Batman : The Dark Knight Blog

Archive for July, 2008

Scorpion fighting Superman? Sub-Zero battling Batman? Really? Really? Yes, really, it turns out.

There are plenty of reasons to be skeptical “Mortal Kombat” co-creator Ed Boon and his team at Midway would properly harness DC Comic’s greatest heroes (and villains) for a crossover game, but my time spent with “Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe” washed away most of those.

It’s an addictive, deceptively simple fighter, where a seasoned “Mortal Kombat” player (read: me) can pair with someone who’s never played — and lose.

I still don’t know the story reasons for why Superman can’t crush Sonya Blade by blinking, but it’s largely irrelevant. All of the characters are mostly on the same level power-wise and that makes for some fantastically fun dynamics. It’s extremely satisfying to toss Scorpion’s spear into Batman’s chest and yell “Get over here,” even if it doesn’t make a lot of sense. You just have to roll with it.

Unlike “Tekken” or “Virtua Fighter,” you don’t need to learn a specific character in “Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.” Most moves are pulled off with the traditional down-to-forward motion combined with a face button. This has been a “Mortal Kombat” staple and it clicks better than ever in this environment. There are, obviously, more complicated moves to discover, but you don’t want to spend hours learning and re-learning each character here; you just want to jump in.

This isn’t a fighting game made for frame-by-frame fighting fans. There are mechanics in place for those hoping for something a little deeper, though. For example, during Scorpion’s teleport punch move, if you time presses correctly, he can execute up to three punches in a row. The additional damage isn’t punishing, though, meaning an expert player isn’t going to take out a novice with a few well-placed blows.

Perhaps most telling, however, was the response at Midway’s own party at Comic-Con. More often than not, attendees are more interested in the open bar than touching a game kiosk. And while, yes, the bar was expectedly packed, so were the many game kiosks. It’s clear this is a game made for a party atmosphere and group play. Smack talking is a must, and there was plenty of it.

So far, this is shaping up to be a game pleasing for “Mortal Kombat” die-hards (those who can look past the lack of spinal finishers) and comic fans pining for an opportunity to pit their favorite heroes and villains against one another. I’ve already started bugging Midway for another chance to play.

Imax has been “this close” to breaking big on the film exhibition scene, well, seemingly forever. So it might ring a bit hollow when executives predict that favourable publicity from Imax’s role in the record success of The Dark Knight will prove to be a watershed for the giant-screen vendor. “This is a game-changer for us,” Imax Filmed Entertainment president Greg Foster said.
The claim – made in the heady afterglow of Warner Bros.’ record bow of its latest Batman sequel – is similar to sentiments expressed by Imax executives at various points in recent years, when Hollywood films like The Matrix and other big commercial releases started hitting giant-screen venues at the same time as conventional theatres. Yet for all that hype, Imax’s usable base of commercially viable screens has yet to hit triple digits domestically.
So why might success with Dark Knight finally push Imax into the exhibition mainstream? Two big reasons, potentially:
*The $158.4 million opening for the latest Batman sequel featured $6.2 million from just 94 Imax screens, or a mind-numbing $67,000 per venue.
*The unprecedented giant-screen grosses arrive just as the company is making a big push into digital exhibition.
The latter point is particularly important. The digital push is lowering exhibitors’ costs on Imax equipment for prospective partnerships — from $1 million-plus per installation to about $150,000. Building upon favourable publicity from its Dark Knight success, Imax hopes to have a much larger installed base of giant screens soon. It also will help Imax participate more aggressively in the spreading 3-D mania.
The Warners-distributed adventure film Journey To The Center Of The Earth enjoyed a much better market “hold” this weekend than other holdover titles, primarily because its hundreds of 3-D screens bolstered its overall weekend gross. All of the film’s 3-D screens were installed by RealD, a vendor of digital 3-D systems.

