Last film you watched and your rating

Wasn't it Ghul who ordered the murder of Bruce's parents though?

Ahem, Falcone was the most interesting villain in Begins, anyway.

As for Two Face in the TDK:

Irreversible - anyone seen this? Holy gooseberry fool, completely brutal.

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides - 5/10

I loved the very first one of these films, but I didn't like the second or third, and had always put that down to it really being one film stretched into two parts to make more money. So while my expectations weren't huge for this, I figured that with it just being one film and leaving many of the old characters behind, it might be closer to the original.

Wrong! I thought it was just as bad as the previous two, maybe even worse. The only reasons I've not given it a far worse score are the visuals, the music, and Johnny Depp. Blackbeard and his crew just felt so lame and pathetic compared to Davy Jones and his. Even Barbosa in the original was a more compelling villain! Huge missed opportunity.

Topaz 7/10

Good in places but not one of my favourites so far

My Hitchcock Journey

Bunni wrote:The editing and pacing in TDK is freakin' awful. One of the reasons its not as good as BB.

One bit always stood out for me. It's the transition at the end of the scene of Gordon and Dent talking in his office near the start. Dent brings up the nickname he had at internal affairs, Gordon responds "I wouldn't know about that..." then wham, scene change. It really does look like they chopped a sentence in half as Oldman is clearly only halfway through whatever he was going to say. It's jarring in the extreme and it's not the only example. Sometimes the film really does feel like a collection of awesome scenes hastily bundled together with masking tape.

It really doesn't. It looked like Gordon is avoiding an awkward moment with a pithy remark. It's then a natural cut away as he's stopped the conversation there. Better evidence for poor editing before you'll convince me.

Parksey wrote:Ahem, Falcone was the most interesting villain in Begins, anyway.

As for Two Face in the TDK:

Purely ignoring his previous actions (I've not watched the film for a while so I can't comment on the threatening of Gordon's family), surely he HAS to die in the TDK?

I mean, he is effectively the Joker's great trick, and his biggest victim. As Skarjo said, it shows that the chaos and madness can envelop anyone and, this is what brings about Batman's "fall" at the end of the film (though Wayne himself isn't corrupted personally in the same way Dent is, and it's through the actions of others rather than personal madness).

Dent HAS to die as the Joker is caught at the end of the film (and, let's face it, he wasn't going to appear in another Nolan film due to tragic circumstances). I don't think Nolan's Two-Face works without the Joker, hence why his story needed to be wrapped up by the end of the film. Arguably, Two-Face isn't a villain per se in TDK so it's a bit of a lesser role, which I think largely annoys those who wish he'd had a whole film to himself.

While the character of Two-Face could carry a whole film, I don't think Nolan's Two-Face could (or, at least, thematically, it wouldn't make sense without the Joker in it also).

He has to die so his character development could go full circle, which, in a way, furthers the actions of the Joker. The two are in symbiotic relationship and needed to both come a cropper in the same film. Tragically, it's Dent who ends up dead, whereas the architect of all the madness simply gets arrested.

Having Two-Face alive and at large in Gotham at the end of the TDK just wouldn't make his fall as dramatic within the context of the film. His death is arguably what costs the city dearest and, if he's alive, there's still a sense of futile hope surrounding his character.

Very interesting point.
People who argue that Dent's transition to Two face is too swift or too pat. The scene with thomas Schiff (spelling?) being interrogated shows that Nolan's Dent is not whiter than white to start with - he's capable of ruthlessness and cruelty. Also it's not just his disfigurement and death of Rachel - he is also in agonising pain as he refused pain killers. Those three things can tip you over the edge. Then once he's already begun killing (wurz, ramirez et al) his downward spiral accelerates and he finds he's capable of even more reprehensible acts.

It's actually quite easy for a few events like this to push you over the edge. I've spent 12 years nursing people who've done it. None of them were criminal masterminds, though, to be fair.

Denster wrote:It really doesn't. It looked like Gordon is avoiding an awkward moment with a pithy remark. It's then a natural cut away as he's stopped the conversation there. Better evidence for poor editing before you'll convince me.

I will never convince you, nor will anyone else. If God himself appeared from the heavens robed in dazzling white atop a celestial mare of unknowable brilliance and declared to his wandering masses that The Dark Knight had shitty editing, the whole world would realise at once how foolish they had been, that The Prestige is clearly the best of the Nolan films and that every one of us are brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers. Peace would reign across the globe. Apart, that is, from a small corner of England where one would find, if one were so inclined, a man whose crown lay untroubled by hair, hunkered in a corner stroking his copy of the Batman sequel and muttering to himself about "pithy remarks."

That's brilliant.



I actually think BB, TDK, Memento and Inception are all better than The Prestige actually.

