It’s been a long, long wait for the third and final installment of Chris Nolan’s Batman trilogy, but The Dark Knight Rises promises to bring the story to a close in spectacular fashion.
Thanks to its theatrical premiere alongside Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, the Web is already buzzing about the Dark Knight Rises teaser trailer and all its implications for how the story will come to a close – and now the official teaser trailer is here!
There isn’t much you have to give away with a teaser trailer (hence the name), and in truth, this was more of an “announcement trailer” than a bonafide “teaser,” so even less was required (or expected) of it.
At this point you need very little to get fans excited for these Nolan Batman films. The Dark Knight teaser trailer had very little going for it when it was released – just a couple of familiar insignias (Batman’s and The Joker’s) alongside some choice dialogue that at once set up the premise and themes of the film. The actual “tease” came in the form of finally hearing Heath Ledger’s Joker voice and laugh.
The new footage contains Commissioner Gordon (Gary Oldman) lying in a hospital bed, pleading that "Batman" must return and take his rightful place as Gotham's "Dark Knight". The sweeping shot of the city landscape-turned-bat-insignia reminiscent of the final sequence of Nolan’s Inception teaser trailer. Directly contrasting The Dark Knight title screen.
In the end, the two points that had me on the edge of my seat were:
1) Is it “Batman” or “Bruce Wayne” Gordon is conversing with? (which is intriguing, either way).
2) The final shot of the teaser, with a seemingly frightened Batman backing away from the hulking brute that is Tom Hardy’s Bane. This shot was pure gold in its implications of the kind of menace Batman will face – one that might finally give us some epic Batman/villain fight scenes, which NONE of the Batman movies have ever really pulled off that well.
Finally, that fleeting glimpse of fatigue and horror on Batman’s face gave new credit to the "Knightfall" rumour we’ve been hearing. Which any real fan should recognise. For those unfamiliar:
“Knightfall” involves Bane coming to Gotham City on quest to beat Batman and take control of the city’s crime syndicates. To accomplish this, Bane blows up Arkham Asylum, flooding Gotham’s streets with all the lunatics that Batman has locked up. Batman tries to recover the fugitives, and in the process wears himself down both mentally and physically. When he’s at his lowest, Batman is confronted by Bane inside of Wayne Manor and an epic fight ensues, ending with Bane breaking Batman’s back. The incident leaves Gotham without a protector, until Bruce Wayne recovers from his injuries and takes the city back.
While it holds obvious appeal for fanboys hoping to see their beloved source material realised on the big screen, there is the obvious risk of having a Batman movie where Batman is out of commission for a significant portion of the film, until he inevitably “rises” to overcome his injuries and stop Bane.
Sure, having “Batman” out of the picture would allow star Christian Bale a fresh opportunity to do a deeper exploration of the character of Bruce Wayne, without the costume and cape getting in the way (which, personally, I could see being an approach that would appeal to Nolan). But would fans respond well to a superhero movie like that? And wouldn’t watching Bruce Wayne climb his way back into the mantle of Batman mirror Batman Begins a little too much?
There’s also the possibility that all those secondary characters like Catwoman (Anne Hathaway), Miranda Tate (Marion Cotillard), or John Blake (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) were purposefully meant to “over crowd” the film, in order to give viewers more characters to follow while Bruce Wayne is injured. Catwoman’s presence in this scenario is especially interesting, since the character has just as often been portrayed as an anti-hero as she has a villain. Could she step up to defend Gotham while Batman can’t?
Then there are those Lazarus Pits rumours, which would take on new possibilities if Bruce Wayne needs a means to fix his broken body…
I could go on and on speculating, but let’s not jump the gun. This is still a HUGE INTERNET RUMOUR that has not been confirmed, and likely won’t be until Nolan wants us to know.THE DARK KNIGHT RISES TEASER TRAILER HERE
Love seems to have had it tough lately. Love's had Twilight, for fuck's sake.
But things weren't always emo-vampires and women making choices between necrophillia or bestiality. One of the greatest romantic fantasies in cinema history, A Matter Of Life And Death (1946), was illuminated by an idea so simple and so beautiful that it makes your heart beat harder just to say it: that a single tear shed for love might stop heaven in its tracks.
More than 60 years later, and The Adjustment Bureau dons its fedora and aims for something just as special. That a kiss can change the course of your fate. And that true love will find a way.
Adapting Philip k. Dick’s short story Adjustment Team, with its neo-noir trappings and brain-twisting setup involving men in fedoras who orchestrate the actions of human beings as if they were lab rats, The Adjustment Bureau may remind some of Dark City, though it's less boldly stylized than that 1998 cult fave, let alone such visually extravagant Dick adaptations as Minority Report and A Scanner Darkly. Writer/producer/director George Nolfi’s genre-jumping mystery sells itself as a thriller but is in fact a surprisingly heartfelt romance.
