With all the breathless adulation for “The Dark Knight” all over the Internet via critics, bloggers, geeks and essentially everyone, you’d think one or two dissenting voices wouldn’t be a big deal or make any kind of chinks in the seemingly unassailable armor.
Unfortunately this rational doesn’t consider the delusional feelings and emotions of irrational geeks and “Dark Knight” enthusiasts that believe this film is the second coming of Christ and as good as “Citizen Kane” if not better.
One of the first voices to showcase the audacity of dissent about the Christopher Nolan-directed film was New York magazine critic David Edelstein as we noted at the beginning of this week. Had anyone cared to carefully examine his piece, they’d find that while he didn’t like the film overall, he didn’t exactly savage it with exacting contempt either and everything he wrote was a fair and critical assessments in the appropriate manner any critic should analyse a film (“Nolan appears to have no clue how to stage or shoot action,” is not a criticism without merit and it’s also not the first time it’s been said).
The only thing we took slight issue was with the fact he called it “sadistic.” The film is PG13 and not that brutal by any means (though it is psychologically grueling, maybe it’s a verbiage quibble). Other comic book films have been skewered far deeper and censured far worse, but this is Batman we’re talking about and a flick that the dorks are pretty much unanimous about in their gushing praise, even though most of them have even yet to see it (ah, the geeks, you gotta love them).
Fans made an uproar about Edelstein’s “negative” review and the vituperatives on the web started to fly like molotov cocktails lobbied in a all-out street riot. As the L.A. Times notes, the NYMag reviewer has been carpetbombed with so much mob-mentality hatemail he’s actually had to take to his Projectionist blog to defend himself (or least have a laugh about it all).
The most amusing point is the flat-out sycophants. “99 percent of these attacks have come from people who haven’t seen the movie,” Edelstein writes. “Which is not to say they won’t love it, having so much emotional energy invested in its greatness.”
He also reminds the dorks living in their mothers’ basement about some of the other embarrassing causes they once fought for. “It took awhile for the fanboys to come around to the consensus that ‘The Phantom Menace’ was inept — I got death wishes for that review, too” (seriously, where are those guys now?)
Another hilarious attack on the critic is one that says he’s “an idiot trying to make a name for himself” and get “hits for his site” (ridiculous assertions). As noted by us and the L.A. Times, both the New Yorker and Time Out New York, didn’t much like the film either, but they eluded the mob simply because they weren’t their first. Hell, even Vulture is avoiding this discussion since they’re blog has been 24-7 ‘Dark Knight’ coverage of late (they probably don’t want to get caught in that kind of sticky cross-fire).
The L.A. Times blog points out the meat of Edelstein’s piece and it’s a salient and well-thought out.
“There has been a lot of chatter in the last few years that criticism is a dying profession, having been supplanted by the democratic voices of the Web. Not to get all Lee Siegel on you, but the Internet has a mob mentality that can overwhelm serious criticism. There is superb writing in blogs and discussion groups … but there are also thousands of semi-literate tirades that actually reinforce the Hollywood status quo, that say: ‘If you do not like “The Dark Knight,'” you should be fired because you do not speak for the people.’ Well, the people don’t need to be spoken for. And a critic’s job is not only to steer you to movies you might not have heard of or that died at the box-office. It’s also to bring a different, much-needed perspective on blockbusters like ‘The Dark Knight.’ ”
Amen, brother. God, the whole thing is rather sad and pathetic. And frankly, most of the movie blogs do little too dissuade the opinions that they’re semi-coherent lunkheads, let alone the chuckleheads on message boards. Hey man, if the shoe fits… Thank god these yucks aren’t Republicans or give a shit about anything outside of getting fantasy land correct on film otherwise the world would be a frightening place. Could you imagine if these guys we’re as pro Iraq War as they were Batman? *Shudder*.
Meanwhile, the Box-Office Derby at Box-Office Mojo is predicting the “The Dark Knight” will take in $137.0 million this weekend. That’s definitely a reasonable number (our initial guess was around $120-125) and those guys are usually within the ball park, but this weekend could be anyone’s guess as obviously all rational thought has been thrown out the window this week (and we must admit we have a lot of disdain for the numbers game that people are obsessed with here, move on, Christ).
For the record, we thought “The Dark Knight” was quite impressive, but it’s not without its flaws (the case for Aaron Eckhart? He’s not that good), nor will it resonate in any major way in the long term. A fantastic comic book movie? Without a doubt. A masterpiece? Keep your pants on, children.