EXPANDING THE NETWORK
Forty-year-old Toronto-based Imax operates 160 screens in North America. But many of its screens are in institutional venues considered inadequate to needs of commercial releases, so Warners was limited to 94 venues for Dark Knight. In keeping with the exclusive, high-end premise it offers moviegoers, Imax probably will never see its domestic screen count hit 1,000. But executives hope to supplement its current inventory with at least 200 new screens within two years and expect to have about 40 new domestic screens and 10 overseas installations up and running by year’s end. “Within a two-year period, we’re going to go from 160 worldwide to at least 360,” Foster said. “And my guess is it’s going to be more. My phones are ringing like you can’t imagine.” Even if Imax’s new installations roll out at the lower end of expectations, Warners should be able to show its sixth Harry Potter movie on about 130 or more Imax screens in November. “I’m thrilled for the success in Imax,” Warners domestic distribution president Dan Fellman said. “We’ve come a long way together and it doesn’t get any better than this. They’ve been able to create a very prestigious branding of their product, which has helped to eventise our films, not only with our consumers but with our filmmakers as well.”
Imax auditoriums appear likely to do land-office business for weeks with Dark Knight, whose director, Christopher Nolan, shot 30 minutes of the 2 1/2-hour film using an Imax camera to add to its giant-screen impact. The Christian Bale starrer is largely sold out on its Imax screens through its second weekend, though exhibitors have been getting creative in shoehorning in additional showtimes in some venues, Foster said.

TOKYO (Reuters) – Christopher Nolan, director of the new Batman sequel “The Dark Knight,” said on Tuesday even he was surprised at the film’s box office success which has shattered records in North American theatres.

Batman buried his rivals at the North American box office for a second weekend on Sunday, racing past $300 million in a record 10 days, distributor Warner Bros. Pictures said.

“When you do a film of this scale, you are certainly hoping to reach a large number of people. But I think we all have been completely taken by surprise by the scale of the film’s success in America particularly,” Nolan told reporters in Tokyo.

“I would not be able to point to exactly what it is … If I knew that all my films would have been successful,” he added at the event to promote the film, which opens in theatres across Japan on August 9.

A week after it scored a record breaking $158 million opening, “The Dark Knight” added a new title to its list of superlatives: the best second weekend, passing the holiday-boosted $72 million haul of 2004’s “Shrek 2.”

Just six days after its release in North America, the film had grossed more domestically than its predecessor, “Batman Begins,” did in its entire run, according to studio Warner Bros, which is owned by Time Warner Inc.

English filmmaker Nolan had also directed 2005’s “Batman Begins.”

The $180 million “The Dark Knight,” which stars Christian Bale as Batman and late actor Heath Ledger as the Joker, is reportedly drawing strong repeat business.

(Reporting by Chika Osaka, writing by Miral Fahmy, editing by Mike Collett-White)

‘The Dark Knight’ has been voted as the best movie of all-time on popular website Internet Movie Database’s (IMDb) list of the top 250 movies of all time.

Even though it has only been on release for one week in Australia and the US, the Batman sequel has taken the number one slot from ‘The Godfather’, which previously held the position since the late Nineties.

Positioning on the chart is decided by average ratings from public votes. ‘The Dark Knight’ has a rating of 9.4 out of 10, with around 115,000 votes registered. It beats ‘The Godfather’s rating of 9.1.
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The next highest-placed movie on the list from this century is ‘The Lord of The Rings: The Return of The King’, which is at number 14 in the chart.

So much for Christian Bale’s family feud getting in the way. The survey says: The Dark Knight will likely break even more box-office records its second weekend in North America.

And that’s despite the infamous squabble over money with his mother Jenny, 61, and sister Sharon, 41, at a London hotel Sunday that eventually led to his arrest and became front page news around the world. Released on bail for suspicion of two minor common verbal assaults, the former child actor has been allowed to travel and will return to his home in the U. S. before his September court appearance in London.

Back at the dream factory, The Dark Knight has already set a record for highest first-weekend total with a grab of more than $158.4 million, flashing by the former champion: Spider-Man 3, which was released last year.

Bale’s dark night notwithstanding, the Caped Crusader will probably also swing by the second week top spot holder: the $72.2 million set by Shrek 2 in 2004.

