The Dark Knight Rises The TDKR General Discussion Thread - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Part 149

[I Am The Knight]

Manhattan is not a dark grimy hell hole where every subway has faulty desaturated lights, and every street corner is an underlie haven for shadows and thugs. As I recall, Peter Parker just wanders down select alley ways and finds gangs of thugs ready to kill him when he is searching for Ben's killer. There is plenty of crime in New York. But TASM has a touch of urban nihilism to it, which is not unlike the neo-oir films (including Nolan's own Memento and traces of which appear in Batman Begins, but extends far more to countless other filmmakers going back to Chinatown in the 1970s). It depicts urban lifestyle as a crumbling visage of decay upon which misery is found.

 

[Travesty]

 

[DACrowe]

^ Exactly.

Plus, it isn't like all of Manhattan is bright and shiny. From what I hear, it isn't a very nice neighbourhood. A couple of years back, I was in NYC and got into a chat on the bus with a local resident. He told me he has already seen hell years ago when he lived in Harlem. And then there is Hell's Kitchen.

Also, what "change in tone"? How has the tone changed? Just because it has more daytime shots now? In that case, TDK really changed the tone from BB. Everything about it has been explained multiple times by Marc Webb himself. The color palette is chosen to match the visuals. You need a lot of bright colors when you have a glowing blue electric villain. But it's still got an edge to it. It still has a villain that's quite creepy. And seeing as one of his friends is about to become one of his worst enemies, I'd argue it still has a pretty darn serious tone.

Hell's Kitchen?

Despite what comic books say, if THAT'S Hell's Kitchen, then put me in the pantry, with all the grimy coffee shops, and intensely dangerous outdoor seating for the Italian restaurants and hookah bars. And then there are the gangs running through there--you've got The Daily Show, Colbert Report, Letterman...

Yes, parts of Harlem still have an edge, but for better or worse, Manhattan has been the realm of the rich or richer since Giuliani Time. But that is getting off topic, I suspect.

 

[DACrowe]

And it's not like other Spider-Man films didn't have darkly lit, nasty city scenes like that either.

I seem to recall Spider-Man saving Mary Jane from getting raped by those snarling thugs in the alley. Or his first appearance. Etc. etc.

I know you don't really believe that the presentations of New York are the same in Spider-Man (2002) and The Amazing Spider-Man. Because, yes there are daytime scenes of clean city streets in Chicago in The Dark Knight. That does not change how the city or the tone of it is presented in those films.

 

[KRYPTON INC.]

Just putting it out there, but no, the bygone NYC of the Pre-Rudy era, that mythic warzone of crime where you were in danger of being mugged at every corner, streets overflowing with homeless people and drug addicts... Well it never was the truth, and even if it was, those days are about two decades behind us. I think Breaking Bad had it right. You want to see the hot bed of crime? You want to see the new Wild West of America where violence and despair and social ills eat at the heart of society? Yeah, look at small town and suburban America. Cities like NYC have got their **** together these days and have been that way for some time. Places like Detroit are actually anomalies when it comes to urban living in the USA.

PS: I am a huge fan of TAS-M. Liberties are taken with the real world in any CBM.

 

[BatLobster]

Truth all over this thread right now.

 

[milost]

Other than Lizard, what was so bad about the city in TASM? I mean really, a "visage of decay upon which misery is found"? I must have watched the wrong ASM. Then again, I only saw it once.

Those people Peter runs into on the subway, in the alleys, etc. aren't hardened criminals, they're straight up weirdos. The guy with the bottle, the weird people that get all angry at him in the alleys. The streets aren't even a "dark and grimy hell hole". I seem to recall those police scanners he's listening to are relatively minor misdemeanors. Peter was just going by the descriptions of each look a like. I mean, how did Uncle Ben die again? Oh, that's right over chocolate milk and bum rushing the guy. He didn't even mean to shoot Uncle Ben and nothing would have happened if he didn't jump the guy and try and take his gun.

 

[Shikamaru]

Hell's Kitchen?

Despite what comic books say, if THAT'S Hell's Kitchen, then put me in the pantry, with all the grimy coffee shops, and intensely dangerous outdoor seating for the Italian restaurants and hookah bars. And then there are the gangs running through there--you've got The Daily Show, Colbert Report, Letterman...

Yes, parts of Harlem still have an edge, but for better or worse, Manhattan has been the realm of the rich or richer since Giuliani Time. But that is getting off topic, I suspect.

Of course. But the point is that there are still a few bad parts in Manhattan. The majority of it is obviously not like that, but I digress.

I also love how you act as if Manhattan is all of New York, when it is not and several other parts of the film have been filmed in NYC in places outside of Manhattan (i.e. Queens).

I would be interested to see an example of TASM painting New York as "noir" though.

 

[BLobo]

I would be interested to see an example of TASM painting New York as "noir" though.

TASM isn´t Noir. It´s just less bright than TASM 2.

