The Dark Knight Rises gets 4 out of 5 from me. Breathtaking opening sequence. A serpentine plot that takes a good 40 mins to get going but dares us to try and keep-up from then on. Bane is a fun villain, but it felt like every time he promised to do something really nasty the film suddenly pulls back to preserve that all-important PG rating.
Anne Hathaway was surprisingly good - better just as Selina Kyle than Catwoman (though she is never called that). A bit of a grifter and femme fatale. The outfit does nothing for me though, at least not in a Julie Newmar/Michelle Pfieffer way (but then again, it's not down there with that Halle Berry atrocity either). But there is no great interplay between Bale and Hathaway that matches those great rooftop controntations between Keaton and Pfieffer in Batman Returns.
It's far from the 'masterpiece' that some over-zealous pundits are already hailing it as. It has many flaws, but enough memorable moments (both rousing and intimate) to make it a worthy climax to this particular interpretation of Batman. Worth seeing on the IMAX screen at least once if at all possible.
Was depressing to emerge from my second viewing of the film to be confronted with the news of the shooting in Colorado...incredibly tragic, horrifying and senseless. For me, the cinema has always been a haven, a place where the lights go down and you can feel safe and anonymous for a couple of hours as you lose yourself in what is happening onscreen.