Bale hasn’t addressed the accusations or explained the incident that occurred Sunday other than calling it “a deeply personal matter”. Most reports suggest there has been turmoil between the three of them since Bale’s father, Dave (who died in 2003) divorced Bale’s mother over two decades ago. That was around the time Bale made his movie breakthrough at 13, starring in Steven Spielberg’s Empire Of The Sun. His father accompanied him to L. A. for the filming.

Whether The Dark Knight will suffer in box-office from his faulty family reunion is up in the air. But most experts think there will be little impact now that the assault seems far less serious than originally speculated.

In North America, The Dark Knight’s only challenger this weekend is The X-Files: I Want To Believe. The second film based on the award-winning series is expected to rake in about $45 million, not even close to Batman’s second go-round, which should put it in some high-profile blockbuster box office territory.

Besides Shrek 2 at $72.2. million, there is Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest at $62.3 million. Next is Spider-Man 3 at $58.2 and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone at $57.5 million.

– Bob Thompson

[Christian Bale (L), Maggie Gyllenhaal (C) and Aaron Eckhart pose during a photocall for "The Dark Knight" film in Barcelona July 23, 2008. Credit: Gustau Nacarino/Reuters]

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“The Dark Knight” earned an estimated $18.5 million in gross revenue at its 12 a.m. opening screenings early Friday morning at 3,040 screens, the most ever for midnight shows, The Associated Press reported. The film, directed by Christopher Nolan, moved ahead of the previous record set in 2005 by “Star Wars, Episode III: The Revenge of the Sith,” which took in $16.9 million at 2,915 screens. Warner Brothers reported that the $18.5 million did not include revenue from subsequent 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. screenings.

JULIE BLOOM

It’s Warner Bros.’ weekend as The Dark Knight sets its series of box office records. So there’s no better time to sync up a little cross-media hype for the studio’s next super hero/graphic novel blockbuster, Watchmen.

The first of the animated webisodes is online now at EW.com or via iTunes. Fans can also sign up there to stay up on when subsequent episodes appear.

Warner Bros.’ big Watchmen sneak peek arrangement with EW.com also rendered a new batch of photos, including the hot Rorschach image above.

As for the production, the latest news remains Zack Snyder’s ongoing battle to trim down his current 3+ hour cut at the studio’s behest.

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Coincidence or art imitating life? The slow downward spiral towards fascism grabs some fast momentum with a bit of slight-of-hand propaganda from the new Batman movie, ‘Dark Knight.’ The recent push towards open martial law in Chicago is an eerie reflection of the Dark Knight production, which filmed many of its Gotham scenes in downtown Chicago last summer. In the film, the Joker (Heath Ledger) creates so much chaos and violence that the National Guard (Gotham National Guard) is brought in to suppress riots and restore order. During filming, extras were dressed up as national guard troops were seen by many Chicago natives acting in scenes and also providing ’security’ for the civilian extras during takes. Military helicopters, armored vehicles and hundreds of uniformed extras maneuvered in downtown Chicago for several days while their scenes were filmed, creating the atmosphere, albeit a fictional one, of open martial law and military code of conduct for all citizens.

One scene is described below:

‘The scene was an evacuation scene where pedestrians and prisoners were being evacuated from Gotham City. There were two bridges the pedestrians would be crossing.

The one on the left was for the National Guard and pedestrians. The bridge on the right is where the action took place.

The premise of the scene was for the pedestrians to be crossing when all of a sudden the National Guard and Gotham City Deparrment of Corrections officers move in. They create a wall to allow the prisoners to board the boat ahead of the pedestrians.

And another, this one from someone who witnessed some of the filming during the Chicago production.

After the interviews, we moved to a corner space in the building with huge windows so we could watch Chris direct a spectacular scene: Two National Guard helicopters carrying troops flying so low and close together over the Chicago River. Extras dressed as rifle-carrying National Guard troops were down on the streets.’

And now, a short one year later, we have the governor of Chicago calling for national guardsmen to be used to suppress violence and crime in the windy city.

