise but I thought it similarly to those had good emotional resonance.

 

Pee Wee's Big Adventure>Ed Wood>Beetlejuice>Mars Attacks!>Edward Scissorhands>Big Fish>Batman Returns>Batman.
His remakes are evil and wrong.

 

As many have argued about Lucas, I think that Burton's a better creator/producer than he is a director. The best film he was ever invovled with, to me, is The Nightmare Before Christmas, and we have Henry Selick to thank for that one. But then, perhaps movies like that and ESB should really be seen as co-directed, because both his and Lucas' visual fingerprints are all over their respective films. Credit should be given where it'd due, even if that person isn't in the credits.

 

I am not sure if I am allowed to post a link to this, as it is another message board. It is IMDB.

This topic is on the Deathly Hallows 2 board, and a heated discussion swerved into the direction of Star Wars, with one poster saying that there is generally nothing good about the Prequels.

I think its this mindset that is particularly flawed, but i really do not want to post on that topic because of the hatred of that poster. I say you guys shouldn't get involved too, but i think his viewpoint is certainly interesting because it signifies that certain people just refuse to see things, and that ultimately you have to judge things for yourself.

Don't let what everyone else says become your opinion. Its unfortunate that with films, we generally tend to listen to majority of critics because well, films cost money and we do not want to get ripped off.

Thats the catch. You never know what you will like, but that requires you watching every single film for yourself to see if you will like it. As that is impossible, i say simply Watch a film if it interests you regardless of critics or fanboys or trolls say.

Actually its better not for me to post the link, you guys would own him to hard

 

Werd. As much as Selick deserves credit for Nightmare Before Christmas, it's Burton's baby. And another good chunk of that movie belongs to Danny Elfman too.

 

i honestly haven't been fond of Tim Burton's inconsistent quality but i thought Nightmare was definitely his thing.

 

Hey, this is exciting! I don't think I've ever talked to someone who actually agrees with me on this.

Planet of the Apes was a mistake. Burton should know better after having so many bad experiences on huge Hollywood productions. He was miserable on Batman, partly due to psycopath producer Jon Peters. And then he actually worked with Peters again (!) on the aborted Superman project with Nicolas Cage. He should have known better than getting into a gigantic remake. But then, it put him on a different course that resulted in Big Fish, which is another movie I'll never stop raving about.

I also found Charlie..., Alice..., and Sweeney Todd as well, kinda boring.

Yeah, I thought the Potter ending was pretty good. But a long time coming. Eight films. Jeez... And I suppose my problem with Jackson's films is mostly The Two Towers. The final film was better, but I guess it's just really hard to match such a kick-ass opening chapter.

 

Two Face comes out of nowhere? How do you figure? In The Dark Knight, you see his girlfriend get blown to bits and half of his face is burned off. We see earlier in the film that despite being a decent guy overall, he can have an explosive temper (when he torments and threatens to shoot one of Joker's henchmen). I can buy into Dent going nuts, based on having the love of his life horribly killed and being in tremendous physical and emotional pain.

I can find Anakin's fall "convincing", I just don't find it all that compelling, because there's no reason to really like him. Harvey Dent at least seems like he genuinely wants to clean up Gotham City. Anakin in AOTC is a punk that doesn't show any redeeming qualities. He spends the whole movie either lusting after Padme, whining about how Obi-Wan treats him, or slaughtering camps of Sandpeople, when many of them were probably not involved with what happened to Shmi. Anakin's fall is believable because he was always a jerk, he just became more evil as time went on.

I don't feel there is really any double standard between the prequels and other movies. I don't think people go out of their way to hate the prequels. Sure there are a lot of bits that are similar in many movies, things become cliche because they are effective at capturing the audience's interest. It's just a matter of making those cliches your own and making them work for your movie.

I will say though, that I'd be baffled if any Jar Jar haters could tolerate the twin robots from Transformers 2. Far more annoying, and more blatantly racist.

 

In my opinion, Harvey Dent's "fall," if it can be called that, is complete and utter rubbish. There's no choice in his case -- he doesn't willingly choose a selfish option. He simply becomes evil because he's traumatized into it by the Joker. Simply put, he goes insane from the loss of Rachel with no contemplation, merely visceral human emotion. And while that might touch the audience briefly on a sentimental level, it doesn't make for a very compelling story. You can no more blame Harvey Dent for his actions than you can blame a dog for snapping at you if you step on its tail. There's no thought involved, just pure animalistic reactions to pain. Anakin's fall, by contrast, involves a great deal of emotional manipulation, but still leaves the final decision in his hands. He may feel trapped, but he's aware of what he is doing and there's multiple layers on motivations behind his actions. Many people find Dent to be a character more readily sympathized with, but I merely find him to be boring. There's no tragedy to the character because his downfall wasn't brought about by his flaws -- he was just another victim of the Joker's convoluted scheme.

