Category: Movies

It’s easy to see why Touchstone wanted to make “Delivery Man.” It has a ton of heart, and it honors the bonds and the importance of family. The catch is that it is an indie script through and through – though a flawed one at that – and the big-budget touches they add to it, namely Vaughn doing that ‘look Ma no hands’ thing that he does, do not serve the material. Despite the outrageousness of the plot, it’s an intimate movie. A smaller scale would have worked wonders, but only to a point.

David Wozniak (Vaughn) is a terminable screw-up. He delivers meat for the butcher shop his father runs, and he is always late, always racking up parking tickets, and completely unreliable. (Also, he owes a loan shark $80,000, as if he weren’t already in enough trouble.) In the span of 24 hours, he discovers that his policewoman girlfriend Emma (Cobie Smulders) is pregnant, and that as a result of nearly 700 donations to a sperm bank when he was in his 20s, he is the father of 533 children. One hundred forty-two of these children want to meet him, and have filed a class action suit against the sperm bank to reveal his identity (he signed all of the documents under the name Starbuck). His lawyer friend Brett (Chris Pratt) takes the case, and gives David an envelope containing profiles of the 142 plaintiffs. Against Brett’s advice, David visits some of his kids anonymously, and tries to help them any way he can. When he sees the good fortune that his kindness provides, David’s life has purpose for the first time, but remaining anonymous quickly proves to be difficult.

Don’t let the trailers fool you: this is not some broad, wacky comedy, even if it’s based on a premise involving a sperm bank. David is essentially coming face to face with people who possess exaggerated amounts of his best and worst qualities (one’s a professional basketball player, one’s a junkie), and learning a hell of a lot about himself in the process. There are moments of levity here and there, but this is much more of a drama than it is a comedy, and it should be. To make too many jokes about this premise would be missing the point.

And what, then, of the parents who raised these kids? They are not spoken of once, and while including them as characters would admittedly bog down the plot, a simple line of dialogue acknowledging their existence and sacrifice would have been nice. There is also the matter of Ryan, the severely disabled participant in the lawsuit. The boy can’t speak, never mind write. How, then, did he give his consent to participate in the lawsuit? That may sound like splitting hairs, but it doesn’t make any sense from a logical standpoint. He’s basically there to manipulate the audience, and while it works, it’s a cheat.

You can see why they wanted Vaughn to play David. He’s a very likable guy, and David is equally as likable. Had they kept Vaughn properly restrained, he may have delivered exactly what the role required. As it is, they gave him too much rope, and the movie suffers because of it. Vaughn is an inherently funny guy, but there is nothing inherently funny about the plot. I’m going to chalk this up to director Ken Scott, who wrote and directed the 2011 film “Starbuck” upon which this film is based, not feeling as though he had the clout to tell Vince Vaughn to take it down a notch. Or worse, he was getting notes from the studio execs to let Vince run wild. Either way, it wasn’t the right call. Also, Smulders is wasted as the girlfriend. She’s the most important person in his life, and she’s treated as an afterthought.

“Delivery Man” has its good points and bad points, but the one thing I kept asking myself when it ended was, who is the audience for this movie? Vince Vaughn fans will most likely be disappointed because it’s not as unleashed as his other work, and indie film fans who would otherwise flock to see this movie will instead skip it because it was made by a major and it stars Vince Vaughn. Neither group is right and neither group is wrong, but both sides shed light on why this version of “Delivery Man” doesn’t work, but that the material has the potential to be something much, much greater.

“Déjà Vu” is a near-mirror image of most Jerry Bruckheimer popcorn flicks: the logic, by and large, works (which is really saying something for a time-travel movie), but watching it unfold isn’t terribly exciting. Compare that to, say, “The Rock” or “Con Air,” which are brain-dead but also tons o’ fun. Maybe director Tony Scott got so wrapped up in the groovy new F/X shots the movie employs, and how he was going to serve up some stunning split-screen imagery that no one’s ever done before, that he lost track of some of those other important ingredients to making a good movie, like acting and pacing.