‘The summer of 2008 will be remembered as especially violent. Blagojevich said there’s been a child shot nearly every day since June 26. Bringing in state troopers — even National Guard helicopters to high-crime areas — is still very much in the planning stages.

While real world crime rates don’t move and flow with the production of Hollywood movies, it seems odd that things would get so out of control in a city where only a year earlier the Joker was rampaging and causing all kinds of anarchy.

“It might be able to free up some resources that the Chicago police uses for capital needs, to be able, to maybe to, hire more police officers, or possibly ask some to come out of retirement, to put them into these violent zones, hot zones, where, clearly, I think, part of the challenge is that gangbangers outnumber police officers five to one,” Blagojevich said.’

While real world crime rates don’t move and flow with the production of Hollywood movies, it seems odd that things would get so out of control in a city where only a year earlier the Joker was rampaging and causing all kinds of anarchy. Be it a Batman super villain or crips and bloods, the order out of chaos formula is in full effect. The image of troops goose stepping through the streets in Chicago was the scene of a major motion picture production, and now it will soon be in real time. Boots on the ground, in your face fascism is coming to a city near you, brought to you by the Pentagon planners and a few friendly Hollywood movies. What was fantasy is now reality, only we don’t have a real Batman to help us.

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By Alex Dobuzinskis

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Batman movie “The Dark Knight” should soar into the box office stratosphere with its U.S. debut in a record number of theaters on Friday that could propel it past the $100 million mark on its opening weekend, industry watchers said.

Topping that blockbuster figure would push “Dark Knight” into rare air seen by only 10 other wide-release movies including “Spider-Man 3″ and “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.”

Already, advance ticket sales have resulted in the sell-out of nearly 1,000 showtimes, online ticket seller Fandango said.

“It’s been a true phenomenon for us, we started to see interest as early as last year for this film,” said Rick Butler, chief operating officer for Fandango.

Warner Bros., the unit of Time Warner Inc that is releasing “Dark Knight,” said it will debut in 4,366 theaters, edging out the record of 4,362 theaters set by “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” with its 2007 opening. That movie raked in about $115 million on its debut weekend.

“Dark Knight” will hope to beat the record debut of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s “Spider-Man 3″ in 2007, which reached $151 million. Sony Pictures is part of Japanese electronics company Sony Corp.

In the No. 2 spot is the $135.6 million debut for 2006’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest,” released by the film division of The Walt Disney Co.

“Certainly a $100-plus million opening weekend is in the cards,” said Paul Dergarabedian, who heads box office tracker Media by Numbers. “I cannot imagine a movie that has been more highly anticipated than this one, at least in recent memory.”

Generally speaking, fans and critics who have seen the film in advance are giving it rave reviews especially for the performance of Heath Ledger as the deranged villain, The Joker.

On rottentomatoes.com, which aggregates reviews, “Dark Knight” has received a 91 percent positive rating.

Critics say the latest movie in the Batman series is a thrilling depiction of good versus evil, picking up where 2005’s “Batman Begins” left off.

That film was a smash hit with a worldwide gross of just about $372 million, after opening to roughly $49 million in the United States and Canada.

“Batman Begins” reshaped the series of films by going back to the character’s origins, after the critical failure of 1997’s “Batman & Robin,” the fourth installment in a series that began with director Tim Burton’s 1989 “Batman.”

“The Dark Knight” stars Christian Bale as Batman, and was directed by Christopher Nolan who made “Batman Begins.”

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis: Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)

Not that it matters of course, when it comes to a pop-culture tsunami like “The Dark Knight,” but so far most of America’s much-maligned film critics have embraced the Christopher Nolan-directed film, which is due to set all sorts of obscure box-office records this weekend. (Is there, for example, a record for biggest July opening during a presidential campaign year?) But there’s always a skunk at every wedding. When it comes to “Dark Knight” fans, the skunk is New York magazine critic David Edelstein, who had the temerity to slag off the new Batman film, calling it “noisy, jumbled and sadistic.”

