The Dark Knight comparison *PIX* - Page 28

The PQ in TDK can best be described as a roller coaster ride of Excellent->Mediocre->Good->Mediocre->Good->Excellent->Good and so on. Anyone will notice that the IMAX scenes are superior just from watching the first 20m of the film. Its unfortunate that WB didn't treat this disc better but its not as bad as some on here would have you believe. The movie is still very watchable in my opinion.

Overall I'd rate the PQ satisfactory and the rest of the material (AQ,movie,extras,etc.) an outstanding.

on the 18th there is a bd-live q & a with nolan i can't be online for it if any of you can, please ask about the pq, dnr, ee and let us know what he says
after all he should have supervised the transfer of his film.

Just paraphrasing her comment to Dent at the party. I haven't seen BB in years so I can't recall her backstory but by having known Alfred and the Waynes, I would associate her with that type of thing.
And Gyllenhall being normal well to do is still not on that level. I have friends who grew up with families that were well off. I also once had a date with a Rockefeller, a daughter of the late Lt. Gov. Win Rockefeller who was worth over a billion dollars.
I picked her up for our date at the family mansion off of fifth avenue in manhattan. The butler escorted me in, I met the infamous grandmother who sized me up in about 30 seconds and after our one date, pretty much prevented us from seeing each other again, kinda like Jack and Rose in Titanic.

Sorry for the tangent.

A lot of people feel this way but many keep it to themselves since it's fallen to the "you must love it" domino effect. I posted a pretty less than stellar review the week it came out, on another forum. Still I did find it entertaining and bought it.

Batman Begin's is much better.

I concur, the Imax Scenes were incredible, the rest was very incosistant. It seemed like the dark scenes were better than the light scenes, especially the bat cave ones. They were the worst.

Agreed. Just finished it.
It was good, yet inconsistant. Heath was great. Bale was bland IMHO as Wayne, one note, (I know brooding... Keaton played it better IMHO) and ridiculously over the top as Batman. The voice is awful. Maggie is dull and pointless in this.
Caine and Freeman were solid but just collecting a paycheck. Oldman was very good but he usually is.
That this is "the greatest film of the year!!" is a bit much. They didn't even make any effort this time to alter Chicago at all. In the last film, you had the monorail thing and the island and it gave just enough of a vibe. This was just Batman runs around modern day Chicago that never has any traffic.
I much prefer the look of Gotham from the 2 Burton films (ESPECIALLY BR) as that IMHO, really made the suspension of disbelief re: a guy dressed as a bat work. The whole thing was surreal. And MUCH more creative. Here you have Batman on a rooftop with a chase bank logo on a building behing him...

Anyways, Ledger made the film.

Absolutley.

Yeah, he's like acting in another film he's so committed. Very interesting stuff. Bale either decided, (or was directed) to simply rage and scream to try and match the level and it just doesn't come off well. I usually like him alot but I feel that Keaton in his prime would've done a much more interesting take. Maybe Bale has the physicality to match the character but in terms of "performance" I think it's just brood/anger/brood/anger...
gets a bit old after awhile. Two films of Bale brooding. Is a third necessary?
There's got to be more than just these 2 emotions to play... I find say, (tangent, I know) Brandon Lee's performance in The Crow infinitely more compelling, watchable and memorable and not that dissimilar character-wise.

I think my problem is the films themselves. They're just not alot of fun. Yeah, they're sometimes exciting, dark, cool looking but you need some light to balance the dark and there is none in TDK. Without a balance, the dark elements stop being very dramatic or interesting. They don't stand out or grab you. In music if a drummer hits the crash cymbal at the end of every measure, after awhile, the crash cymbal has no impact. So when you watch a dark, brooding, somber film for 2 and a 1/2 hours without any contrast, after awhile, the dark elements stop being dark and just become repetitive and dull IMHO.

Why doesn't someone do a custom commentary via BD LIVE and point out all the scenes where the EE is most annoying.

Watched this tonight as well. It was pretty easy to spot the EE in multiple scenes. It is definitely there. As others have mentioned this movie (PQ) was excellent one second and then just average another. It was not as consistent as I would like, but I still found the PQ to be slightly above average overall. The IMAX scenes really were impressive IMHO and I really enjoyed the shifting AR. Blacks were excellent considering how dark this movie is, and the movie definitely had moments for me where the PQ really shined. I would give the movie 4 out of 5 stars for PQ. Without the IMAX scenes and shifting AR, I would have given it 3 out of 5.

As for the movie itself I really enjoyed it. Hard to say if I liked it better than the Batman Begins. They are two different films and Ledger's performance blew me away. Oldman was solid as ever. I definitely agree with others in that Maggie G just did not have the right chemistry for me. I thought her acting was solid, but the chemistry was just not there like it was with Katie H. But this is definitely one of the top movies of the year for me. This movie will get a ton of replay in my house.

If Warner releases an updated copy at some point that address the shortcomings with the PQ and extras (with regards to more extras surrounding Ledger) I will definitely bite.

I hate Batman Begins, can't even watch it.

