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ORIGINAL: horribleives

I generally like Brooker (though I prefer him in print to hearing his smug voice) and thought the bit about The Dark Knight Rises was quite funny. As I said in another thread though, he's got a bit of a cheek dismissing Batman and The Avengers as kids films (and in the case of the latter being therefore not worthy of his attention) when he's a massive fan of Doctor bloody Who.

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ORIGINAL: Don_a_van

I think CB is OK but as with most things, he has become a victim of his own hype of late which has inevitably lead to a re-evalutaion of his work. Over saturation is rarely a good thing as familiarity often breeds contempt.

As for his thoughts on Superhero movies, I agree somewhat. Is there a place for both fun and a more serious type of superhero movie? IMO absolutely as I like the change of tone between the different franchises. Was the decision to make the new Batman Trilogy darker and more realistic the correct choice? Again I'd say absolutely. Batman as a character is absolutely more suited towards this kind of tone as his background isn't filled with happiness and light, plus we've already had many goes at a more frivolous and campy\fun Batman and we all know how they turned out.

However I will add that I think Nolan did take it too far the other way. Sure I think he got the characterisation spot on but in doing so he has removed any sense of fun to be had from a slightly deranged person who dresses up as a bat. Making it too grounded also means that many of the action set pieces also lack real impact and some of the fight choreography was shockingingly bad.

I'll cite the Tumbler chase sequence in BB as an example of what I mean, Batman rolls out in the Tumbler which again is quite a disappointing design for a Bat vehicle due to the fact that Nolan wanted it to be realistic but you think at least we'll get to see some mayhem.....but nothing happens. He drives around in it a bit, get's chased by the police, switches off his lights (and for some bizarre slides forward in his seat) and the act of simply switching his lights off (gasp) makes his 20 tonne tank miraclously disappear from 20 cop cars and a helicopter. He then switches his lights back on (oh looks he's back) and then drivers around a bit more and err...that's it. The whole scene could have had the excitement\novelty of Bond driving a stolen tank through Moscow but turned up to 11, instead it ends up feeling like Batman has just popped out to the shops to grab some milk, VERY anti-climatic.

This happens many times throughout the films and the fight choreography is laughable in places for a triple AAA superhero title. I get that he might have some problems with movement in that suit but come on, this is 2013, when even low budget Indonesian films are able to provide fight scenes that are 10 times more memorable than the ultimate Superhero franchise, something isn't working. I seriously cannot remember one decent fight scene in all 3 films.

So was the tone correct for Nolan's movies, again absolutely....the problem is they just aren't as good as people seem to think they are and are in fact sub-par in many areas I'd consider essential to a good Superhero movie but the fact that they are "more adult\serious" in nature seems to have engendered this notion that they are "better" than other superhero movies which are "just for kids". The problem is this notion now seems to have filtered into the pyche of the film studios so that EVERY new film is now trying to "do a Batman" buy being darker and grittier, most for films which don't even justify this treatment, simply because Nolan has now made it cool\profitable to do so. This is where the argument for pretentiousness gains some traction IMO.

Nolan MAY have been successful in turning the Superhero genre into high art but in doing so, he has definately lost more than he has gained IMO, my only fear is that from what I can see of the trailer, he is determined to take The Man of Steel in the same direction, I hope I'm wrong, we've already had a Superman reboot with all the fun sucked out of it!

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ORIGINAL: spark1

but a 'comic book movies are just for kids/laughs' attitude drove the superman and batman franchises over a cliff in the 80s/90s.

donner and nolan were right-versimilitude is the key.

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ORIGINAL: Dannybohy

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ORIGINAL: spark1

but a 'comic book movies are just for kids/laughs' attitude drove the superman and batman franchises over a cliff in the 80s/90s.

donner and nolan were right-versimilitude is the key.

They are mostly just for kids and big kids (adults) , don't kid yourself!. ;)

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ORIGINAL: Don_a_van

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ORIGINAL: Dannybohy

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ORIGINAL: spark1

but a 'comic book movies are just for kids/laughs' attitude drove the superman and batman franchises over a cliff in the 80s/90s.

donner and nolan were right-versimilitude is the key.

