How Batman got his groove back

Rating: 8/10 (22 July 2012)

Eight years later after Dent's death and Batman's retirement, Gotham City is in a state of peace. Under powers granted by the Dent Act, Commissioner Gordon has nearly eradicated violent and organized crime. However, he still feels guilty about the cover-up of Harvey Dent's crimes. He plans to admit to the conspiracy, but decides that the city is not ready to hear the truth, but his speech is stolen by terrorist leader Bane. Gordon is shot in the process, and he promotes patrol officer John Blake to detective, allowing Blake to report directly to him. As Batman has disappeared from Gotham City, so too has Bruce Wayne, locking himself inside Wayne Manor. Both Gordon and Blake implore Bruce to return as Batman. Bruce decides the time is right, but realizes that Bane may be his match and breaks Batman. Bruce needs to retrain and save Gotham from Bane who is planning on going out with a bang. With the help of a Robin Hood like friend, Selena Kyle, Bruce will show that justice can prevail.
The conclusion to the epic trilogy is complete now with The Dark Knight Rises. I don't think anyone could've expected anyone to save the Batman series the way Christopher Nolan did. Taking a darker and deeper look into the best super hero of all time, he created this whole world where it actually seemed possible for all this to happen. That there are people who could dress like bats to stop the bad guys and villains who dress up and almost destroy the world. Batman Begins was a very good movie, The Dark Knight is a masterpiece, but The Dark Knight Rises falls just a notch short of what I was expecting. The Dark Knight delivers in terrific performances, a great story and excellent cinematography. We have a great villain done right with Bane. Unfortunately with the nightmare that was Batman & Robin, Bane was made into a weird deaf mute which had nothing to do with the comics. Nolan didn't just write Bane well, but he made him very terrifying adding a cold demeanor with the slick intelligence of Hannibal Lector. But the one who steals the show is Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle(who is never mentioned as Catwoman), but her character is written so well and Anne pulls in a great performance, one of her best. I wanted to see more of her on the screen. Also Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who is becoming one of my favorite actors, pulls in a great performance and in a twist that I kept screaming with his character was pulled in very well in the end. I liked having this Howard Hughes affect with Bruce Wayne in the beginning, having a good continue from the end of the Dark Knight where he takes a nasty fall with Dent and was limping. It was good to be put back into place where we forget that Bruce is human, he will hurt. In this film, he's broke: financially, mentally and physically and this is all about how he comes back into his own groove as Batman completing his story.
While the film is very good, it falls short of being great. While I liked the subtext of what's going on with Wall Street and how Selina is like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to help herself and others, it didn't really fit that well with the story with the stock market effect. Tom Hardy pulls in a terrific performance as Bane, but for some reason he's actually not that memorable. I think he lacks that pinch of charisma that Heath had to make the Joker one of the best movie villains of all time. Plus, I wasn't a big fan of his voice, about 40% of his dialog I couldn't understand because it was a bit muffled. Also I wasn't a fan of his voice in general, it didn't fit well with the power he had. Maybe it was because his face was covered, he couldn't get the performance that could've been Oscar worthy. Also the film does feel a bit dragged out, the first 2/3's of the film feels like more talk vs. action and not much Batman. I wish also that there was a feeling of fun, because the story is almost too dark at times. Batman could've had some more juicy dialog that was more replaced by Selina. I also didn't like that they had to make her a love interest in the end, Selina's character on her own was perfect and it feels like a last minute cliché that just gets thrown in for an applause. There are a few inconsistencies with the story that I don't want to give away, but the ending leaves a lot of questions.
But please, don't take the negative comments I have wrong, this is a very good film and worth seeing in the theater at the full ticket price. The effects are terrific and all the performances are magnificent and the world is just awesome to look at as Bane is just playing with it like his own sand box. The ending is one of the best I've seen and a great climax to a wonderful trilogy. That fight with Bane and Batman was too awesome and seeing Gotham fight back for their city was great. It's sad to see Nolan's era of Batman end, but good to know that there was a man who actually was able to bring it back to life.
8/10