The Batman (2022)

I like Batman. I think you know I like Batman. In fact, I spent a month last year telling you just how much I like Batman. And so it should probably come as no surprise that I really liked The Batman, helmed by Matt Reeves and starring Robert Pattinson as the broodiest Dark Knight yet. The Batman is overwhelmingly confident, hypnotic at three hours long and entirely refreshing compared to what Batman has been before. 

Two years into his war on crime, Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) has turned the mantle of the Batman into a figure of fear, of dark vengeance in a city nevertheless still overwhelmed by crime. When the mayor is murdered, The Riddler (Paul Dano) announces his intention to do what Batman never could and rid the city of its lawless infestation. As Batman races to expose a criminal conspiracy, he finds unlikely leads in the form of a slinky cat burglar (Zoë Kravitz), a mobster lieutenant (Colin Farrell), and his own trusty butler (Andy Serkis).

 

If we learned one lesson from Zack Snyder’s Justice League, it’s that we really should not be arbitrarily cutting comic book movies to a length that fits a studio’s idea of how many screenings per day a theater can accommodate. If a story needs to be four hours long, let it be. If you need three hours to tell a dark detective story introducing three classic Batman villains – by your leave, Mr. Reeves. Especially after proving himself on making two of the best Planet of the Apes movies, with the patently impossible task of making CGI apes endearing and sympathetic, Reeves is a filmmaker who’s never anything less than totally in command. Take his Gotham – at once fully realized and blossoming anew like a pressed flower, revealing itself to an audience as a layered artifact of decay and corruption. Crumbling and desiccated, Reeves’s Gotham sprawls, and while this fanboy will always lament that we never got a franchise out of Ben Affleck’s Batman (then again, never say never), this Gotham is fascinating enough to warrant the myriad spinoffs we’ve already been promised.

 

When it comes to the Dark Knight himself, Robert Pattinson acquits himself well. I had expected him to be playing up the billionaire playboy, not unlike his suave spy turn in Tenet, but this Batman distinguishes himself by leaning hard into the psychological damage that comes with being an obsessive loner vigilante. While I usually like my Batman a little more healed, this younger Bat is certainly a valid interpretation, and Pattinson plays it to the hilt. He’s visibly uncomfortable and morose every time he’s Bruce Wayne, and he’s only standing taller when he’s in the cape and cowl. It’s a fascinating and grim performance, even as we start to see signs that this bat is coming out of his cave.

 

I always say that the problem with modern comic book movies is almost never the casting, and The Batman boasts another well-rounded slate of performers. Zoë Kravitz has a unique take on the character of Catwoman, such that I forgot that this was the same character that Anne Hathaway and Michelle Pfeiffer had played before her. (The less said of Halle Berry’s outing, the better.) As Selina Kyle, Kravitz is knowingly seductive, yet there’s a fantastic character beat that will come as no surprise to fans of the comics, giving Kravitz something truly emotional with which to grapple. Meanwhile, Colin Farrell is literally unrecognizable as The Penguin, such that one almost wonders why they paid for an actor of his caliber; then again, maybe that’s the point – if The Penguin is going to have presence, you need a performer with presence. And then there’s The Riddler, and Paul Dano is spooky and deranged as a criminal mastermind who’s equal parts Zodiac Killer, Jigsaw from the Saw films, and Moriarty all rolled into one. We don’t see Dano for much of the film, ensconced as he is in military surplus and a full-face mask, but there are moments when he channels his There Will Be Blood antagonist in unhinged monologues, to great effect.

 

For the “human” parts – the ones that don’t get colorful aliases – these performances are appropriately more subdued, less flashy. Jeffrey Wright is great fun as Jim Gordon, exasperated and sarcastic. Without being showy about it, Wright builds a deep camaraderie with Pattinson’s Batman, respectful of his mission but willing to poke fun at his methods. After being told not to use his gun, for example, Wright rolls his eyes and tells Batman, “That’s your thing, man.” On the other hand, Andy Serkis as Alfred is a bit of a headscratcher. Compared to some of Serkis’s more recent high-profile franchise roles, there isn’t much for him to do as Alfred, though his clear frustration with his young charge’s calling is a bridge further than Michael Caine’s interpretation. Still, one feels that the material does not quite give Serkis room to soar, and it is in this casting more than any other that I felt I’d have rather been seeing, say, Jeremy Irons.