 

Wait, he's a victim...but there's no tragedy? Huh?

One of the themes of The Dark Knight was that anyone has the potential to go bad. We see it in other parts of the movie, like when The Joker is trying to get the people on the two boats to kill each other. Toward the end of the movie The Joker's plot revolves around trying to show that human beings are ultimately rotten to the core. I think Harvey being a victim is what makes his fall more tragic than Anakin's. Anakin was nasty throughout the movies, and while Harvey had a temper, he was overall a decent person trying to do his best. Dent wasn't just another victim either. He was the main target, because Joker felt that if he could turn Dent bad, the guy that seemed to be the city's last hope, he would prove that anyone could go bad.

I don't find any tragedy in Anakin's fall because he was a jerk from the beginning. Obi-Wan calls him a good friend, but we rarely see that in the movies, except for the beginning of ROTS. He spent most of the movie being a self-centered crybaby.

 

For me, yes. Dent is simply a victim, he isn't a tragic character. I consider a tragedy to be the result of a fatal flaw. A tragic character is one who is brought low by his own weaknesses and choices. Dent's story is tragic to be sure, but it's tragic in the sense that he was the victim of a terrible series of circumstances. The Joker was essentially a destructive force of nature (like a hurricane or a tornado) that swept in, killed those he loved, and traumatized him into becoming "evil." He never consciously chose to do something out of a selfish motivation with a full understanding of the consequences and control of his faculties. When he goes "bad" the man has just had half his face burned off, listened to his girlfriend die, and been psychologically tormented by the Joker. He's operating on pure animalistic instinct. Anakin, though he's emotionally fraught, is still making a decision in joining Palpatine and it's a decision he's well aware is causing him to do evil (hence the tears). So while Anakin's downfall is caused by his faults (attachment and selfishness), Dent's is not. One might say that Anakin's story is a tragedy. Dent's is simply sad.

The theme that "anyone has the potential to go bad" is lost on me, though, in that Nolan didn't portray Dent as having chosen his particular path. Thus the message seems to be, "torment someone enough and they'll eventually be psychologically damaged and will do terrible things as a result" which is a bit of a "no duh" for me. Evil, in my opinion, necessitates selfishness and I saw none of that in Dent -- only agony and grief. So while I may feel sorry for him to a degree, he falls flat because his characterization comes off as one-dimensional. And if the theme of the Dark Knight was that anyone could go bad, then I don't see the point in showing both boatfuls of people refusing to kill the other members.

Here, in summation, is my argument: Anakin fell in part due to manipulation and his own weaknesses. He chose to succumb to the darkness. Dent was pushed off a cliff by the Joker. But none of us can resist the pull of gravity, so I found his situation to be uninteresting in comparison. Of course, you may disagree.

Anakin's status as a jerk is a matter of interpretation, though. Many see his complaints against Obi-Wan as unjustified, but I think there's a degree of truth to them. When he says Obi-Wan doesn't understand him, for example, I'm reminded of when Obi-Wan wondered what Anakin was doing on Tatooine, even though he was well aware that the kid was deeply worried about his mother. Then there's the fact that Obi-Wan has very little trust in his apprentice in AOTC (although by ROTS, ironically, this has improved). Both have legitimate complaints -- Obi Wan in saying that Anakin is arrogant and headstrong and Anakin in saying that Obi-Wan is overly critical and doesn't understand. I also think you're forgetting that

 

Just to add to what PiettsHat has already said...

I don't find much that's "decent" about a man on a moral crusade to rid a city of "scum" on its "streets". This is a pretty vile attitude to criminality, in my opinion, and the fact that Dent, a rich, white authority figure, and second arm of the law, approves of a mysterious vigilante who drives a tank on an indefinite quest to beat people up and rescue his would-be girlfriend whilst recklessly endangering other citizens and causing untold damage to public and private property, well... How "good" of a person can Dent really be? How "good" can any of Batman's fans actually be? "The Dark Knight" *is* dark; but not in any particularly cutting or elegant way, in my view. So much of the film orbits around -- or at least pays continual lip service to -- crime, law and order, and justice and fairness, that it feels quite constricting and juvenile, even fascist, in its heavy-handed delivery of characters and situations that "better" films (in my opinion) would satirize and shun. I think the film wants to arouse a viewer's sympathy and awe at different turns, but uses quite cheap tricks and advances simplistic positions and arguments in service of a contrived, laboured story. To me, TDK, while sometimes compared to TESB, as a super-solid, surprisingly-dark "second chapter" in a popular fantasy genre, isn't nearly as sophisticated or atmospheric as Kershner and Lucas' film/mood masterpiece. On the other hand, it's all subjective, isn't it? I've read a more nuanced interpretation of the ferry scene, for example, that suggests the real failure lies with Batman and The Joker, who both fail to perceive what actually unfolded on the boats, with the majority of the civilians voting to blow up the prisoners' ferry, and the cowardice of those in authority who would let others take the fall (guy in the prisoners' ferry) or the spineless hypocrisy of a civilian easily voting one way but ultimately acting another -- wrinkles in the fabric that actually support The Joker's position, even though he completely fails to see it, and which Batman makes a hash of with his sentimental rebuke: "This city ... just showed you ... that it's FULL of people ... ready to believe in goooooood!" Nolan's movies aren't all bad. They have things to offer and I can glean my own insights from them. I'll still take the Kurosawa-like austerity and magical defamiliarizing-of-the-familiar of Lucas' films -- plus all the memorable characters, assured mise-en-scene, sharp action sequences, flashy effects and innovative sound design -- over anything Nolan has made, though.