Batman Begins 6/10
Dark Knight 9/10

I just watched the movie and even then non-Imax scenes rate it at Tier 1 from me. Pity I didn't care for the writing though.

As the IMAX scenes make up less than 15% of the movie it is obvious that they must have impressed you a lot to ramp up your score from 3 to 4 out of 5

Seriously speaking I think that if only unenhanced 35mm parts had been put on the Blu-Ray we would probably have had a better chance to give this an honest 4.5 or even 5 out of 5 rating on the merits of great PQ for the whole runtime, not only the less than 15% shot with IMAX cameras.


Same for me - I really liked the movie and that despite the really strange voice of Batman and the fact that Ms. Gyllenhaal seemed to only accidentally have gotten a role in this one.

Really enjoyed the IMAX scenes since I didn't get to see this in an IMAX theater. The aspect ratios were never distracting to my wife & I. Display is a 50" XBR1 SXRD.

Those screenshots made me feel physically ill.

Well, good thing I didn't go blind buy this one.

I can continue to hold onto the hope that the studios might care enough about their BD releases sometime in the distant future.

Most of the studios do care now, I think. Warner is really the exception in caring so little. So let's hope that Warner can learn something from the far better practices followed by most of the studios.

Rachel Dawes (Gyllenhall's character) was the child of a woman who worked for the Waynes from what I could tell in Batman Begins, which made her an interesting contrast to Wayne and a more interesting relationship. It's really too bad that they didn't spend more time or effort developing that kind of connection between the two in TDK as well as they had in BB. I don't completely blame MG though.

I think MG has shown elsewhere that she is capable. The fault really lies with the people who chose her for this part. I think she was just miscast in this role.

In a lot of the scenes, you can see the Chicago el trains running around. The first scene with the Joker waiting on the corner to be picked up, look above his right shoulder. This is much more like the comics than the monorail that was in Batman Begins, BUT look at the first scene that shows Wayne Tower and you'll see the monorail from Begins.


That's just who Batman is. I read the comics back in the day and still read graphic novels once in awhile. In several stories, there is no happy ending. The last page of Knight Fall ends with Bruce having a broken back and having lost the city. As for his voice, there are several times in the comics when people comment on him sounding like an animal. When Azrael took over as Batman once Bruce was paralyzed, Robin even told him to altar his voice to the growl that Bruce uses. Also, Bruce comes off as he does around other people because he's supposed to be acting like he's drunk a lot of the time.

Totally agree. It's like the art department didn't think much beyond slapping Gotham City on a few props and police cars. Just didn't buy this was the same city established in Begins.

Actually, one of the things I liked most about TDK was the seemingly extensive use of real Chicago locations, particularly interiors with windows showing the city. Perhaps that is just my general preference for real locations and distaste for studio sets.

Very good point. Regardless of whether the film is fun to watch or too brooding, it is VERY faithful to the characters from the comics (even if it takes some liberties with they way they look). Batman is often portrayed as the dark loner and Joker's little monologue to him at the end perfectly encapsulates their relationship. Likewise, Two-Face's reliance on the coin and random chance is again 100% faithful to his modus operandi from the books.

I enjoyed the BluRay presentation and thought the picture looked great. I was able to follow all the action scenes (something I had a hard time with at the theater) and found the picture to be sharp and colorful. Maybe its the way my TV is calibrated but I didn't notice any significant EE.

The only disappointment for me was the lackluster extras: just a couple of recycled documentaries from A&E and the Biography Channel and some pretty forgettable still galleries. For such a high profile film, I was expecting something a little more ambitious.

Well there will be more in the next release!

I agree, it feels very close to how I think Batman is in the comics.

As for the visual change of Gotham, I read that they wanted to show much more of the upper class area of the city, in contrast to the working class area that they mainly used in Batman begins.

As a funny side note, when they were going to shoot Batman begins, Nolan watched Blade runner with the crew, and said that this is the movie he wants to make.

When he planned for The Dark knight, he took alot of inspiration from Heat. (Just look who he cast as the bank manager).

I actually liked the lack of change they gave the city. It made the movie feel more substantial to me, like it was a real modern day crime drama (as real as a guy in a cape can be), rather than a movie based on a comic book.

Doesn't help that she has a 'butter-face'. Nice body, butter-face!!

Theres a line in Year One about when Batman makes his first appearance he jumps down on soem criminals with a "roar he brought over from africa".

The voice, growls - all of it is consistant with the character.

Watched it last night on a 51" calibrated CRT set. THe biggest distraction for me was how not like film it looked, in my eyes. It had a very processed, electronic look to it that I couldn't not notice. The film itself was satisfying in every way, but then I already knew that.

No it certainly is not.
Watched the BR last night, for my FIRST EVER viewing of D.K.
Sounded great....gave my tempest-x a good workout.
Great movie!

Looked and sounded great. I thought the shifting aspect ratio would be distracting, but it's not at all. I have always been a fan of open matte but this is the next best thing. Hopefully we see more of it.

Love this movie, btw. Movie of the year.