Denzel Washington plays Doug Carlin, a New Orleans ATF agent investigating the horrific bombing of a steamboat filled with US Navy sailors and their families. While filtering through the casualties, he stumbles upon the body of a girl named Claire (Paula Patton), though the circumstances surrounding her death lead Doug to believe she is not a victim of the bombing but a clue to the bomber’s identity. Enter FBI Agent Pryzwarra (Val Kilmer), who shows Doug a top-secret government program that allows them to lock in on any place in the world four days in the past. As they follow Claire’s life, Doug doesn’t just want to find the man responsible for the bombing; he wants to save Claire’s life. But can he? Will the rules of the time-space continuum permit such a thing?

That last question alone takes up nearly ten minutes of exposition in the scene where Doug is shown the technology that permits the Feds to look back in time. Ten, long, minutes. Every time Washington said “Let me get this straight” or “Are you saying that…,” I thought to myself: college kids across the country have their next movie drinking game. There’s certainly a story here, but it gets continuously sidetracked by the gimmicks. Our jaws are supposed to drop at the possibility of a bunch of satellites having the ability to provide a very revealing window into the past (one that, for the sake of convenience, cannot be replayed or sped up, though it can be recorded in tiny increments), and again when Doug goes into the field and uses this new technology in mind-boggling ways. And maybe your jaw will drop when those things happen, but a better approach would have been to move the story along, rather than getting bogged down in the minutiae.

Then there’s the ending, which works on one level but doesn’t work on another (to say more would mean spoiling everything). Movies that are based on time travel all have those paradoxes, and this one is no exception. In fact, the cynical, no-dry-eyes-in-the-house part of me saw a fantastic, if brutal, ending to this movie, and was disappointed that they were thisclose to realizing it, only to go in another direction. Unlike “Stranger than Fiction” – and I’m totally stealing the end of the great Roger Ebert’s review for this line – the compromise here was not the choice of the characters, but the storytellers. They probably couldn’t sell the script any other way, of course, but they should know that other options were in front of them, much like they were for the characters in their story.

Props to “Déjà Vu” for trying to take the typical Bruckheimer action movie and make it smarter, but they should have focused on what makes a Bruckheimer movie a Bruckheimer movie, and it ain’t smarts. No one goes to see these movies to be challenged in any way; they see them to be entertained, and that’s where the film loses its way. Film buffs will surely berate me for “lowering the standards” by accepting Bruckheimer’s movies for what they are, but let’s get real for a second. The standards are already low, and it’s not Bruckheimer’s fault. I call out his junk when I see it (“Armageddon,” “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest,” “Kangaroo Jack,” “Bad Boys” and its sequel), and while this isn’t art, it isn’t junk, either. But it’s also not what it could have been. Give me access to the technology that’s in this movie, and I’ll make a better movie. Maybe not the most likable movie, but a better one.

You can cut a movie until it’s faster than light, but no amount of editing will make a movie more intense if the action isn’t in the script. Director John Madden clearly understands this, because his film “The Debt” manages to wring tension out of a sequence that cuts between two people walking at normal speed. In truth, only a third of the movie could be considered a thriller; the rest of it is the kind of period piece family drama that litters Ang Lee’s resume, but the action-to-plot ratio is not what undoes the movie. Rather, it’s the transparency of the payoff. It’s painfully obvious what the movie has planned, and while the ride is perfectly enjoyable, you’ll wish for a prettier sunset once you’ve arrived.

In 1966, three young agents of the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad earn great acclaim for succeeding on their mission to bring Nazi war criminal-in-hiding Dieter Vogel, a.k.a. the Butcher of Birkenau, to justice. Flash-forward to 1997, where the daughter of agents Rachel Singer (Helen Mirren) and Stephan Gold (Tom Wilkinson) has written a book about her parents’ courageous story. The only problem is that the story Rachel and Stephan have told everyone is not exactly how things went down, and the two must decide between continuing the charade, which would mean potentially torpedoing their daughter’s career prospects, and coming clean.

You can see why the actors were drawn to the movie, on a number of levels. Oscar nominee John Madden (“Shakespeare in Love”) is at the helm, and the script was shepherded by It Boy Matthew Vaughn (“Kick-Ass”). The young actors get to play multilingual secret agents in the ‘60s, and the older actors, well, the men get to use accents. Helen Mirren, meanwhile, gets the best of both worlds by speaking Russian and kicking ass. Odds are, though, that the original script that lured the actors in has a much more satisfying ending than the one presented here, which has potential but ultimately reeks of tampering and reshoots.