They are mostly just for kids and big kids (adults) , don't kid yourself!. ;)

100% agree. This reminds me of people who try to justify reading comics by calling them graphic novels, they are still books with pretty pictures of buxom women and musclebound blokes bashing each other through buildings. Just accept what they are and don't feel the need to justify your hobbies\likes by trying to make them sound more grown up\important than they are. This doesn't mean they need to be totally silly, camp or frivolous, they can have a serious tone to but this all needs to be tempered by not loosing sight of the fact that you are still telling a story about a grown man wearing tights so stop trying to make them something they aren't. Citizen Kane they ain't and don't need to be to justify their existence.

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ORIGINAL: Don_a_van

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ORIGINAL: Dannybohy

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ORIGINAL: spark1

but a 'comic book movies are just for kids/laughs' attitude drove the superman and batman franchises over a cliff in the 80s/90s.

donner and nolan were right-versimilitude is the key.

They are mostly just for kids and big kids (adults) , don't kid yourself!. ;)

100% agree. This reminds me of people who try to justify reading comics by calling them graphic novels, they are still books with pretty pictures of buxom women and musclebound blokes bashing each other through buildings. Just accept what they are and don't feel the need to justify your hobbies\likes by trying to make them sound more grown up\important than they are. This doesn't mean they need to be totally silly, camp or frivolous, they can have a serious tone to but this all needs to be tempered by not loosing sight of the fact that you are still telling a story about a grown man wearing tights so stop trying to make them something they aren't. Citizen Kane they ain't and don't need to be to justify their existence.

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ORIGINAL: scary_ice

Completely agree with pretty much everything Don has said here. The fight scenes in all the Nolan Batman movies were pretty unmemorable, and I'm worried that The Man of Steel will suffer from this seriousness overload too.

This already happened in comics with Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns in the 80's and suddenly everyone was making their superheroes 'dark' i.e. brooding and tortured, and this trend became boring very quickly.

I think that's why I enjoyed Avengers so much, because it was just a funny, exciting blockbuster that actually seemed to be enjoying itself!

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ORIGINAL: Don_a_van

I've seen him bring nothing new, that has wowed me visually to this space in any of his movies.

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ORIGINAL: giggity

i dont think its so much ego as it was something he genuinely wanted to do. If he wanted to do an action film then what would be the point if he didnt direct the action? It's the same as saying you want to go to disneyland and then not going on any rides.

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ORIGINAL: jobloffski

The action in Nolan's Batman films enacted the themes of the films and reflected whoever Batman as fighting,and the acting performance in the fight scenes mattered to the whole film. Second unit action usually reflects that the performance of the actors and the action itself is necessary to the film sort of but doesn't really matter at all.The benefit of not using second unit is that there is better continuity between the non action bits and the action bits, because the vibe created in non action bits flows better into what is happening and why. It feels like things all belong in the film.

In Begins there are distinct ways of shooting the fights: Against those who he can walk over, the editing it like a flurry of blows, reflecting, for example in the 'goons in the docks' sequence, the direction and editing reflects the goons experience of not seeing where the blows are coming from. Whereas, when fighting Leeson's character the framing is different, Batman is more visible, and the direction is less frenetic. The direction of the action reflects the characters.

Similarly in TDK, when fighting those he can take easily, there's brutal speed to Batman knocking people down, almos tin passing contrasted with frustration and failure in the bits where he faces the joker, pounding on him to no avail.The acting performances whether talking or fighting remain consistent because the director directs both.

In TDKR, the 'character state of mind' based direction of the action reaches it's darkest when an immobile, almost unconscious Batman is framed in closeup, with the camera still, Bane's fist thudding into his mask until it cracks. This moment has particular thematic, symbolic and emotional weight to carry in it's moment and for the trilogy.

Second unit direction of the kind of action Nolan put in the films would have made the action look and feel different, but Nolan's approach to the action wasn't to make people go wow, but to create the feeling of how it felt to be those characters in those moments. Batman knocking people over like skittles first time out, enduring against the Joker, and then broken. The action was so integral to the story being told and so rooted in character that second unit direction of the action wouldn't have allowed Nolan the level of directorial control he wanted over how the films FEEL. It's not old school Bond type action where it's a sideshow to the narrative during which the narrative waits for the action to be over.The action is just a part of the whole narrative and the state of play for characters changes during it. Which is more or less why a director like Nolan would want to direct it himself.