Skarjo wrote: I say Dent would Pedro has told me over many a bottle of Desperados

Desperados? What the hell is wrong with you?

Airplane! - *****

Funniest film ever made? Can't think of one that was so consistently funny.

Denster wrote:Better evidence for poor editing before you'll convince me.

I don't really want to get in the middle of this, especially as I don't have a personal opinion on the matter, but I came across this a few days ago:
[vimeo]28792404[/vimeo]

Poncho wrote:Oh, I didn't realise it was out so soon - I don't actually own a copy of the film so I may have to get it. Although I'm not sure if I'm up for watching the seppuku scene again any time soon. Talking about the film has reminded me of what a wonderful, wonderful actor Tatsuya Nakadai is. Honestly, I can't think of many better.

Can't say I'm looking forward to Miike's remake, though. I've already made my thoughts about 13 Assassins clear and Harakiri is a film that I don't think ever needed a remake at all. It isn't even dated.

Yeah, hes great

True, it doesn't need a remake but it'll be interesting to see what hes done with it and it should make more people seek out the original.

In fact, just had a look on imdb, theres some reviews on there for Miike's Harakiri... http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1728196/

OldSoulCyborg wrote:

Denster wrote:Better evidence for poor editing before you'll convince me.

I don't really want to get in the middle of this, especially as I don't have a personal opinion on the matter, but I came across this a few days ago:
[vimeo]28792404[/vimeo]

That was great.

Hanna - Sorry Banjo, I really, really wanted to love this but ended up just liking it instead. Fairly run-of-the-mill storyline, the obvious thing that sticks out is the editing and the way it's all shot. Very stylish and I liked it. Saoirse Ronan, who I'm a fan of, was fantastic all the way through - she took a character with not much there and made her compelling to watch. I think it's those big blue eyes of hers that makes the whole being amazed at seeing technology for the first time effective. The soundtrack was good for the most part; slightly overbearing at times and gave me horrible flashbacks to Run Lola Run, but it provided the film a lovely energy.

However, I wasn't big on the tone of the film as in: I don't know what it was supposed to be. At its heart, it's a po-faced mish-mash of a chase film spliced with a coming-of-age tale with a little bit of arty farty cinematography sprinkled on top. But there were a ton of little moments that I assume were intended as light-hearted comic relief? Whatever it was, I'm not sure it worked.

When I speak of tone, I'm talking heavily about the characters and the casting choices of Joe Wright. No real problem with Eric Bana; a bit underused but he was functional. But Cate Blanchett, despite looking pretty damn hot, was miscast. Hamming it up with her basic, cookie cutter attempt at being a villain with some bizarre thing to do with her teeth and a dodgy accent. The hired bad guy and his cronies (that pretty much being the best word I could use to describe them) felt like they had stumbled from the set of a totally different film. Who would hire him to do such an important job? He couldn't catch a cold. Don't even get me started on that British family. Now, could you argue that the characters being how they were was Joe Wright's way of showing us what it was like for Hanna? I mean, to a girl living in a forest her whole life, basically anyone she meets is going to seem a little weird. I can see how that might work for some, but not so much for me.

It took a bit too long for it to get to Berlin and by that point, it felt like it had run out of steam a little. Hanna's exposure to the real world was enjoyable but then began to plod along in what felt like an attempt to pad out the run time. Ultimately disappointed, but Hanna is a strong action film with a terrific central performance that has much to recommend despite that. May be a grower with time.

6/10

Fake edit: There's one scene around the middle that annoyed me way more than it should have but doesn't affect the film that much so I'll put it here. This girl has been trained to be a perfect assassin and can escape a remote holding facility by her lonesome, but can't stay hidden in a strawberry floating box from a kid?

Here's me meeting Aaron Eckhart - he told me he thought BB was better, too.

Poncho wrote:Fake edit: There's one scene around the middle that annoyed me way more than it should have but doesn't affect the film that much so I'll put it here. This girl has been trained to be a perfect assassin and can escape a remote holding facility by her lonesome, but can't stay hidden in a strawberry floating box from a kid?

The film is rife with odd inconsistencies like that. How about Hanna's fascination with electricity yet complete mastery of a computer?

Devil. WTF mon. Pile of gooseberry fool, the dude that directed it should be banned from going near a video camera

Limitless - the plot was let down by a few slightly too unbelievable moments like The kid on ice-skates being used as a weapon and gulping down a few mouthfuls of the dead gangsters blood somehow managing to get enough of the drug into his body to have an effect less than 15 seconds later but overall I really enjoyed this.

8/10

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - 7.5/10

The acting was great (with an amazing cast) and its beautifully realised but the pace was quite glacial and the ending wimpered out a bit.

It has made me want to watch the original now though. I think i watched most of it many moons ago but i don't remember much apart from Alec Guiness standing on a balcony (i think!)