 

At three hours long, The Batman is an experience, and while it’s the longest Batman film by a mile (or eleven minutes, depending how you measure), it never feels excessive or bloated. There is a third-act turn that does feel a bit like it belongs to a different movie, but it cues up the fulfillment of a number of thematic and character threads in a way that’s immensely satisfying in the way that only comic book spectacle can be. The Batman also goes for broke in a way that many superhero franchise films don’t, and if they’re cuing up the comic book plot that I think they’re invoking (no spoilers), we’re in for a wild ride. If this is the only Batman movie Reeves, Pattinson, and company deliver, they’ve done well to skip the origin and dive right into the heart of Gotham. But I cannot believe we have seen the last of this Batman, and I certainly hope not, too.

 

The Batman is rated PG-13 for “strong violent and disturbing content, drug content, strong language, and some suggestive material.” Directed by Matt Reeves. Written by Matt Reeves and Peter Craig. Based on the DC Comics. Starring Robert Pattinson, Zoë Kravitz, Paul Dano, Jeffrey Wright, John Turturro, Andy Serkis, and Colin Farrell.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)

When Venom came out in 2018, I remember the world freaking out. Was it good? Could a bad movie make that much money? With its late-90s vibe and gleefully cheesy mentality, was Venom the future of superhero movies? I vividly remember insisting, “Venom is fine.” It certainly wasn’t worth the consternation into which so many comics fans lathered themselves. (Then again, nothing usually is.)

On the other hand, its sequel, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, is not fine. It’s dire. It’s nearly unwatchable. Its only saving grace is that it’s only ninety minutes long, and you will want to run to the nearest comic book to cleanse your palate.

 

Possessed by the man-eating alien symbiote Venom, Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) has found himself the only reporter to whom serial killer Cletus Kasady (Woody Harrelson) will make his confessions. Kasady’s time on death row is short-lived, though, once he too becomes infected with a symbiote that transforms him into the murderous Carnage. While Carnage scampers off to free his equally homicidal lover Shriek (Naomie Harris), Eddie must mend his fractured relationship with Venom before San Francisco burns.

 

Somehow, at 97 minutes, Let There Be Carnage still feels like it’s too long. The plot meanders and dithers until Kasady becomes Carnage, as though we need ample exposition to make us believe that Woody Harrelson is playing a crazy person. Between his manic eyes and the insane red wig he was sporting in the previous film’s mid-credits scene (a bonkers creative decision that is, alas, ignored in this film), I don’t think we need to wait more than thirty minutes before Kasady transforms into Carnage, especially when the film is already this brief. The showdown between these two characters, which ought to be a hallmark feature of the film, is limited to the climactic third-act setpiece. Compare to the comics, which made Carnage the star of a 14-issue crossover series, “Maximum Carnage.” For a villain this iconic, with a performer as significant as Harrelson, it seems almost a waste not to use him more.

 

The film is, like its twin protagonist and antagonist, bifurcated between identities. On the one hand, it is a superhero sequel in which the stakes are raised with a high-profile villain from the comics. On the other hand, Let There Be Carnage may as well be a CGI remake of The Odd Couple, in which Tom Hardy is forced to share an apartment with his own gooey anthropomorphized voice. You might charitably view this as a satirical riff on the standard sequel, in which the superhero wrestles with his chosen path and contemplates abandoning the heroic path (cf., Spider-Man 2). But it’s hard to be charitable to a movie in which Tom Hardy is keeping live chickens in his apartment to stop himself from cannibalizing muggers and hobos. At every turn, there are glimmers of a less deranged film, but time after time Venom takes the manic path. If you’re a filmgoer who likes the volume at eleven, though, perhaps Let There Be Carnage is the Venom for you.