Are all hischoices perfectly executed? No, but I think I prefer the occasional noble failure to the all bullshit you can end up with when the action and the character interaction are constructed as separate elements, by people with different professional, imagination and intellectual prioities then edited together.

And Charlie Brooker is a professional piss taker. So it's best not to believe even HE believes everything he says. It's also best to remember who he works for. A broadcaster with a very high level of self regard that doesn't exactly want to encourage people to not watch television (which is the reason you wont be seeing, for example, programmes looking at how complex and emotionally engaging and morally cloudy in a genuinely adult way some computer games are on that channel,because it would encourage people to do things that mean people might spend tens of hours not getting their entertainment from the BBC and discovering that the BBC isn't really 'the best at everything' that it promotes itself as being).

The generalisation that film x is too whatever and film y is just for kids is arse biscuit material. Real people can veer between escapism and silliness and harder, heavier material whenever they want, if they aren't too influenced by whatever people say to just do what they want. Blazing Saddles one night, maybe Inland Empire the next, that's me. Whatever,whenever, my choice,because I'm not a robot who has decided what works best for me and shunning everything else as 'for plebs' or whatever.

Charlie Brooker can be very funny. And even if I like the things he rips on, I can still laugh at the things he says. And anyway, historically, superhero films, comics etc, fantasy too, rise to be more prominent when there aren't any real heroes and people get tired of cunts trying to tell them what to do and think. No real heroes= the rise of fictional ones.So maybe super hero films being so prominent right now is a reflection of something bigger than the focus placed upon it by someone who has established himself as a professional hater of popular culture so firmly that he's actually being completely absorbed into it

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ORIGINAL: Dave Oz

I'm a bit of a Brooker fan, but I don't think he completely "gets" movies (which is even more strange considering he writes decent television scripts). He seems to apply the criteria he uses to judge the worth of, for example, dodgy news reporting with what a film should be. It's a bit strange because someone as clearly as astute as Brooker, you'd think he'd have read a book or two on cinema. Case in point, in last weeks Weekly Wipe he starts having a go at 'Django Unchained'. He couldn't seem to wrap his head around the depiction of violence and the way in which slavery was handled in the film, which is fair enough, but what did he expect in a Tarantino film; a touching character study?

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ORIGINAL: spark1

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ORIGINAL: Dave Oz

I'm a bit of a Brooker fan, but I don't think he completely "gets" movies (which is even more strange considering he writes decent television scripts). He seems to apply the criteria he uses to judge the worth of, for example, dodgy news reporting with what a film should be. It's a bit strange because someone as clearly as astute as Brooker, you'd think he'd have read a book or two on cinema. Case in point, in last weeks Weekly Wipe he starts having a go at 'Django Unchained'. He couldn't seem to wrap his head around the depiction of violence and the way in which slavery was handled in the film, which is fair enough, but what did he expect in a Tarantino film; a touching character study?

actually charlie did not get that 'django' is not about slavery but quentin raiding movie genres again.
though his 'film review' bit in 'wipe' is may be a piss take of the current 'film 2013'.

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ORIGINAL: Don_a_van

I think Nolan did take it too far the other way. Sure I think he got the characterisation spot on but in doing so he has removed any sense of fun to be had from a slightly deranged person who dresses up as a bat.

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ORIGINAL: Cloud Cuckoo
Picture a film noir version of Superted and you might see what he means.

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Brooker is an absolute genius. He is the god of relentless cynicism, scathing reviews and ascerbic comment. I have worshipped at his altar since he described Susan Boyle as looking like "a cross between a 1970s Soviet president and a haunted tree", a description so imaginative and yet cruelly accurate that I nearly choked to death on my own laughter. The man is not "over-hyped" - he has earned it all. Thank fuck for broadcasters like Charlie Brooker.

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ORIGINAL: matty_b
You have a nice face, Shifty. A face I would have a cup of tea with.

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ORIGINAL: porntrooper
Shifty said it best

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Brooker is an absolute genius.