The Dark Knight Flops

Rating: 6/10 (6 December 2013)

I gave this review a 6 after I watched the theater release in part because of irrational exuberance of another Batman film. As it has been out on cable/Apple TV and I've had the chance to watch it again, it deserves perhaps a 3. The film is so sloppily paced and the plot fails to really focus a coherent story this is likely Nolan's worst film.
The good - the first scene is pretty cool (once you get passed asking why no CIA agent thought about taking the hood off of a prisoner that is handcuffed - but compared to other plot holes in the film that's relatively minor).
The bad: everything else.
The film starts with a celebration of Harvey Dent (not a bad move) 8 years later.....uh, why 8 years later? In real time it is only 4 years later but for some reason the script calls for double that? Someone could ask why is that a big deal - the deal is it makes Bruce Wayne a creepy hermit. He's holed himself in his mansion for 8 years? Really?
Anne Hathaway: actress did the best with what she had, which was a total of 15 minutes of screen time with Bruce/Batman and the same 15 minutes in real time. Regardless of what viewers thought about Katie Holmes and Maggie Gyllenhaal, the character of Rachel was established - she was a childhood friend. Selina was never established. She robbed Bruce once, danced with him and stole a car, fought with him for a few minutes and later betrayed him. And she's the love interest? Uh, where did the interest establish?
Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman: More or less forgotten.
Bane, Talia and the general plot: Ludicrous. Another example of a film where there is a villain switch everyone saw coming, no real motive or to the extent there was one no attempt to satisfy the motive (couldn't Talia just hit the switch at any time?)
Plot holes: All over and have been discussed ad nauseum, from the strange prison that is inescapable yet Talia did and didn't help anyone out, is in nowhere land but Bruce manages to get back to Gotham and find Selina in a huge city, to cops being underground for months (?) and are still clean shaven and look like they are showered and ready to go to work, to the pointlessness of Modine's character, to Batman taking the time to burn his signal onto a bridge when there is a time bomb (another ridiculous cliché) about to go off, to a nuke blast which Bruce survives and manages to escape to a bistro and not be noticed, not that he isn't one of the most recognizable people in the world.
This was a sloppy, sloppy film