My main gripe is that The Dark Knight was a film that changed popular culture and has REMAINED in the consciousness of popular culture AND cinema for the 4 years since its release.
No film nominated in 2008, certainly not the film that won (Slumdog Millionaire) can say the same. The Dark Knight was a transcendent film. It was a Michael Mann/Christopher McQuarrie crime-thriller meets a James Cameron tent-pole action film, meets a superhero film, meets a social commentary.
My main question with awards like this is usually, "Which of these great, worthy films of any given year will most fondly and vividly be remembered 10-15 years from now?"
I would say that in 2008 that film would be The Dark Knight. In 2009? Avatar. In 2010? Inception. In 2011? This was a strange year. I felt The Descendants and Moneyball were stronger films than The Artist, but I get it...
As far as this year, I feel that The Dark Knight Rises needs to be nominated just on resonance alone. As a part of a whole, and as a film on its own it is wholly deserving. This will be a film that will be remembered and talked about much longer than a Moonrise Kingdom, etc. This is a film that was part of a trilogy that was a game-changer for a genre. A trilogy that made a genre truly credible. Reward it. Make it TRULY credible and deem it legitimate.
If there are ten nominations, The Dark Knight Rises should sneak in.
1.) Argo
2.) Armour
3.) Beasts of the Southern Wild
4.) Django Unchained
5.) The Dark Knight Rises
6.) Les Miserables
7.) Life of Pi
8.) Lincoln
9.) Silver Linings Playbook
10.) Zero Dark Thirty
(alphabetical)
-R