When Comic Book
Super-Heroes Saved Us From Edge City, Batman To The Rescue- The Scum Also
Rises-Christian Bale’s Dark Knight Rises-(2012) –A Film Review
DVD Review
By Leslie Dumont
Dark Knight Rises,
starring Christian Bale, Anne Hathaway, Gary Oldman, 2012
[I noted in a recent
thumbs down film review of Joan Crawford and Clark Gable’s 1933 Dancing Girl which really turned out to
be just a freebie chance to get a lot of stuff off my shoulders since the film
itself took about thirty seconds to pan about what had been going on around
this publication in the short time I have been here. Here as a result of it
turns out a serious decision by new site manager Greg Green to change things
around, to get young women, younger everything if not yet more widespread
racial and ethnic diversity which the times and American social demographics
cry out writing major pieces rather than the old standard stringer role that
went on here for years. I have heard, mostly around the water cooler and mostly
from Seth Garth who has become something of a mentor to me, that some of the
older white writers have not been happy with this new regime, especially one Sam
Lowell who I am now locking horns with over what is really the direction of the
publication.
Frankly Greg has been
all over the place trying new ideas, some working and some even to a novice
like me just out of journalism grad school kind of crazy. I will give an
example because it directly affects how I wound up doing this review of one of
the endless DC Comics Batman sagas that has hit the cinemas. Greg, trying to
assert his authority as new site manager, after what appears to have been an
all-out bloodless blood-bath to remove former chief Allan Jackson who I really
want to talk more about since it turned out he was “resurrected” or according
to Seth who was involved in radical politics back in the 1960s with Allan
“rehabilitated” to do the successful encore of The Roots Is The Toots series had the “bright” idea to have the
older writers broaden their horizons by reviewing various Marvel/DC Comic
films. That set of assignments set up a firestorm among the older guys who
could not possibility sit through such fare much less understand why
hard-working parents are forced to refinance their homes to get tickets, deadly
soda and inane popcorn for their loving off-spring under penalty of
insurrection-or worse.
I freely admit I hope
that the thing would fizzle giving me a chance to do my thing with fresher eyes
and with a less draconian view of such films since they were a staple of one of
my journalism classes- The Rise of The
Blockbuster. As such thing were bound to do the older writers got squirrelly
about things and so Will Bradley, Maura Mason, Lenny Grace and I think a couple
of others, younger writers all got the assignments. But that is not the end of
the story although I have already detailed my “dispute” with Sam Lowell in that
last review mentioned above when he connived to get a prestige assignment away
from me and under Seth Garth’s guidance and mentorship screamed to high heavens
and got a couple of series of my own including the superhero comics work. Work
that I will like Sam did to me on that prestige series rewrite what others have
written in the interest of completeness. Since this one got lost in the
turnover I will start with the last saga of the Dark Knight trilogy. Sarah Lemoyne]
********
There is a lot the
average reader of film reviews, probably reviews of any kind at least
professional reviews about what goes on behind the scenes in the selection,
assignment and use of the editorial fist. Some of it is generic to any
organization but other things are subject to the whims of whoever is in charge.
The play of say the New York Review of
Books which goes for high-brow twisting reviews is very different from the
cloisters of the American Film Gazette which
in its long history has reviewed virtually every Hollywood and foreign film ever
made in its nearly seventy-five year existence. That who is in charge, who is
in charge here is my first point and for a reason having nothing to do with
this yet another super-hero comic book come to cinema Dark Knight Rises which frankly I thought had been abandoned once
the site manager, the guy who shapes and gives out the assignments here, heard
loud and clear from us peon writers that the mass audience for this stuff does
not, I emphasize, does not read film reviews in exotic flower publications
filled with plenty of other stuff they could care less about.
