Having recently seen the first trilogy among Nolan’s works, I wonder what opinions you hold about the movies in general. Seeing that I’m quite late to the party, I expect some strong and mature takes in the comments, but you are still free to voice any opinion you may have.
I relly like them. He took Batman to a complete different direction and showed that comic book addaptation can be more than just goofy fan servicy kind of movies.
The first 2 movies were really good, the thrid kinda meh.
What I wanted to add is, that watching the movies today with the abundance of hereo movies, will make them feel worse than they were when they came out. Because quite a few of the movies today took inspiration and expanded on what made this movies great.
TLDR what I like about the movies is how they made movies for all instead of juat comic fans like we were used to up until them. Specially for DC heroes.
I’m always a sucker for scenes that show people are better than people give them credit for. The scene in Spiderman 2 when the subway car passengers refuse to give up a fainted Peter to Doc Ock is a good example; another is in The Dark Knight, when Joker tries to get two ferries to detonate the other one’s bombs, and neither does.
Too serious, too dark (literally hard to see, which is bad in a movie). So I didn’t bother with more than the first.
I’m not a specific superhero movie fan, but have seen all of the marvel ones and like some of the DC ones too, like the latest superman. Since it’s a silly and unrealistic thing to begin with, I like superhero movie approaches that don’t take themselves fully seriously.
Absolutely loved the Arkham Asylum game!
Saw the first two years ago, but never got round to watching the third one until a few weeks ago.
Batman Begins - I don’t really remember it too well. I think I thought it was ok.
Dark Knight - don’t remember too well hut I remember really enjoying it.
DKR - I thought it was ok, but some bits were just so dumb, and it was often quite confusing tbh. I had thought that the general view on it was that it was great, but reading the comments here, apparently that’s not the case!
I really enjoy Nolan’s work on the whole, but I’m not sure the Batman films were a good fit for him.
As batman movies go they’re pretty boring. It’s a dark and gritty hero, fighting dark and gritty villains, in a boring gritty city, with boring citizens. Their not bad movies. They were clearly made by clever talented people, good at what they do. But the result lacks any real contrast, just black on black on black on black. I’ll rewatch any other batman movie at the drop of a hat, no questions asked. I know I’ll be entertained. But I’m totally uninterested in rewatching the Nolan Batman movies.
I want to know what voice Hardy gave Bane before the one we heard because I heard he was asked to change it because it sucked. I gotta hear how bad it was before the one they approved because I still wanna know why he gave him that voice.
Eh.
3.5/10
My hot take is 3 feels like a movie about occupy wallstreet, but Nolan wasn’t allowed to show those parties having any kind of validity, and the script got rewritten. The last half is just so wildly lower in quality than the first half.
They fall into the category of movies I liked but not enough to rewatch on my own. Those movies that never crosses my mind to put on but if it is already on I keep watching until they end.
Pretty good movies.
But I think that also understates how influential they were to superhero popular culture. It bears remembering that prior to the BatTrilogy, for a decade-ish superhero films had been either the squeezed-dry sequels of B-list characters, comedies, aimed largely at kids, and/or barely resembled their source material. While 90s and early 00s Superhero comics were moving through their edgy antihero phases, films struggling to define themselves.
The Nolan Trilogy brought the idea of Batman as a tortured loner, alienated from his family and allies, into the broader popular culture. Batman allows villains to die, spies on innocents, and eschews sidekicks. There is no Justice League. “You either die a hero, or live long enough to become the villain” is not the sentiment that pervaded superhero screen media in the years prior to the Nolan trilogy.
Even if you don’t like superhero stuff, they’re worth watching just as an artifact of mid-late 00’s culture, in my opinion.
I’ve only seen the one with Bane, and I thought it sucked.
It felt like Bane beat Batman for no reason, and Batman just had to overcome a pointless trial where he learned nothing, to create a manufactured darkest hour. I didn’t feel like Batman ideologically bested Bane, and ideology is important to Me.
