Chris Reviews The Dark Knight Rises

So the Christopher Nolan Batman saga has finally come to an end. Yet again the franchise has been tainted by tragedy (We pray for the families of the victims). Considering that this and Prometheus were my two most highly anticipated films of the summer, I had pretty high expectations. In the end I feel pretty similar to this as I did with that film, I have a fair amount of criticism for the film but still love it anyway.

The Good-

This film is held together by great performances across the board. While I like Michael Keaton, Christian Bale will probably always be Batman to me. Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Morgan Freeman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tom Hardy and Anne Hathaway were all good to great in this as well. The set pieces and action sequences were good to great throughout the film and the final 30 to 40 minutes was very exciting.  I also loved how well this film tied into Batman Begins to help wrap up the story. The story is somewhat similar to the first film and provides a complete arc to the saga. I have a feeling this film is best watched as a part of a whole trilogy rather than on its own. One final note: I really enjoyed the soundtrack for this film, possibly more than The Dark Knight.

The Bad-

While I liked Tom Hardy and I think he did a great job with what he was given, overall I think Bane was a pretty weak villain. He seems to have the potential to be a cool villain but he is poorly developed and when the final information is revealed about his character it kind of makes his character irrelevant, despite being billed as the main villain. I also found the film to be a bit clunky through the first two acts, almost to the point where I was getting bored. My final complaint is something that I had an issue with in the Dark Knight and part of the reason why I like Batman Begins the best, the secondary characters yet again overshadow the hero. While it worked well for the most part in the The Dark Knight, Bane is not as effective at carrying the film as the Joker was.

Summary-

Despite my complaints with the film I still really enjoyed it and am sad the saga is over. This a fitting end to one of the best trilogies in film history, right up there with The Lord of the Rings. This is a film that presents a lot of good ideas and great moments but has a few flaws that hold it back from being a great movie and instead settles in as just a really good one.

MY RATING

4 out of 5

Chris "Da Franchise" Hart