The casting of the young male leads is curiously backwards. The tall, raven-haired Marton Csokas should grow up to become tall, raven-haired Ciaran Hinds. Instead, he’s played by the less tall, full-faced Tom Wilkinson, while Hinds is played in flashback by the less tall, full-faced Sam Worthington. It creates a visual disconnect at times, which is a shame because the young men deserve better. Jessica Chastain is the lucky one; she becomes Helen Mirren in the end, which means that her back story will be the juiciest, and Chastain makes the most of a role that demands her to be both cruel and empathetic, sometimes within seconds. The movie’s true star, though, is Jesper Christensen, who’s delightfully nasty as the unrepentant Dr. Vogel. Had the rest of the characters been as fully developed as he was, the unsatisfying finale would have been far easier to stomach.

It’s difficult to put down “The Debt,” because the world could use more thrillers like it, or at the very least, thrillers that aim for more than a series of gun fights. The lack of a real mystery at the story’s core, though, is fatal, so it’s to the credit of the cast (despite the miscasting) and direction that they are able to make “The Debt” as entertaining as it is.

Embrace the badness. It’s a lesson that a lot of movies would benefit greatly from learning. Look at “Ghost Rider,” for example. That’s a bad, bad movie, right there, but hot damn, is it bad in a really fun way. James Wan, director of “Saw” and this year’s underwhelming “Dead Silence,” must have known that he was setting himself up for trouble when he signed on to make “Death Sentence,” author Brian Garfield’s first sequel to his 1972 novel “Death Wish.” And yet, Wan approaches the subject matter with a wide-eyed innocence that only occasionally taps into its potential for awesome badness. If you’re going to get in bed with a movie like this, you should be prepared to go all the way.

Kevin Bacon is Nick Hume, a risk assessment specialist whose life is torn apart when his oldest son Brendon (Stuart Lafferty) is killed before his very eyes in a gas station holdup by a group of masked thugs. Nick jumps the killer and is able to ID him in a police line, but once he learns that the killer will serve a relatively short sentence, Nick recants his testimony, making the killer a free man and, more conveniently, an open target. Nick exacts his revenge by killing his son’s killer, unaware that he has just started a gang war with noted dirtbag Billy Darley (Garrett Hedlund), who now feels just as wronged as Nick did, setting the wheels of vigilante justice into tragic motion.

I’m willing to wager that Wan was attracted to the source material because it was as far removed from “Saw” as any directorial gig that he has likely been offered to date, and yet as each death scene came and went, I could not shake the thought that the movie would have been better served by a series of deadly traps, each one grislier than the last. They actually seemed to be heading in that direction at one point – in what turned out to be the most entertaining death scene the movie has to offer – but from then on, the goings get serious, man, and even though you want to get excited when Bacon gives the camera the ‘I’m Gonna Git You Sucka’ look, it’s too late for the movie to live up to either Wan’s reputation as a gorehound director or the awesomely bad potential of the source material. I will, however, give points to Bacon for giving the movie his all. Six degrees jokes and all, Bacon knows what a movie needs, even when the director himself doesn’t.

There is a case study to be made with “Death Sentence,” in that someone should wait outside of a theater showing the movie and ask the viewers, “So what is the moral of the story?” My critic friends and I asked ourselves that question as we were walking out, and we could not come up with one. Is vigilante justice wrong, or is vigilante justice only wrong when there is retribution for your act of retribution? The movie itself doesn’t appear to have an answer for this; it just wants to make sure a bunch of people get dead, but even on that front it fails, since the director, like it or not, has a reputation for dispatching with people in far more interesting ways than the poor bastards here. If you’re lucky enough to have a Brew & View near you, that would be the perfect environment in which to see “Death Sentence.” Since the movie itself didn’t embrace its inherent badness, it is now your problem to do so. A few drinks will definitely help in that endeavor.

The ads for “Dead Silence” will tell you that the movie comes from “the writer and director of ‘Saw.’” A more accurate description, though, would be that it comes from “the writers of ‘Magic’ and ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street,’” since the movie’s premise borrows liberally from both. If it bears any similarity to “Saw,” it’s in the ending, but more on that later.