 

Throughout Let There Be Carnage, one thing is abundantly clear – everyone who made the film was clearly having a ball, serving up plate after plate of ham. Indeed, some of this fun must have come from the fact that, yes, the studio let them make a movie so unhinged, so eccentric. It’s the sort of blank check creative recklessness that comes with recouping eight times your budget, but the first film was already abundantly nutty; Let There Be Carnage is like giving cotton candy to a caffeinated toddler at a theme park’s last call. And I’m sure there are moviegoers for whom this is the perfect flavor of superhero movie, madcap and ludicrous. To them I say, God bless. I look at this film, having forgotten what I actually liked about the first Venom, and I realize that Let There Be Carnage is simply not on my wavelength. It is difficult even to recognize it as residing on the same planet as I do. 

Venom: Let There Be Carnage is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of violence and action, some strong language, disturbing material and suggestive references.” Directed by Andy Serkis. Written by Tom Hardy and Kelly Marcel. Starring Tom Hardy, Michelle Williams, Naomie Harris, Reid Scott, Stephen Graham, and Woody Harrelson.

Black Panther (2018)

At this point – a week after its release and eighteen films deep into the reliable Marvel Cinematic Universe – you probably don’t need me to tell you that Black Panther is great. I can’t say it’s the best superhero film ever, and indeed it’s hard to say if it’s the best film of Phase Three, which includes first-rate features like Captain America: Civil War and Spider-Man: Homecoming. But I will go out on a limb and say that it’s the best first entry in a Marvel sub-franchise since Iron Man, doing the work of building out the larger franchise’s world, distinguishing itself as a story in its own right, and managing to entertain the dickens out of a diverse audience who are helping it to shatter records.

After the death of his father, T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) assumes the mantle of King of Wakanda, a secretive nation in Africa guarding technological advances and a massive cache of vibranium, a rare indestructible metal. T’Challa also takes on the identity of his nation’s defender, the Black Panther, who is called to action when Erik Stevens – the Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) – and arms dealer Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis, upping the mania from Age of Ultron) steal a vibranium artifact from a London museum. All the while, T’Challa wrestles with his father’s legacy, wondering whether Wakanda should remain hidden from the world.

Marvel has not really made a bad movie since the inception of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008. Your mileage may vary, as in the case of The Incredible Hulk and Thor: The Dark World (which I liked but have never felt compelled to rewatch), but by and large the MCU has been a case study in crowdpleasing. When introducing new characters to the universe, though, Marvel has struggled to break out of the mold set by Iron Man. With its scientific macguffin, Ant-Man is largely (no pun intended) “Tiny Iron Man”; when Doctor Strange has to set his ego aside to embrace a higher calling, it’s difficult not to see him as “Magic Iron Man.”

Black Panther is not, however, the story of a Tony Stark type who takes the throne and learns humility; it’s about a prince coming into his own, grappling with the weight of history and some very compelling arguments from his enemies. It might be Marvel’s most philosophical movie, and it’s certainly the most political (such is bound to happen when your protagonist is a king), but moreover it’s one of the more unique, giving audiences something we’ve truly never seen before in a superhero movie – a fully-realized alternate world which is entirely plausible and rousingly engaging. Wakanda is unlike anything in recent memory (though parts do feel as though it’s a pilot launch for a new Disney theme park, which I’d happily attend), and director Ryan Coogler is wise to give us Wakanda such as it is without the crutch of a point-of-view character; we’re dropped into the world, which displays a consistent internal logic without being overly explained. Even the film’s introductory history lesson, though expositional, gives weight to the film as we begin to wonder to whom the story was being told.

After seeing the film twice, I was glad to see that Black Panther really holds up, and that two different audiences had a consistent baseline of reactions to the film’s twists, punchlines, and triumphs. Black Panther contains a number of surprising reveals, each well-executed without the need for an explanatory pause. Perhaps the greatest surprise, though, is that the film’s ostensible villain, Killmonger, actually makes a lot of sense (surprising, I know, for a man whose name might as well be Murderman). “Where were you?” he asks of the isolationist Wakanda after recounting a litany of history’s horrors. Killmonger is a welcome relief from the generic world-conquerors Marvel has been known to give us, distinctive and fantastically performed by Jordan (proving that Marvel continues to be the rehabilitation clinic for former Human Torches). That he poses both a physical and philosophical challenge to T’Challa is one of the film’s greatest strengths.

