Directed by Christopher Nolan
Characters:
Bruce Wayne/Batman (Christian Bale)
Selena Kyle/Catwoman (Anne Hathaway)
Alfred Pennyworth (Michael Cain)
Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman)
John Blake (Joseph Gordan-Levitt)
Miranda Tate (Marion Cotillard)
Bane (Tom Hardy)
So I've come to my final Batman review before Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice (I still have Man Of Steel), and it's for The Dark Knight Rises, the last live action Batman movie we've seen, and the final Christopher Nolan Batman movie. Also, just because I see a lot of people getting confused, these movies are in no way connected to the DC Cinematic Universe.
The Dark Knight Rises was arguably the most anticipated film of 2012, and this is the year in which The Avengers released. Utilising the immense success of The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan carried Christian Bale's Batman eight years after the events of that movie, and straight into a time that I'm sure nobody was expecting. Bruce Wayne is wasted when this movie starts. He can't walk properly, he's cut himself off from the world, and he looks like he's fifty years old. And Gotham City, on the surface, is all good now, but deep down, the effects of what The Joker did in The Dark Knight are visible. And that proves to be the basis of which Bane takes advantage.
Bane is such a brilliant villain in this movie. Christopher Nolan went all out with his villains, and Bane is no exception. And while the rest of the villains in the trilogy had different advantages over Batman, nobody quite had the one that Bane did in this movie: a physical one. And considering that Batman wasn't really in good shape when this movie began, that's a great advantage to have. And then, halfway through the movie, Bane already won. He broke Batman, sent him to the prison, and made Gotham his own. That's all just phenomenal. Even though this was the last movie in the trilogy, Bruce Wayne really had to rise, rise more than he ever has in his life. Much like Iron Man 3, this is more a movie of the human rather than the superhero counterpart, and while I understand why people wouldn't like that, it's something that I really respect. We don't need the superhero all the time. Humanising a character is always a great thing to do, and that's exactly what The Dark Knight Rises did. And Tom Hardy's performance as Bane is, without saying of course, great.
The Dark Knight rises also felt huge. Some movies just radiate an aura of spectacle. From the eerie chants that surround Bruce Wayne in the prison, and when Bane is around, to the dystopian Gotham City, everything manages to feel amazing, and credit has to be given to the cinematography and the sound editing for that aspect. Speaking of cinematography though, there's a section in the end that's half shot like the rest of the movie, and half in IMAX widescreen, and once you notice the constant transition, it gets annoying.
Even supporting characters are great in this movie. Anne Hathaway, as strange as it sounds, is a really good Catwoman, and Miranda Tate turns out to be a really important character. I like how the trilogy actually is a trilogy, because a lot of the elements in this movie trace back to Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. Joseph Gordan-Levitt's character is one that, if done wrong, you can hate just for his presence, but I really liked him in this movie. That sort of character was needed in a movie like this.
Sure, there are plot holes in this movie, and it certainly isn't perfect, but what movie is? Even in The Dark Knight, the cop Ramirez knew what really happened to Harvey Dent, and the guy who worked for Wayne Enterprises knew that Bruce Wayne was Batman, but nothing comes of it. I feel like this movie receives criticism just for the sake of it, because everything big these days can't just be left good.
So ignoring all the bad opinions on this movie, I'll stick to mine. On a scale where M is the lowest, and R is the highest possible rating, with the highlighted letter being the rating:
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