Ryan Kwanten stars as Jamie, a man whose wife is brutally murdered while he’s out getting takeout. The detective assigned to the case, Jim Lipton (Donnie Wahlberg), thinks Jamie is guilty, but Jamie thinks it has something to do with the ventriloquist doll he mysteriously received before his wife was killed. Those dolls, to the people from Jamie’s hometown, are a bad omen; he grew up hearing a ghost story about a ventriloquist named Mary Shaw (Judith Roberts), who would cut out your tongue if you screamed at the sight of her. Jamie thinks he’s being terrorized by Mary, and he confronts his distant father (Bob Gunton) to find out why.

Like the “Saw” movies, “Dead Silence” is not scary so much as it’s unsettling. Mary Shaw’s victims look like gored-up versions of the dead people in “The Ring,” which will have you covering your mouth unconsciously. The manipulation of audio – or the slow draining thereof – is used to shockingly good effect, and those damn dolls are just creepy. The entire movie is shot in a wash of blue and gray, which makes everything look just a tad more sinister than it otherwise would.

But it’s only so creepy, so sinister. “Saw,” after all, was not a horror movie but a graphic thriller. “Dead Silence,” likewise, is a graphic ghost story. And, typical of writer Leigh Whannell and director James Wan, they couldn’t resist coming up with an ending that will have you arguing with your mates afterwards about its plausibility. Personally, I think it’s a huge cheat, but I thought the endings to “Saw” and “Saw III” were cheats too, so there you go.

“Dead Silence” is better than most horror movies these days, particularly those of the subgenre that likes to call itself claustrophobic cruelty (read: exploitative torture). However, that’s kind of like praising the 1963 Mets because they didn’t lose as many games as they did the previous season. Better, yes, but not quite great.

“God will forgive them. He’ll forgive them and allow them into heaven. I can’t live with that.”

So begins “Dead Man’s Shoes,” a pitch-black revenge thriller set in an even darker suburban London underworld. It’s an indie jack of all trades of sorts, using elements of drama, horror and even a pinch of comedy to tell its tale. It’s a bit jumpy, and, thanks to the thick accents, could use subtitles a la the club scene in “Trainspotting,” but despite the fact that there is little left to the imagination, the movie is enthralling.

The dialogue quoted above belongs to Richard (Paddy Considine), a soldier who returns to his grimy ‘burb after seven years in the service. While Richard was away, a local group of drug dealing dirtbags was not very nice to his developmentally disabled little brother Anthony (Toby Kebbell). They took Anthony in and watched after him, but they also humiliated him as well, and Richard has a score to settle, particularly with Sonny (Gary Stretch), the leader of the group. As we see Richard go on his rampage, the movie jumps back and forth between details about how Anthony suffered at the hands of Sonny and his mates, and Richard’s slow, methodical execution of said mates.

If you’re anything like me, you’ll catch about every sixth word of dialogue, but surprisingly, it’ll be enough to follow the action. I’m not sure if that’s because the story structure is so mind-numbingly simple or because director Shane Meadows’ use of visuals successfully fills the gaps. Richard doesn’t stalk these goons like Jason Voorhees, hiding in the shadows; he’s pretty much right out in the open, taunting them for their gross incompetence and complete inability to stop him. And just when the movie appears to be on autopilot, they reveal a piece of information that drastically changes your feelings about everything you’ve seen up to that point, and all for the better. Without that scene, the movie is just one long, anticlimactic death scene. With it, it becomes a probing character study.

IMDb lists “Dead Man’s Shoes” as a 2004 release, which makes one wonder what held this movie back a couple years. This isn’t some “Adventures of Pluto Nash” shelving decision here, where the studio knew it was sitting on a dud and tried to keep it off the books. Why was no one interested in releasing this? It’s not the most revelatory movie in the world, but much, much worse UK imports than this have crossed the pond in the last two years.

Any movie that dares to discuss a hot button topic like global warming is going to get some press, but it’s safe to say that no one expected Moveon.org to rally behind “The Day After Tomorrow” and declare it “the movie George W. Bush doesn’t want you to see.” This is, of course, preposterous. If there is one thing Roland Emmerich’s movies are unquestionably not, it’s important. In “Independence Day”, he had two characters disarm an alien race with a computer virus. In “Stargate”, he took cross-dressing Jaye Davidson from “The Crying Game” and made him a sun god. All Emmerich really wants to do is blow stuff up. There is no sense in looking for or expecting anything else from him.