Really, though, Black Panther is so full of good performances that it’s tough to single one out. Jordan has rightly gotten his fair share of critical accolades, and we knew from Civil War that Boseman had the kingly presence required for the Black Panther. As T’Challa’s sister Shuri, Letitia Wright steals her every scene; whether it’s playing Q to T’Challa’s 007 or testing out her sonic wrist cannons, with her infectious charm and rebellious streak, Wright is the next face to watch in the Marvel movies because she ought to be in every one of them going forward. (Can you imagine her bonding with Rocket Raccoon or Peter Parker?) I would say she steals nearly every scene because Winston Duke, as rival tribe leader M’Baku the Man-Ape, is an unexpected hoot, with an intimidating presence and a gregarious sense of humor to match. Lupita Nyong’o and Danai Gurira are just two of the many badass women in T’Challa’s life and by his side, and it’s remarkably refreshing to see a film so full of women who are always working together, never devalued by the male protagonist or by each other. (And yes, the film passes the Bechdel test.)

Look, I could go on and on, running down the cast list and finding something to praise. There’s not a bad performance in the bunch, and there’s not a single sequence that wastes time in the film’s 130+-minute runtime. I had worried that Black Panther might feel like a holding pattern before May’s Infinity War (to which, we’re told, this whole universe has been building), but instead it feels heroically fresh, such that I’m almost more excited to hear about Black Panther II. It’s equally gratifying that, as Marvel approaches their ostensible endgame, they’re loosening the reins on their house style and letting some fresh voices like Taika Waititi, James Gunn, and Ryan Coogler do their thing in the Marvel sandbox. It gives one the idea that Infinity War might not be an ending but rather a beginning, a prismatic expansion point from which the Marvel Cinematic Universe can spread out, diversify, and challenge our ideas of what a superhero movie can be. Wakanda forever, indeed.

Black Panther is rated PG-13 for “prolonged sequences of action violence, and a brief rude gesture.” Directed by Ryan Coogler. Written by Ryan Coogler and Joe Robert Cole. Based on the Marvel Comics by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Starring Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Forest Whitaker, and Andy Serkis.

War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)

In War of the Planet of the Apes, the special effects are so good that even the characters themselves have to comment on them. “Look at your eyes,” Woody Harrelson’s Colonel says from behind polished sunglasses to the ape leader Caesar; “Almost human.” Where most films go for either exceptional storytelling or digital animation of the first order, War for the Planet of the Apes manages to juggle both.

Caesar (Serkis) and his ape clan are recovering from the attack of the humans in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes when The Colonel (Harrelson) arrives with his sights on killing Caesar to save the planet from the apes. Filled with bloodlust at the sneak attack, Caesar sends his apes away and pursues The Colonel in search of vengeance.

As the third film (whether it’s the last in the franchise seems to be a subject of some debate, though franchises never really die these days), War does seem to be the best of the bunch in terms of narrative craft and technical dexterity. The storytelling in the first half of the film recalls Wall-E, with long nonverbal sequences that nevertheless advance the story and the characterization. Of course, this is to say nothing of the success of the computer animation itself, which brings the apes to life in a way that is frankly astonishing. While there might be some cognitive dissonance in knowing that these are rendered by computer, there are disproportionately more moments where that edifice fades altogether, and the simian characters are as human as the ones played by live actors. One must acknowledge, however, the human performers like Harrelson, who do equally pivotal work in performing opposite characters that are not actually there, going a long way to selling the conceit to the audience.