My favourite Batman bossfight is Terry McGinnis beating the Joker in Batman Beyond. Terry is a gen alpha kid who grew up on 67 and Skibidi Toilet. Terry knows funny. And the Joker isn’t funny. The Joker can’t stand being the butt of the joke, he can’t stand being vulnerable. Vulnerability is the key to all great comedy, and the Joker can’t do it. Terry defeats the Joker by out-funnying the Joker. That’s meaningful.
I never felt like anything happening in Nolan’s Batman had any meaning.
First movie was OK, It laid a good foundation.
The second one was great.
The third one was absolutely terrible.
It’s pretty impressive how good the second one is considering what it’s between.
I have an unpopular opinion in that I did not like Batman Begins. The direction is great. There’s a great vibe to it all. The concept is there. But imo, the really high quality of Nolan’s visual directing does so much work distracting people from how lacking the movie is in actual substance.
I don’t know how he hit such gold with the second. It wasn’t just the great performance from Ledger: the overall writing and story are just way, way better than the other two. Good for him, though.
But imo, the really high quality of Nolan’s visual directing does so much work distracting people from how lacking the movie is in actual substance.
Kind of describes most of Nolan’s movies really. As a technical director, he’s almost unparalleled, but his movies have often struggled to find a meaningful emotional core. They’re all polish, but often lacking in substance. Tenet was especially bad for this. An absolute masterpiece of directorial craftsmanship, but almost entirely devoid of basic elements like characters.
He’s made some absolute gems - The Dark Knight still holds up, Memento deserves its reputation, and The Prestige is a masterpiece - but I find that for the most part he seems more interested in technical flexes than in the actual story he’s telling. I’ve enjoyed every single one of his movies, don’t get me wrong, but they don’t stick with me the way that something like Prisoners or Only God Forgives does.
I felt that they were the most definitive Batman movies we’ll get for a while. I don’t think it was fair for people to uphold Dark Knight Rises against the Dark Knight, because the bar was already set high. It was all a nice breath of fresh air to have a series of movies that didn’t play up to a lot of fan service like the MCU did.
To this day though, I really don’t like how growling Batman got when he spoke. What was up with that? Give him a freaking cough drop.
Christian Bale apparently once said that, when you put on the Batman suit, the growl just happens automatically.
If only he could ask Morgan Freeman for learning to speak with a deep voice
I laughed out loud in the theater when I heard the Batman voice for the first time.
It’s mighty fantastic. I love the soundtrack - by Hans Zimmer, naturally - and I love the grittier take on an “action hero” story. Not quite as dark as the later The Batman, but that one sucked. I fell asleep.
I strongly recommend watching them with high quality speakers! Volume UP!!!
An acquaintance of mine who was a movie/filmography major said to me some years ago, regarding Nolan’s trilogy, “I’m sorry [my real name] but this is a piece of shit.” I still don’t know what he meant.
I actually enjoyed the Pattinson Batman movie. It was a callback to the Detective Comics origins. Hollywood tends to focus on the action, but Batman in the comics is first and foremost a detective. So the Battinson movie was focused on that. And for most of the movie, he was basically just a dude in a hoodie with a bike, riding around town looking for clues. The Riddler was a great villain for that kind of movie, and doing it any other way would have reduced Riddler’s entire character to just another punching bag.
It’s sooo good
Thanks for explaining that! Maybe I just wasn’t well enough informed before watching the movie. 😊
Interesting. I did find the soundtracks to be cinematic while watching the movies, but there was nothing iconic about it, not even a simple hum I could remember afterwards. I could always recall parts of the music for other Nolan’s films I’ve watched, but the entire trilogy seems to be an exception for some reason.
I think I know what you mean. And it’s funny you say “hum”, because that kind of describes the soundtrack. It’s mostly quietly, slowly moving deep string harmonies, sort of like a hum, so it’s totally understandable that nothing of it really stands out. I think it’s mostly for creating atmosphere.