It is in that regard that “The Day After Tomorrow” is a smashing success, no pun intended. The visuals are absolutely spellbinding. And, true to form in an Emmerich film, everything else about the movie is utterly silly.

Dennis Quaid plays Jack Hall, a climatologist who witnesses firsthand a sheet of ice the size of Rhode Island break off the Antarctic snowcap. He tries to warn world leaders at a convention in New Delhi about the drastic effects this will have on the environment, only to be scoffed at by Vice President Becker (Kenneth Walsh), a man who was undoubtedly made up to be a dead ringer for Dick Cheney. The problem is, Hall was more right than he knew; while he was anticipating climate changes in a hundred years, the effects of this ice block are nearly instantaneous, producing hail the size of cats in Tokyo, multiple tornadoes in Los Angeles and a hellacious tidal wave in New York City. And where else would Hall’s estranged son Sam (Jake Gyllenhaal) be but in New York City for an academic competition, which he did as a ruse to get closer to cute classmate Laura (Emmy Rossum, the dead girl in “Mystic River”). Jack is determined to save his son, and heads up from D.C. in a brutal snowstorm to find him.

Nothing I wrote after the comment about the flood in New York is really of any importance, and this is where Emmerich’s movies fail us every time. The buildup to the spectacular special effects scenes is always well done, but none of his movies have a third act worth a damn. Once the flood hits New York, we have seen roughly everything that matters (though the Russian tanker that floats down the street later on is awfully cool). When there are no more special effects to dazzle us with, he has nothing left but the actors, and since he has invested so little time in creating characters or a story remotely engaging, they all fall flat.

But we’ve been through this with him before, and now those familiar with this work know exactly what to expect. “The Day After Tomorrow” looks fantastic, and is a little scary. But it’s not nearly as scary, or important, as some people will want you to believe. Take it for what it is, just another disaster movie, and enjoy the ride.

The greatest compliment that can ever be paid to a documentary that covers a certain genre of music, or quadriplegic sport, or class of sub-zero animal, is that even people who have no interest whatsoever in that music/sport/animal will find plenty to enjoy in the movie about that topic. Put “Dave Chappelle’s Block Party” in the same category. It’s not flawless in its backstage/pre-show banter-to-concert footage ratio, but it finds a way to endear itself to people that would otherwise have nothing to do with a movie about a hip hop block party. People like me, for example, who are not terribly up to date on today’s hip hop kiddies (I’m white, in my late 30’s, and not at all afraid to act my age) and have always wanted to strangle Chappelle anytime he’s shown up in a movie. I love “Con Air,” but I couldn’t wait until his character was taken out, by any means necessary.

The setup is that Chappelle wants to throw an old school block party in the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn, and assembles his own dream team of talent to perform (Mos Def, Kanye West, Common, Dead Prez, the Roots, Cody Chestnutt, a reunited Fugees, and even some golden age heroes like Big Daddy Kane). The action then flies back to Dayton (Chappelle grew up in nearby Yellow Springs) three days prior to the event, where Chappelle hands out free passes good for transportation, hotel and admission to the event. The real money moment comes when he invites the entire Central State University marching band to perform at the event, and they shriek with delight and jump all over Chappelle like he’s Willie Wonka, a reference Chappelle himself acknowledges before he gives his first pass away. The band winds up contributing to Kanye West’s performance of “Jesus Walks” – that’s right, Kanye West took time out from writing musical history to perform at Chappelle’s party– and it turns out to be one of the highlights of the show.

Call these the words of someone who does not keep up with that hip hoppin’ stuff that the kids are so into, but the movie would have been a hell of a lot more entertaining if Chappelle had more screen time. Well, let’s qualify that a bit: the backstage banter in all shapes and forms, from house band leader ?uestlove Thompson to Jill Scott to the startling moment where Erykah Badu just rips it all off (that will make sense when you see it), is far more interesting than the show itself. The only time the show upstages the offstage/backstage banter is when Chappelle pulls a wannabe MC out of the audience, only to discover that the guy’s skills, as it were, are rudimentary at best. There is also Chappelle’s hilarious bit as a beatnik on the bongos, as well as his attempt to run the band like he’s James Brown, but the less I say about those things, the better. In fairness, Chappelle is funny wherever he is. Everyone else is much more interesting offstage, where the viewer can get a glimpse into their souls, rather than simply seeing the “entertainers” the public sees when they are performing.

Fans of Chappelle will find lots to like about “Dave Chappelle’s Block Party,” while fans of Common, Kanye, et al will probably wish that those guys got more face time. It’s a tough line to straddle, and French director Michel Gondry (“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” of all things) does not seem like the first choice for this movie, since he’s never done made a movie like this before and may never make one again. But Gondry, like all good directors, has an uncanny sense for what works, and for the most part, he gets it right. It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey, and while this is one of those movies that could have benefited from more journey and less destination, it still winds up in a happy place either way.

usr 3.5]

Someone out there is going to use the phrase “the thinking man’s ‘Ring’” to describe “Dark Water,” the latest Japanese horror flick to get an American makeover. And it would not be at all cliché to do so. Indeed, “Dark Water” is less a horror movie than a psychological thriller, focusing on how the ghosts of our past haunt us more than any floating creepy crawlies ever could. It uses more of “The Ring’s” story structure than it probably should, Faustian deal and all (both “Ring” movies and “Dark Water” share writer/director Hideo Nakata), but “Dark Water” plunges far deeper into its characters and their histories, and as a result its payoff is more rewarding.

Jennifer Connelly is Dahlia, a recently divorced mom who’s undergoing a nasty custody battle with her ex-husband Kyle (Dougray Scott) over their daughter Ceci (Ariel Gade). In an attempt to thwart Kyle’s efforts to move all of them to Jersey City, Dahlia takes an apartment in a run-down building on Roosevelt Island. Things slowly start to unravel when water begins to drip into the bedroom from the apartment above them, which confuses both building manager Mr. Murray (John C. Reilly) and superintendent Veeck (Pete Postlethwaite), since the family living above them have been out of the country for months. As Dahlia learns more about the residents of the vacant apartment, she starts questioning her own sanity as well as that of Ceci, who has a new imaginary friend that knows things she shouldn’t know.

There are many refreshing aspects to “Dark Water,” but perhaps the most pleasant one is the near absence of special effects. Director Walter Salles (“The Station Agent,” “The Motorcycle Diaries”) wisely stays out of the way, allowing the story to tell itself without any fancy gimmickry or cheap “boo” jumps. If he uses anything, it’s the contrast of shadows and light to create an unsettled mood, which suits the material perfectly. The script, adapted by Rafael Yglesias (“Fearless,” “Death and the Maiden”), is well balanced, exposing Dahlia’s flaws but preventing her from looking like a loon, while at the same time peeking into the darker sides of everyone around her, even those trying to help her.

Connelly is fascinating to watch here. Dahlia knows her weaknesses better than anyone, and watching her deal with how things are versus how things appear versus what she’s afraid is about to happen is heartbreaking. Gade, unfortunately, doesn’t fare as well. Ceci’s sudden insistence that Dahlia take the apartment, coming on the heels of her begging to leave at once, could have used another take. Postlethwaite’s nonexistent accent needed work, too. Truth be told, this is Connelly’s movie, and everyone else, from Reilly’s nice-but-creepy Murray to Tim Roth’s perpetually on the go lawyer Platzer, exists solely to assist or prevent Dahlia’s slow descent into madness.

Smart movies have not done well so far this summer (see “Cinderella Man,” or do what the rest of the country did and skip it), but to be fair, the dumb ones haven’t done so well, either. Touchstone would be wise to position “Dark Water” as a movie more akin to “The Others” than “The Ring,” if it hopes to find the audience the movie deserves.

[ust 3.5]

There are two star ratings for this one. I went back and watched it a second time, and felt the need to address a couple of things.

That gale-force wind blowing outside your window is merely Christopher Nolan letting out a sigh of relief now that he’s officially finished with the “Batman” franchise. He has dealt with – and exceeded – unreasonable expectations from the moment he signed on to direct 2005’s “Batman Begins,” so you have to think that he is ecstatic to be moving on. Indeed, it appears that Nolan himself knew when he began work on “The Dark Knight Rises” that there was no way that he could one-up the relentless thrillfest that is “The Dark Knight,” so this time, he didn’t even try; instead, he chose to make a Big Statement about society as a whole, and shoehorned Bruce Wayne and friends into it. He may have stuck the landing – and he did – but it comes at the end of a very, very long routine. By the time it arrives, the audience is exhausted from watching. And not in a good way, like it was at the end of “The Dark Knight.”

Eight years after Batman took the fall for the crimes committed by former do-gooder district attorney Harvey “Two Face” Dent, Gotham is still enjoying a relatively crime-free existence, though the truth about that night’s events still eats at police commissioner Gordon (Gary Oldman). Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale), meanwhile, has become a recluse now that the city no longer needs his alter ego, and Wayne Enterprises has suffered greatly as a result. Bruce abruptly finds himself back in the game, though, when a cat burglar named Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) nicks some valuables from one of Bruce’s vaults. Selina doesn’t realize at the time that her job was a small part of a much larger plan devised by bulked up terrorist Bane (Tom Hardy) to destroy the city in general, and Bruce in particular.

Most movies have a ‘B’ story that goes side by side with the ‘A’ story, but “The Dark Knight Rises” has an entire alphabet’s worth of sub-stories. Along with Selina and Bane, there is Bruce’s relationship with lifelong butler Alfred (Michael Caine), Jim Gordon’s guilt, righteous policeman John Blake’s (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) frustration with the force’s lack of results, and the blossoming love affair between Bruce and environmental rights activist Miranda Tate (Marion Cotillard). That makes for a lot of plot, which is compounded when one of the characters receives an origin story to boot. And yet, while the movie would have greatly benefited from a shorter running time, it’s difficult to say what, if anything, should be removed. Everyone plays a vital role in the end, and to diminish their screen time in any way would jeopardize the impact of the third act.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about “The Dark Knight Rises” is how unsurprising it is. Nolan usually has three or four tricks up his sleeve when shooting a film, but this time around, he has one, and the studio used it in the very first trailer cut for the film (the football stadium scene). He did add a new wrinkle with the Bat Bike, but there really isn’t anything here that Nolan didn’t do better in his first two “Batman” films (the flipped semi truck, the train crash, the hospital, etc.). It’s as carefully considered and well executed as those movies, but it’s all been done.

Sad to say, the acting follows suit, even with four Oscar winners in the cast. Bale is, well, Bale as Bruce Wayne, and Anne Hathaway was an inspired choice to play Selina Kyle (she’s a high-stakes grifter as opposed to Michelle Pfeiffer’s spurned secretary), but Gordon-Levitt is given very little to do as the impatient Blake, and Tom Hardy has to act with his mouth covered, which makes it difficult to do much acting. Matthew Modine, meanwhile, is pretty awful as a complacent lieutenant. It’s tempting to talk about Marion Cotillard, but…no.

“The Dark Knight Rises” is arguably Christopher Nolan’s weakest movie, but let’s put that in perspective: it’s still better than the best “Transformers” movie, and for all of the things that don’t work, give Nolan credit for not taking the easy way out. He aimed for something big, and that’s good; unfortunately for him, he bit off more than he could chew.

P.S. I watched “The Dark Knight Rises” a second time, and it’s funny how much different the movie felt from the very beginning, once I knew where it was going and how it was going to get there. People who write about music don’t write their reviews based on one listen; they’re allowed to absorb the album and get to know it on an intimate level. People who write about movies, on the other hand, tend to regurgitate rather than absorb. We get one shot at forming what we hope will be an opinion that we can live with for the rest of our lives. This is one instance where I will readily admit that I didn’t get it quite right the first time.

This is not to say that the movie is a masterwork – Nolan leans on some plot devices that border on hoary, it could have benefited from some nips and tucks in the run time, and Bane is simply not as interesting of a character as the Joker – but take a step back, and the movie makes more sense. To those who saw “The Dark Knight Rises” and were disappointed, I say: I get it. But before you run to Twitter about how it’s the worst movie ever (it’s not, by the way), consider giving it a second chance. If anyone has earned that, it’s Christopher Nolan.