Where the first two films had gone for an epic scope, showing the state of the world degenerating toward the dystopia glimpsed in the 1968 original film, War does well to restrict itself to a singularly personal narrative. Early in the film, Caesar strikes off on his own, allowing the film to breathe without the burden of cross-cutting between plotlines. And while some filmgoers might find these scenes unpleasantly protracted, there’s a certain delight in seeing the film play out at its own pace, particularly as it toys with themes left dangling from the last film. Indeed, I greatly appreciated the way this film wrestles with the violent resolution to the Koba plotline, which rightly continues to haunt Caesar. It’s that sort of attention to detail that makes this film seem more thoughtful; I recall, for example, thinking that Dawn had very little connective tissue to Rise of the Planet of the Apes, but this one feels properly of a piece with its predecessors, revisiting both Koba from Dawn and the simian flu from Rise.

Gratefully, however, this film diverges from its predecessors by dint of its utopian vision. Rather than continue to amble toward the dystopia of the Charlton Heston original, War instead imagines a happier ending for the shifting paradigm of men and apes. The Colonel’s fear, that men will become cattle on a planet of apes, was seen in 1968, with Heston’s ability to speak alarming his ape captors, but these apes are different; the particularly affective scenes between orangutan Maurice (named for Maurice Evans, he of Dr. Zaius fame) and the mute human girl Nova (get it?) go a long way to imagining a better world, particularly when contrasted with the internecine and self-perpetuating violence the humans enact on the apes and on themselves.

If there is a fourth film, fair enough, though it’ll take a bit of thread-pulling to get us closer to the 1968 Planet of the Apes. If this is the last, however, it’s a fitting conclusion to the trilogy, framing Caesar as part Noah, part Moses, surviving a great flood and leading his people closer to a promised land. And if we get a spin-off, can it please be the story of Bad Ape, the scene-stealing simian?

War for the Planet of the Apes is rated PG-13 for “sequences of sci-fi violence and action, thematic elements, and some disturbing images.” Directed by Matt Reeves. Written by Mark Bomback and Matt Reeves. Starring Andy Serkis, Woody Harrelson, Steve Zahn, Karin Konoval, Amiah Miller, and Terry Notary.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is now the eighth “Apes film,” the second film in the third franchise since 1968.  I list off the pedigree because I am feeling a slight sense of ape fatigue.  Though the film is tracking in the low 90s on Rotten Tomatoes, my take on it is a little less enthusiastic – there’s nothing the film does incorrectly, but I do have a distinct sense of having seen all this before.

A decade after Rise of the Planet of the Apes, apes and humans live in isolation from each other.  The apes, led by Caesar (motion-captured by Andy Serkis), want to live in peace in a semi-civilized state; the humans, led by Dreyfus (Gary Oldman), want to reclaim a hydroelectric dam in the middle of ape territory.  While Malcolm (Jason Clarke) tries to broker a peace with the apes, Caesar faces a dissenting faction from within, led by his advisor Koba.

Rather than go toward the fantastical apocalypses provided by the Heston and Burton eras, Dawn continues in the realistic vein of its predecessor, with a marked focus on the verisimilitude of the special effects.  Assessing solely these visual effects, Dawn is a triumph; between the movements and the digitized facial expressions, it’s heroically easy to forget that you’re not watching real monkeys.  There’s rumbling about Serkis being up for an Oscar for his lead performance – well, I’m not sure about that, mostly because it’s hard for me to tell what’s Serkis and what’s an animator, but I do think he’s courting a well-deserved “Special Technical Achievement” award.

There’s a lot of other moving pieces in the film that are also successful, though they’re far outshined by the technical fakery.  Oldman and Clarke are compelling enough, though Oldman’s role is roughly equivalent to Bryan Cranston’s in Godzilla – he’s there for a plot mechanism, and you’ll probably leave the theater itching for more screen time from an actor as talented as he is.  But the slightly undercooked quality of the human characters really emphasizes the fact that this is first and foremost the primates’ show.

When it comes to the story, though, I’m not convinced that Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is particularly visionary.  It is certainly more subtle than Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (an obvious inspiration) in that it isn’t reductionist in its approach to protagonist/antagonist relationships.  But once it does establish Koba and Dreyfus as antagonists of a sort, the film proceeds in a fairly predictable manner.  What ultimately emerges is a very unsurprising allegory about cooperation in spite of differences, open-mindedness on the subject of diversity.  Forgive me for saying, I’ve seen this movie several times already.