 

[BatLobster]

Few things-

1. Yes pretty much any comic book movie set in New York/Manhattan has to exaggerate the amount of crime there in order to justify the story, so ASM isn't alone in that regard.

2. TASM certainly was not a "grim" or "gritty" urban hell take on the character.

3. But there is a still a notable difference in style between the first film and what we've seen from the second film. I think for me the sunglasses lenses are a perfect example. Not only are they are darker but it's more of that "real world" kind of vibe I get from the first movie. But the Spidey we see in the second film looks like he swung right off a comic book page (or a Raimi film + bigger lenses).

4. As I said, I think the biggest influence Batman Begins had on TASM was more at the studio level. It set the precedent that you could completely redo a superhero character and pretend the older movies never existed and that the audience would buy it. The fact that there was a successful model for that is really the only explanation for Sony rebooting the franchise so soon IMO, especially when you still had a lot of fans who wanted to see a 4th film in the old franchise (in spite of what they thought of Spider-Man 3). They pulled the reboot card. And while it's not a complete grim and gritty re-imagining, it was certainly more modern and less campy than Raimi's Silver Age-influenced incarnation of the character.

That is all.

 

[DACrowe]

Of course. But the point is that there are still a few bad parts in Manhattan. The majority of it is obviously not like that, but I digress.

I also love how you act as if Manhattan is all of New York, when it is not and several other parts of the film have been filmed in NYC in places outside of Manhattan (i.e. Queens).

I would be interested to see an example of TASM painting New York as "noir" though.

Oh New York is definitely five boroughs. But in the Spidey movies, and the comics for that matter, if he isn't chatting with Aunt May, they ignore the other four. If they made a movie about Spidey going into the Bronx, it'd be interesting. Especially because he'd finally be in danger.

 

[DACrowe]

TASM isn´t Noir. It´s just less bright than TASM 2.

I never said it was noir. I said it had traces of noir, elements of it. A movie can be influenced by certain other films and storytelling techniques without being that thing wholesale.

 

[Schlosser85]

One of my--relatively few--gripes with Nolan's Batverse is how Gotham is a bland and generic big city.

The only part of it that feels like comic Gotham to me is the Narrows, and they ignore the Narrows after Begins.

 

[Shikamaru]

I kinda agree with that. Aside from Gotham in BB, I still liked a lot of the night scenes in TDK. However, yes, Gotham became more and more generic looking with each film.

 

[Travesty]

I liked Gotham in BB. I hated it in TDK, and I thought it was just ok in TDKR.

Overall, not that impressed with it. And to me, the aesthetic and tone of Gotham is a very big part of what I enjoy about Batman.

 

[Schlosser85]

Same. I miss the dreary gothic feel from the comics. Nolan's Gotham--apart from the Narrows--is too bright and clean and shiny and architecturally generic.

 

[shauner111]

Yeah it becomes more of a regular city as time goes on. My favorite Gotham is probably Tim Burton's. Anything that looks gothic is just cool as hell. I never got excited about Nolan's gotham but i understand what he was going for by making it a regular city. So i appreciated it. Im not fussy when it comes to the look of Gotham. Even Batman Forever was fine to me.

 

[Schlosser85]

I like the gothic feel of Burton's Gotham even though I don't like Burton's Batman movies. Schumacher just made Gotham over-the-top until it was just ridiculous.

 

[DACrowe]

One of my--relatively few--gripes with Nolan's Batverse is how Gotham is a bland and generic big city.

The only part of it that feels like comic Gotham to me is the Narrows, and they ignore the Narrows after Begins.

To be fair, I think very much what we think of as comic Gotham is heavily influenced by the Burton movies and TAS that was forced to follow suit (for the best).

With that said, I love the gothic architecture and that look for Gotham, and think it has never looked better than in Arkham City. But I respect Nolan going back to it being simply a decaying major American city. In fact, I agree the Narrows was a concession to that Burton or stylized approach, but the city felt much more alive in the sequels when he was not compromising on that.

With that said, I hope Snyder goes back to a more stylized approach to the city.

 

[Kane52630]

Schumacher just made Gotham over-the-top until it was just ridiculous.

And awesome.

 

[Schlosser85]

Batman & Robin is one of the most mentally ******ed movies I have ever seen in my life. Like it was written and directed by a five-year-old with bright crayons.

 

[Kane52630]

I know right? it's so great.

 

[Shikamaru]

I prefer a more normal-looking city over a Burton-esque stylized one. I like my DC cities stylized to an extent, but still realistic at the end of the day. My favorite portrayal of Gotham is the one seen in books like Year One, The Dark Knight Returns, and The Long Halloween. It was still very dark and gritty, but in a realistic way.

 

[I Am The Knight]

The Narrows is one of the reasons why BB is my favorite Nolan Bat flick. It had a great atmosphere to it.

 

[The Shape]

The Narrows is one of the reasons why BB is my favorite Nolan Bat flick. It had a great atmosphere to it.

It looked too much like a movie set.