Greg Green, the guy who
shapes the contours of what gets into the public prints here after a grueling
internal battle in 2017 before I signed on thought, I believe in order to quell
the disquiet after that battle, to solidify his new position and create his own
brand, or maybe all of the above that reviewers should feel free, without
recrimination, to what old leftie the wizened and somewhat senile Sam Lowell
has called “fire on the party headquarters” meaning a reviewer can, if she or
he so chooses, go beyond the scope of the review and let readers get an insight
glimpse of what goes on in section of the publishing world. I have taken that
liberty here and without recrimination since it has seen the light of day. More
ominous thought, my second point stab, is why after all of the anguish and
gnashing of teeth by serious writers here are we going back to reviewing this
kids’ stuff, this comic book madness. That is where the whims and whatever
other fluff is going on in an editor’s head comes into play. Greg although he
acquiesced ready did believe that action-packed films, above all comic book
super-heroes were the wave of the future.
He suffered in silence
for a while apparently but once Black
Panther came out and he saw the gross ticket receipts he did a big
backslide. He called it “in the interest of completeness,” meaning that we
collectively had not reviewed every possible film in the genre. So here I am,
woe is me, doing hard time going on and on about what mind-numbing stuff I have
to review. I had to laugh when in a recent review of one of the million 007
James Bond films, another Greg Green pet project, Seth Garth brought back to
memory the old days in the industry when we got paid by the word and he, I,
would when we were lowly stringers trying not to starve “pad” our reviews with
plenty of stuff which had not much to do with the film and hope to not get
edited too badly. Now I have to write this extraneous stuff for a flat fee. And
I do so here.
This Superman, no,
Batman long drawn out film is the long- expected sequel to the first one in
this series. Stay with me on this since Batman like his buddy Superman has had
various reincarnations depending on a generation’s take on what will play, or
at least some half-baked Hollywood screenwriter’s idea of what will play,
beyond the bang-bang action a minute pace expected of these things. In the
first film Batman had taken the sword over the death of some do-gooder D.A. who
harbored evil thoughts although he had nothing to do with that good guy turned
bad guy’s demise. Except it allowed him, Bruce Wayne, Batman’s alter ego, to
hibernate in some isolated splendor out on mansion row and not worry about
scumbags and creeps returning to fair Gotham (the sky line of which looked
amazing like, ah, New York City), to wreak havoc and turn the place into a
cesspool of drugs, prostitution, gambling, shady deals and endless
corruption-again. A thankless task.
Maybe someday we will
reduce the scumbag and creep population to manageable size but for now every
crazy monomaniac with some dough and manpower sees such places as Western
Civilization urban areas as fair game, as merely a subject for spoils. Enter
one hellish brute Bane and his underground, literally underground, army ready
to reduce Gotham to their playground. This guy is relentless, tough and unlike
others who have tried to make an end run on the town had a plan, a plan beyond
total devastation if he does not get his way. So once word gets up to Mansion
Row Batman has the old flame lighted under his ass to save “his” city once
again. Save with the sometimes help, sometimes unhelpfulness of Cat Woman,
played by fetching Anne Hathaway breaking the mold of her girl next door looks who
has her own agenda, has her own rock to get out from under.
Like I said this Bane
really was a piece of work, really had his stuff together despite wearing a
weird semi-mask to alleviate ancient wounds. As the battled ensues on the first
go-round Batman shows some rust after that long hiatus and loses the round, is
taken prisoner never to be seen again. At least that is what Bane had thought.
Once Bane and crew take some action which includes having access to a nuclear
machine which can be turned into a weapon the town’s police force and its
general population accept the new regime for a while. At one point the machine
was in cold storage but a big- time woman environmentalist has taken charge and
so despite her the damn thing was weaponized. A few resistance fighters,
including Cat Woman in her better moments, pushed back until Batman escaped coming
back to town looking for creeps, scumbags and glory. Push back not only against
Bane and his thugs but that woman who controlled the nuclear button turned out
to be something like the big guy’s lover, or friend. So chaos looms, looms as
long as Batman can’t figure out how to get that freaking bomb out of Gotham
City’s harms’ way.
Bruce/Batman falls on
his sword again but really only off-stage in case there is to be another
sequel, the desire to make this yet another trilogy which seems to be the way
these comic book adventures go. Having said all that I hope, I really hope,
everybody can see what a forlorn task it is write this foolishness. I hope Greg
is listening-again. Just kidding but I wanted to show that I can do insightful film
panning just as well as moribund Sam Lowell, or whoever writes his stuff these
days