With a very different movie, I’d have spent a long time on the matter of the familiar plot, but in the case of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes this is less a misstep and more of a non-step.  The filmmakers don’t strike any false notes here; rather, the melody is quite familiar (no pun intended, though Michael Giacchino’s score does recall early Apes soundtracks).  The visual effects are the standout feature – the apes are strikingly rendered, the sequences in which they attack are appropriately terrifying, and the internecine struggles feel astoundingly human.  It’s not the second coming of science fiction, but it is a well-told iteration of a classic tale.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action, and brief strong language.”  There is some amount of blood seen, mostly during fights between apes.  Fight scenes between humans and apes proceed with more gunfire but with less blood; some of the scenes of attacking apes may be frightening for younger viewers.  The film also includes one F-bomb and several scatological S-bombs.

Pop back here on Thursday when The Cinema King tackles Transformers: Age of Extinction!

Monday at the Movies - January 28, 2013

Welcome to this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.”  This week, two animated features – both nominated for an Academy Award, no less.

The Adventures of Tintin (2011) – One of the best things I can say about Steven Spielberg’s Tintin adaptation (the first in a purported franchise) is that in many ways it’s the “Young Indiana Jones” movie we never actually got to see.  Based on the iconic comic series by Hergé, this film finds Tintin (Jamie Bell) on an adventure to uncover lost treasure amid the mystery of identical model ships.  Tintin recruits the help of the besotted Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis) before the sinister Sakharine (Daniel Craig) can unearth the secret of the Unicorn.  Under Spielberg’s direction (and John Williams’s rousing score), the comparison to Indiana Jones is particularly apt because Tintin is littered with action sequences that require only a fedora and a whip to fit into Indy’s canon; though the stakes are often quite low (we know, for instance, that Tintin is untouchable and free from danger), the spectacle Spielberg creates is thrilling and a treat to watch.  The animation style, somewhere near that “uncanny valley” of digital resemblance, may be off-putting to some viewers, but I found the quasi-realistic renderings mostly undistracting, adding to the slightly surreal atmosphere of the movie.  Digitally painting over the actors both approximates Hergé’s style while allowing actors to take on roles beyond their “type” – casting Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, for example, as the identical bumbling detectives Thomson and Thompson is visually unlikely but possible (and fantastic) in Tintin.  All told, Tintin was more fun than I was expecting, a welcome relief from Spielberg’s recent “heavier” work and a reminder of the childlike awe his movies can bring.  (Not that there’s anything wrong with “childlike.”)

The Pirates! Band of Misfits (2012) – In a post-Depp world, we’ve seen an infusion of piratical adventures featuring swashbucklers of every ilk (even Doctor Who got in on the act with “The Curse of the Black Spot”).  But Band of Misfits is by far the most irreverent, throwing anachronisms to the wind like so much topsail being unfurled.  Rendered in the claymation style popularized by Wallace & Gromit, The Pirates stars Hugh Grant as the luxuriantly bearded Pirate Captain, whose quest for the coveted Pirate of the Year Award is waylaid when Charles Darwin (David Tennant) discovers that the Pirate Captain’s parrot is actually a presumed-extinct dodo.  Along the way, the pirates run afoul of the pirate vendetta of Queen Victoria (Imelda Staunton), as well as the Pirate King dressed suspiciously like Elvis.  If all of this sounds like it doesn’t fit, you’d be right, but that’s the brand of humor served up by director Peter Lord; in typical British fashion, cheekiness is the order of the day, governed by “It just is” logic.  The Pirate Captain is an out-of-type choice for Hugh Grant, who’s usually more at home as the foppish and awkward elite in love, but he lends the requisite confidence and swagger to the Captain.  Historical buffs may quibble – after all, Darwin never trained a monkey to speak using an infinite supply of notecards – but surrender to the ludic whimsy of the film is required.  If one can believe it, The Pirates (recently nominated for the Oscar for Best Animated Film) takes itself less seriously than the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, and that’s such a good thing.

That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” We’ll see you here next week!