The Dark Knight
Sat, Jul. 26th, 2008 06:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterI note that I did actually like the movie, and that I am a huge Batman fan and have been ever since I was seven and watched the dorky Adam West show and pretended I was the Batcycle when my sister was Batgirl (I was fueled by orange Tic Tacs). I also note that dark Batman appeals to the teenager in me, who read Dark Knight Returns at an incredibly impressionable age.
And yet...
Wow. So Rachel Dawes is the Woman in the Refrigerator for not one, but two men? Way to work in your misogyny while keeping the women in the film to a minimum.
Also, I'm so glad that the cowardly, money-grubbing, white-collar criminals are foreign Chinese people; the thuggish, street criminals are black; and that the mob is black, Italian, and Eastern European. *rolls eyes* It's great that there were some POC in secondary, non-criminal roles, but really, I think three minutes of a black police commissioner or Morgan Freeman's presence doesn't quite take the sting away from the implication that most criminals are POC. And even then, the biggest mastermind villain (Joker) is still white!
Despite my issues with how Rachel Dawes was handled, I very much liked what they did with Harvey Dent—my dad commented that Aaron Eckhart had the most to do in the movie, and I agree. That said, I wanted to slap Alfred for his decision to burn Rachel's letter, and I wanted to slap everyone who was all, "Gotham will be saved by a lie! Batman is so noble and heroic for walking off and being the bad guy!"
I cannot quite articulate why, as I do agree about the practical reasoning for covering Harvey Dent's crimes. Possibly it's because Batman's level of violence and property destruction (action movies really are fantasy) makes me scoff at the notion that Batman would even care about his reputation.
I think I may also be superhero-movie-d out; I'm tired of endless debate on what's moral or not for superheroes and wish that there were more of a deconstruction of superheroes and the entire action movie genre. Let's see how the Watchmen movie goes...
And yet...
Wow. So Rachel Dawes is the Woman in the Refrigerator for not one, but two men? Way to work in your misogyny while keeping the women in the film to a minimum.
Also, I'm so glad that the cowardly, money-grubbing, white-collar criminals are foreign Chinese people; the thuggish, street criminals are black; and that the mob is black, Italian, and Eastern European. *rolls eyes* It's great that there were some POC in secondary, non-criminal roles, but really, I think three minutes of a black police commissioner or Morgan Freeman's presence doesn't quite take the sting away from the implication that most criminals are POC. And even then, the biggest mastermind villain (Joker) is still white!
Despite my issues with how Rachel Dawes was handled, I very much liked what they did with Harvey Dent—my dad commented that Aaron Eckhart had the most to do in the movie, and I agree. That said, I wanted to slap Alfred for his decision to burn Rachel's letter, and I wanted to slap everyone who was all, "Gotham will be saved by a lie! Batman is so noble and heroic for walking off and being the bad guy!"
I cannot quite articulate why, as I do agree about the practical reasoning for covering Harvey Dent's crimes. Possibly it's because Batman's level of violence and property destruction (action movies really are fantasy) makes me scoff at the notion that Batman would even care about his reputation.
I think I may also be superhero-movie-d out; I'm tired of endless debate on what's moral or not for superheroes and wish that there were more of a deconstruction of superheroes and the entire action movie genre. Let's see how the Watchmen movie goes...
A bit off-topic
Fri, Aug. 8th, 2008 11:02 am (UTC)-Chris