The long DARK boring KNIGHT

Rating: Null/10 (20 July 2008)

...describes the night I went to see this movie. The 9 year old sitting next to me was literally crying to his dad to leave. He eventually fell asleep.
Once again another Batman movie comes out after all the hoopla and cool looking imagery and all I get is a very overlong, humorless movie filled with monologues on what makes men go bat crap crazy.
Once again Batman gets lost in the shuffle of too many characters, too many villains, convoluted storyline, and too little screen time. Of course movies should come with a plot but they should be entertaining as well. And the plot just wasn't very interesting in itself.
The movie exclaims Gotham, Gotham, Gotham, but you never get a sense of life in the city. You're supposed to believe that Gotham is overrun by criminals because they pack all of the 'crimelords' into one room where they basically say "we're running this city". Then they pack all the cops and Batman into a room where they basically say "we can't let them run the city" and that's basically it.
Where was the action? There were so many scenes of talk, talk, talk that when the action began to happen I remembered I was watching a 'supposedly' superhero action movie. And before you knew it, the scene was over and we were back to watching Bruce Wayne watch the news on TV. There was really no definitive, memorable action sequence. Although I will say that the editing during the Bat bike scenes was 'cut' much better than the Batmobile scene in Batman Begins. You actually get to view extended shots of the bike and appreciate how cool it looks before it cuts away.
I did not like the technique of playing multiple scenes with various characters simultaneously building up to some sort of mini climax. It works well when you use it once maybe. Not throughout most of the movie. It felt like watching a trailer.
Heath Ledger (r.i.p.) was very good. Ackhart was just as good. Maggie Gyllenhal does a very good impersonation of Katie Holmes playing Rachel. In fact, the whole cast was excellent. But where was Christian Bale? There were just too many shots of Bale sitting and staring at something. The sea, the TV, the city, the TV, his Bat suit.
All in all I was disappointed with this over long, self important, humorless summer blockbuster. My kid summed it up on the way home saying how he felt the movie was made for 'fortysomething' fans of the graphic novels. And he's right. The movie won't disappoint that crowd. But if you're not in that crowd, you might feel a little out of place.