Movie Review: 'The Dark Knight Rises'

The Dark Knight Rises. It rises to the fine filming and super story-telling but doesn’t rise to the expectations - this is what I would say in one line. The movie takes its own time with some not-so-needed stuff and extends till 2 hours and 45 minutes, allowing you to frequently realize your left-over pop corn, which shouldn’t happen in a Batman movie.

From the climax of The Dark Knight, this movie leaps forward by 8 years. Time screws everyone and Batman is no exception. Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale), the Batman has gone into oblivion, having taken the heat of Harvey Dent’s murder. He is seen having unshaven whiskers, limping in his age-old mansion with a stick support. He looks feeble and pitiable and doesn’t look even remotely close to someone who once had a charisma of a super hero. Bruce lives a life of a recluse with his only companion, his elderly butler, Alfred (Michael Caine). If I am to exaggerate a bit then I’d say that you would hardly find any age difference between both, at least initially. Moreover, when Bruce tells him that the world doesn’t need Batman anymore, you would sadly agree with him.

The bad boy, Bane (Tom Hardy) however is a beefy mammoth with a mask and is really good in his performance. It is no big deal for him to thrash Batman like a laundry man does to clothes on a rock. Once I actually wished during Bane’s enjoyment of Batman’s bonking if the Hulk were there to crush Bane to dust and help Batman get up on his feet. Trust me, even sexy Catwoman, Selena Kyle (Anne Hathaway) would have given a good fight to Bane with her exceptionally flexible moves.

Now with all the respect to Batman’s commitment to service his city Gotham and his proven previous achievements with his out-of-the-world stunts, I have no hesitation in saying that Batman looks really hopeless this time for his sheer lack of energy and smartness. He saves Gotham from the earth-shattering nuclear explosion as it was purely director Christopher Nolan's wish to make him do that as a revered hero. The eye-catchers however are – couple of bike stunts as one must expect, Anne Hathaway’s beguiling charm, the jaw-dropping scene when Bane escapes from an air-plane, finely shot scene of converting football ground into a dry valley while leaving the audience in the stadium dumbstruck. Last but not the least, I very dearly missed my hero, Heath Ledger, played as a joker in the last sequel who was an unbearable pain in the Batman’s back.

Overall, it is a very good movie but I am really disappointed for the lack of super-heroism in Batman. And I am not a buyer of that nonsense crap that it is due to his age, so please spare me. You can undoubtedly go and take a treat of some mind-blowing action stuff.