DID YOU EVER DANCE WITH THE DEVIL BY THE PALE MOONLIGHT? Okay, so L-Cubed's Scott thinks we're a bunch of Debbie Downers because of all the hatin' here on Katie Holmes' suckitude in Batman Begins.
Y'know what? That wasn't even my big problem with the movie -- which, mind you, I liked. But maybe it's a personal tic of mine, but I prefer my Big Summer Comic Book Movies to be fun, and this movie was, instead, relentlessly grim. Which I can admire and appreciate for the consistency of its artistic vision and universe, but when push comes to shove, I prefer Tim Burton's Batman or Spider-Man over the new film because they were joyful at their heart -- in Spider-Man, from the overall bounciness and thrill of discovery and in the former via Jack Nicholson's Joker. Even in telling a story in a bleak city about vengeance, Tim Burton found a way to make us smile.
I saw Tim Burton's Batman midnight of the night before it came out, with my friend Craig. Actually, we couldn't get tickets for the midnight showing; by the time we got to the AMC Orleans at 8pm, all that was left was the 12:45am showing. (So we got tickets for that, and snuck into the midnight showing instead -- who was going to be looking at details in a crowd that large?) It remains one of the singular moviegoing experiences of my life -- I came in with no expectations, no advance critic's impressions, and was completely blown away -- even that swooping camera through the logo during the opening credits is etched in my visual memory.
I recognize that Christopher Nolan's vision is entirely consistent with the mythos of the Dark Knight, and that basically, I'm opting for pleasure over insight here. This story was truer to the source material than Burton's. Fine. But when it comes to my expectations for summer movies, is it wrong to want to have a little more fun?
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