David Norris (Matt Damon) is an up-and-coming politician running for a U.S. Senate seat from the state of New York. He's young and brash and, when his past catches up with him, he loses the election. He meets Elise Sellas (Emily Blunt) in his darkest hour, when he's preparing to give his conciliation speech. She inspires him but, like Cinderella, she vanishes without giving her name and he doesn't even have a glass slipper to fit to her feet. Three years later, on the morning when chance brings David and Elise back together, he learns of the existence of The Adjustment Bureau. After recognising that they have been observed, they capture David. The situation is explained to him and he is allowed to go free, but with two provisos: (1) He cannot tell anyone about the existence of The Adjustment Bureau - to do so would make him immediately subject to "resetting" (lobotomization), and (2) He cannot ever again see Elise. From that point, his life becomes an ongoing struggle to circumvent the obstacles placed in his path and be with Elise. The more successful he becomes, the more seriously his threat is regarded by The Adjustment Bureau, and eventually they bring in Thompson (Terence Stamp), "The Hammer," to resolve the situation.
With oscar-winning cinematographer John Toll brushing the mood between light and dark (the shifting weather seems to track Norris’ storming emotions and the uncertain heavenly shifts), Damon probably has as much running to do here as he did in any of the Bourne movies.
“We actually tried free will before,” rumbles Terence Stamp, the Bureau’s dark destroyer brought in to prevent Norris from disrupting destiny. “You gave us the Dark ages for five centuries.”
From theological metaphors to pre-determinist minefields, we’re on seriously tricky ground here. Nolfi asks some difficult, adult questions about life and choices. Between being a President or a husband. Between changing the world or settling down.
Maybe it’s simpler to accept breaking the laws of nature when it happens in a dream, like Inception, or in a computer network, like in The Matrix, but The Adjustment Bureau’s corporate hierarchy of a surprisingly incompetent bureaucracy endowed with mystical powers that its agents use to keep the world on track—right here under our noses—is a suspension of disbelief that eventually collapses.
Source Code, the second film from director Duncan Jones (following 2009 BAFTA winning Moon) and powerful enough to have the world recognise him for more than just David Bowie's son. Much in the same vein as Inception, it’s difficult to explain much about the plot of the film without spoiling it, the joy found in Source Code is about discovering the mysteries and unraveling the answers.
At the centre is Jake Gyllenhaal in the role of a Colter Stevens, US army helicopter pilot who has crashed in Afghanistan. When he comes to, he finds himself in civilian clothes aboard a crowded commuter train arriving slightly late into Chicago. Not only is he confused about actually being on the train, but he’s also being referred to as “Sean” by fellow passenger Christina (Michelle Monaghan). Minutes later, eight to be precise, the train explodes and Colter re-awakens in a capsule and learns that he is part of the ‘Source Code’ project which taps into the afterglow of someone’s memory to re-live the last eight minutes of their life. By going back into the train event, Colter must locate the bomber who is still on the train and avert a further terrorist attack on the city.
Gyllenhaal is on fine form, more often than not he usually comes across as dull, but here that stoned look that often glazes over his face is gone. Probably his greatest film since Donnie Darko...
What would you do if you only had a minute to live? Colter asks Christina, the girl he’s only just met but who’s died in his arms umpteen times already. The question really resonates. In so many action thrillers the big explosions ring hollow, they don’t seem to reverberate in a meaningful way with the cool movie stars in the foreground. This is not a techie film, it’s an emotional movie, very subjective, more fantasy than scientific.
I do have one reservation, and that’s to do with my dissatisfaction with the way Colter conducts his investigation – I can’t say more than that and you’ll have to see it for yourself to see if you feel the same way. But I guess he’s not a professional, and in the circumstances you can’t be too harsh…
All-in-all, Source Code is a fantastic film. It’s full of action and suspense, it’s unpredictable, emotional, and visually stimulating. The trailers do not do it justice; it is certainly worth seeing. In the day and age where our country's security threat level is something preposterous like Teal - suggesting that somewhere, sometime, something could possibly go down. Source Code is the kind of film that if you went on a date to see, she'd be holding you that little bit closer and tighter on the bus or god forbid train ride home. Source Code Trailer Here
It’s been a long, long wait for the third and final installment of Chris Nolan’s Batman trilogy, but The Dark Knight Rises promises to bring the story to a close in spectacular fashion.
In the end, the two points that had me on the edge of my seat were:
