'The Dark Knight': Take 2
I wasn’t blown away by ‘The Dark Knight.’ Period. I wanted to be. So badly. But I couldn’t help but walk out of the theater with a list of things they could/should have done differently. And it makes me think something is wrong with me that all the reviews I’ve read are nothing short of stellar, and people I have talked to have said things like, “There is not one thing I would change about this film.”
So the question remains: is there something wrong with me, or with all of you? In my head, I can’t decide whether people are just getting caught up in the hype, making them ignore the movie’s flaws, or whether the conditions in which I saw the movie for the first time took away from the experience. Let me explain:
A few months ago, I saw a poster for the movie advertising it at an IMAX theater. I thought it would be a great way to see a movie my friends and I were anticipating, watching it on a huge screen, making it that much more exciting. When we all decided this would be the way to go, however, all the pre-movie buzz had led to most showings being sold out, with the only screening on opening night that still had seats was the 1:15am showing. We said screw it, it will still be awesome, and bought the tickets.
So I had my typical Friday, worked late, picked up Erin, and went to Gish’s house for some food and a little movie talk. We got to the theater around 12:15, stood in line with some real nerds (some dressed up as the Joker,) and waited to be let in. Now even though I was excited, you can’t help but be a little sleepy knowing you are gonna end up being awake for 22 hours.Finally the line started to move, and the adrenaline started coursing through our veins.
This, however, was when things got bad. As we are inclined to do, we tried for the absolute best seats in the house, despite there being maybe 150 people in front of us. As we’re rushing up the long walkway up to the top of the theater, I start to panic. I try to find any row of four seats that was available. I was told, “No!” by my group, and we tried to find seats at the top. I’m still jumping around in the aisles, many times walking on the seats themselves to secure a good spot. Alas, we finally reached the top of the theater with no spots open.
As we headed back down the opposite way, we knew we screwed up royally. I start to get desperate, looking for any open spots that had so one sitting there, loudly airing my displeasure with those who had a purse or extra coat tossed into an open seat (I mean, shit, these are battle conditions!) Finally, with no where left to turn, we end up about 7 rows from the bottom. We grudingly took our seats, as I looked around fuming at the other moviegoers, angry we got so royally screwed.
I don’t think we realized how bad our seats we’re until the movie started. You see, an IMAX screen is curved, so its like your watching a movie on the inside of a basketball; if you’re sitting eye-level with the focal point of the screen, I’m sure it’s a great experience. But if you’re sitting in the bottom left hand corner, all the images on the screen are going to look stretched out and distorted. Plus it didn’t help that some kid (whom I named Rosacea Face) kept banging his FUCKING KNEES IN OUR SEATS EVERY TIME HE WALKED DOWN THE AISLE!!!!! If you’re gonna have a weak bladder, but down the fucking Mountain Dew and sit on the end!!!! If you bang your knobby knees into my head rest one more time, I am gonna just snap!!!
The only things that really looked nice were the huge landscape, IMAX-specialized shots. Those really did look nice and made you feel like you were in the movie. Otherwise though, it left a lot to be desired.
This is why I will be going to see the movie AGAIN this afternoon. After that, I will post my review. This was more just a gripe about what happened to us when we saw it, and a possible reason why I didn’t absolutely LOVE the movie like everyone else apparently did.
And as we walked out of the theater, depressed we had aimed to such great heights for the best seats in the house, I couldn’t help but be remined of this quote by George Costanza…
“I got greedy. I flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami….”