 

You're touching on what I think (even as a fan of the films) is the main problem with the Prequel Trilogy. The OT told a story over a span of four years. The PT spreads itself much thinner as it covers 13 and thus there are big time gaps and some character development that we don't get to see as they've got to focus more on setting the stage for the later films. And thus we have to take some things on de-facto. To show everything people would've wanted in that time frame it probably would've taken 5 or 6 films.

This plays a big factor into Anakin as many saw him as just an angry and whiny jerk throughout the PT and not the good friend Obi-Wan spoke fondly of in A NEW HOPE. We see they're meeting in PHANTOM MENACE but then flash past ten years of their relationship's development to one of Anakin's darkest times where he's faced with temptation that is against the Jedi Code as well as terrible visions of and witnessing the event of his mother's death. With the transition to a character like Darth Vader it would seem that showing a character's darker moments are more important as that would cause more change towards heading down the road of villainy, while their good moments don't. I do think that Anakin and Obi-Wan's relationship was pretty realistic with what we got to see in ATTACK OF THE CLONES. The thing to keep in mind is that Anakin at that point was an angsty teenager (and let's be honest, we all at least at times had/have angst in our teenage years). They argue, but it's only natural for their to be tension between a child and their parents as well as between a student and their teacher (Obi-Wan being both to Anakin). Anakin was going through hard times, and Obi-Wan while strict with him wasn't doing it because they hated each other like so many have said, but that when you care about someone you have to be straightforward and sometimes harsh to try and help them. That's the interesting parallel with Palpatine who served as Anakin's dark father figure who lavished him with all the praise he wanted but in the end it didn't do anything for him and led to his degeneration. But I will say that I thought their friendship was very well displayed in REVENGE OF THE SITH. Their interactions throughout the whole Invisible Hand sequence felt like it was between old lifelong friends, and other scenes including Obi-Wan's parting from Anakin at the Senate as well as their talk before Obi-Wan went to Utapau was able to cement in my mind that they were friends. And Anakin in the first half was much more likable (still not fantastically acted however) and seemed in general to be a good person who was being tempted by evil. With more films their friendship would've gotten even more limelight and we would've seen its full development, but I agree that the TCW does help suffice for this.

 

Let's not read into someone failing to put in my opinion in front of everything. I always figure that sort of thing is implied when we're talking about silly things like movies.

Simplistic and juvenile? What about Star Wars? Where the rebels are clearly the good guys, and everyone in the Empire is clearly a bad guy? Do we ever see how the Imperial officers are merely human beings doing the bes

 

It's cool.

Sometimes I don't think about how we're only seeing these characters for a few hours, and not the ten years between Phantom Menace and AOTC. It's entirely possible that Anakin was a stand up guy and the audience just never has the chance to see it. Maybe I spent years as a kid wanting to see Darth Vader as a goody two-shoes before he went bad, so that's why it doesn't seem like there's much of a change in character to me.

 

As far as Anakin, I do think the ten-year gap between TPM and AOTC is an issue as we don't see the development of the friendship between him and Obi-Wan. Also, during the four hours of AOTC and ROTS, we have to see the factors that lead to his fall as well as the fall itself, so of course we're going to see him at his worst--and there wasn't enough time to do that and do justice to him at his best. Thankfully we have TCW series for that.


You're complaining about the lack of so-called development of the friendship between Anakin and Obi-Wan during the ten-year span between TPM and AOTC, yet you have nothing to say about the love story between Leia and Han that suddenly popped up at the beginning of ESB, after the three-year span between ANH and ESB? Or Luke's development into a highly skilled Jedi Knight during the one-year span between ESB and ROTJ, without Yoda's help? Or why after three years, Han was still wanted by Jabba?

