Dark and melancholic

Rating: 8/10 (23 July 2012)

This is the darkest of this trilogy. There was, to me, also a sense of melancholia and hopelessness to the movie. These emotions are the byproduct of a very high level of violence within the movie. Fifteen minutes into the movie, a group of helpless people are machine-gunned. The movie contains at least two other scenes where men armed with automatic weapons break into crowded public places and begin firing. I'm neither a pacifist nor a stranger to firearms, but these scenes were hard to take without wincing and wondering if another limit was being erased. There is a battle between Bane and Batman that was even worse than the shooting gallery scenes. I looked at my watch to see how much longer remained in the film and wondered if the violence could get worse.
I found it difficult to sympathize with any of the characters in Dark Knight. All seemed superficial with the possible exception of Bale's Batman. He did generate sympathy but is a superhero suppose to rely on sympathy? There was another scene in which GCPD's finest face off against Bane's forces. I think the scene was intended to illicit a feeling of retribution, but it didn't. It just seemed like a lot of people dying without benefit. The movie didn't seem to contain much suspense. I felt like I knew what was going to happen for the big buildup/release happened. There weren't many bat gadgets either. The bat flier and bat cycle were used extensively in the movie, but there was a lack of gee whiz for both.
I didn't hate the movie but didn't get as much enjoyment from it as I had hoped for. It was as fun as I would imagine nuclear winter to be.