Insults your intelligence

Rating: 6/10 (26 July 2012)

Didn't love it.
Don't want my money back, I bought the LARGE popcorn so it averages out a little better. Don't want 3 hours of my life back, it's not THAT (Time Machine) bad. Just expected better.
Christopher Nolan - a director who usually doesn't mess up on this scale, seems to have phoned it in, starting with the shooting script.
Camera, makeup, sets, lighting, sound, music , action sequence choreographers - all delivered. Exceeded expectations in fact.
Anne Hathaway was ass-kicking eye candy - totally great. Christian Bale was perfection. Michael Caine underplayed it also to perfection.
Edit/Directorial FAILs include Oldman and Freeman who were only allowed to deliver workmanlike performances this outing. TWO towering talents - used as wallpaper. Sigh. Oldman sizzled in the first two movies. Here his character looked into the abyss and compromised, yet we barely see his pain until it's all over. Freeman's "Lucius Fox" had a lot to be proud of and then a lot to worry about. We don't really /need/ Freeman to give us "the look" that says "the asteroid is coming," but we kinda expect it. He does it so well in a single beat. Those three to five missed "beats" didn't hurt the story, but two mega-talents were already on set and already paid. Editing/direction failed to let them connect with the audience as only they can. Expectations *not* met.
My knowledge of the world and science is often bruised by movies, but this time I felt insulted. Usually this is just engineering stuff (a jet can't actually do "that") but this time we've added geographic impossibilities and more.
A twin turboprop at cruise flies 250-366 MPH. You're gonna put bad guys on ropes to snatch a scientist from inside it while it's flying? Not a chance in the world, but Hollywood does this kind of crap so much, we're used to it by now.
Minion's willing to die for their leader - the antagonist - in large quantities - sure. Wait, there's no Islamic type faith involved? ah, not so likely.
Photographing an English country estate for Wayne Mansion ... well OK, but there are a bunch of former robber baron mansions in Cape Cod that are public parks nowadays - they could REALLY use the location fees to help their maintenance budgets.
Taking VERY WELL KNOWN (and frequently photographed in NatGeo etc.) interiors and exteriors in India and suggest they're a few minutes outside of Pittsburgh - err Gotham; err, NYC; err... Sigh. Suspension of disbelief shattered past point of recovery.
Antagonist in a mask? Check. But why exactly? Constant drip of pain meds, don't ya know. Ah... No. That's not the way pain management works.
10,000 cops trapped in a tunnel for weeks/months fed by care packages? Ah... no. They wouldn't emerge from the tunnel after weeks/months all in starched uniforms and battle ready either.
Terrorist antagonist spouting "we are the 99%" type balderdash at New Yorkers or Pennsylvanians (err, Gothamites) well, OK. BUT A LOT OF THEM BUY INTO IT? Ah...
A 6-figure to 7-figure super car in the garage without Bruce Wayne knowing it is there? No. A Prius or a Suburban sure, but past about $50k, there's a lot of ego in car selection - even for the super rich. They do have a few grins with it though.
Bruce Wayne really needs a cane to walk, then decides to become Batman in a very few days? Only in Hollywierd.
Some Pitsburgh Steelers playing themselves on the gridiron - unless they worked for SEG scale, that's spraying money, not telling a story.
Bat-Transport cycle and 'copter are 100% impossible, but they did look good so that part I can forgive.
Bat-'copter dodging half a dozen surface-to-air missiles by flying between sky-scrapers? Ya know, that's been done so many times, I won't object, other than to simply yawn at what should have been a high tension scene.
Good ride. Lots of wonderful moments. As a whole, it fails to delight. Good opening weekend, if otherwise newsy; but I doubt it breaks $1Bn or even $600m.