What do you mean "we have to see" the factors that led to his fall? Lucas had hinted the aspects of Anakin's personality in all three movies that led to his fall in ROTS. Why else did Lucas go through all of that trouble in showing Anakin's reluctance in leaving Tatooine and his mother and later his vow to be willing to do anything to save a loved one, following Shmi's death? Or his arrogance over his skills and impatience toward Obi-Wan's teaching skills? Why on earth did Lucas bother showing his feelings for Padme over THREE movies? These were all hints that led to Anakin's decision to become Palpatine's apprentice in order to save Padme.

 

How does it compare to the attitude that criminals should simply be left alone to do as they please?

Well, if they think that Nolan's films are superior to the PT, they are obviously evil and despicable. If they were good, they would sympathize with the gangsters.

This is an inevitable part of the Batman setting and as such has nothing specifically to do with Nolan. If you want to do "better" films that smirk at the very idea of justice, you don't do Batman.

 

I'm confused as well, Cryo. The "fascistic" charge doesn't really hold up, considering that Wayne's War on Crime includes lifting millions out of poverty via Wayne Enterprises and blackmailing corrupt cops and judges. He's essentially an enlightened aristocrat in the FDR mold.

Also--and I may be saying this because I live next door to a sociopathic drug dealer--some people just need to get the crap kicked out of them. Repeatedly.

 

YES... What about Star Wars? What are you doing here if you think the saga presents its "heroes" and "villains" in a simplistic and juvenile light? In my view, Star Wars is a dialectical examination -- an epic adventure and giddy satire -- of human thought and action. It may require some lateral thinking to see. We have regular human guys working in a bureaucratic-like manner within the Empire, manning battle stations, space cruisers, and the like, as if it's just another day at the office. That, in itself, is quite revealing. In my opinion, Lucas doesn't have to show us HOW they got where they are; he implies that a majority are just there for another day at work. In other words, they're morally culpable, and not. The reason we see Luke and Co. blasting Imperials away is because the Rebels are, essentially, terrorists, seeking to bring down one socio-political system and replace it with another. Right underneath the top layer of these movies, there lurks a deep reservoir of irony. Lucas is showing us events "from a certain point of view". This is hinted at in the first installment and more or less made explicit in the final movie of the series in the respective episodes' very dialogue, but you can see it all over, ranging from the bombastic, hyper-confident "20th Century Fox" logo/fanfare that announces the start of each entry, to the propaganda-like war reels that follow in the same basic colour, to all events and situations repeating in subtly shifted patterns between would-be "heroes" and "villains". ROTS virtually gives the game away: "There are heroes on both sides." And one hero, dubbed as such at the end of the opening sequence, turns out to be Anakin Skywalker, the saga's future nemesis/tormenter, who is given that epithet by his supposed "brother", for killing a prominent member of the opposition, only to be later confronted, provoked and, effectively, attacked by this same person in the film's final act. The duels, too, are highly suggestive. EVERYTHING IS! Duels, in real life, were typically carried out by upper-class gents to settle ego-bruising disputes: the decadent dressing-up of primitive conflict resolution (i.e., violence). Then the title, "Star Wars", seems to be ripped from Mayan archeology, where it was first coined in the 1960s to denote battles waged between rival Mayan cities -- civil wars -- that were timed according to astronomical events (the idea that DESTINY is perceived to be real and that human beings have used any justification they can think of, historically, to enact violence against closely-related groups; a pervading irony that the saga runs and runs with).

I agree that "getting into it" -- at least, on conventional, verbal terms -- would, indeed, bog down a fantasy film; indeed, ANY movie. That's not what Star Wars does. While it is structurally simple, it is very complex in other areas: non-linear and abstract. GL encourages a viewer, especially with his repeating, two-trilogy approach, to look for similarities and differences; to cut through obvious dogma and appreciate deeper meaning: endless reciprocity and inter-connectivity. This is not, in my view, what Nolan does in his movies. No two film-makers can or will do exactly the same thing, of course, but Nolan's films, in my opinion, lack the colourful, esoteric qual

 

The first film stressed that Thomas Wayne used his corporation to employ the desperate, fund charities, and construct cheap mass transportation, and his efforts helped pull Gotham out of her economic depression. The military contracts of which you speak were spearheaded by Rutger Hauer's character, the seedy tyro replacement who unwittingly supplied the League of Shadows with that water-vaporizer doomsday machine. When Bruce Wayne and Lucius Fox took back control, they nixed the weapons projects and restored Father Wayne's benign vision. Hence, the enlightened aristocrat.

And I would contend that there's nothing at all abhorrent in brutalizing gangsters, so kudos to Batman!



BTW, does anyone ever feel tempted to use Bale's Batman voice in inappropriate places? Imagine pulling up to a McDonald's drive-thru and grumbling, "I want a quarter-pounder...with cheeeeeeeeeeese!"