And that was just the beginning: Edelstein hooted at the action scenes (“spectacularly incoherent”), the director (“Nolan appears to have no clue how to stage or shoot action”) and the movie in general (“it’s all fits and starts, fitfully suspenseful, fitfully scary… with jolts of brutality to keep you revved up”). “Dark Knight” loyalists did not take this lying down. Edelstein has been bombarded with so much e-mail abuse since his review posted that he felt obligated to respond to the vitriol. (The New Yorker’s David Denby didn’t like the movie much either, but he’s somehow escaped being tarred and feathered by the angry mob, perhaps because everyone was more enraged by the Obama cartoon on the cover of this week’s magazine.)

I’m not going to get in the middle of this maelstrom, since sadly, I’m such a cultural slacker that I haven’t seen the movie yet. But I feel a pang of sympathy for Edelstein, who notes that the Batman fanboys seem to want to have it both ways–calling him a snob for taking the movie seriously, then mocking his pretentiousness for offering more than a “Wow!” as a critical response. The ranting and name-calling all takes us back to the primal question of today’s moviegoing age: Do critics still matter?

You should read Edelstein’s entire response, but here, in a nutshell, is his argument, which is worth pondering:

“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.’ ”

At midnight, it comes. With expectations fueled by hundreds of advance sellouts, glorious reviews and Oscar buzz.

The Dark Knight, box-office experts say assuredly, is a $100 million opening-weekend lock—a feat requiring a take of at least $1.4 million every hour for 72 straight hours, a feat accomplished by only 10 movies in Hollywood history.

So far.

“It’s just a ripped movie,” says Media by the Numbers’s Paul Dergarabedian of the latest Batman adventure. “It’s not just a superhero movie. It is a crime epic…It kind of transcends that superhero moniker.”

The follow-up to Christopher Nolan’s franchise restarter, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight returns Christian Bale to Gotham City and casts Heath Ledger as the Joker, a performance, the late actor’s last, that is already inspiring Oscar odds. Reviews have been, with few exceptions, raves.

As of today, Fandango said, The Dark Knight was accounting for 94 percent of all its ticket sales. At MovieTickets.com, another online service, the movie was selling tickets at twice the rate of Spider-Man 3, Hollywood’s reigning opening weekend champ.

Warner Bros. is giving The Dark Knight every chance to beat Spider-Man 3: It’s opening the film at 4,366 theaters, Exhibitor Relations Co. said today, the widest of wide releases ever.

“It’s got the room to be a possible record breaker,” says the box-office tracking firm’s Chad Hartigan.

It’ll also have the time. The movie will maximize its opening day by opening at midnight tonight at about 75 percent of its theaters, Hartigan says. From 1:15 a.m. to 9:15 a.m. Friday, there’ll be some 500 Dark Knight screenings nationwide, per Fandango, a handful of which will occur at the previously noted but still eye-opening hour of 6 a.m.

Add it all up, and, perhaps surprisingly, box-office observers expect that come Sunday Spider-Man 3 will still be on top, its record $151.1 million, Friday-Sunday record still intact.

For one main thing, Spider-Man 3, unlike The Dark Knight, opened in early May. Like Iron Man this year, that 2007 movie had nothing but a clear running field in front of it. The Dark Knight, by comparison, is a latecomer, arriving at the beach after some of the choice spots have been hogged by hits such as Hancock and WALL-E.

“Spider-Man 3 is probably out of reach,” Hartigan says.

Hartigan thinks The Dark Knight could open in the neighborhood of $125 million, putting it at third all-time. Likewise, Box Office Guru’s Gitesh Pandya is looking for an opening of $120 million-plus.

But Spider-Man shouldn’t get too comfortable. Another of the Webslinger’s records could be in play.

Currently, Spider-Man 3 boasts Hollywood’s biggest single-day gross, with $59.8 million, per Box Office Mojo stats. Enter The Dark Knight, primed for a potentially unprecedented Friday, with the round-the-clock screenings, the sellouts (270-plus recorded by MovieTickets.com alone), and this: a stat from Fandago that says 38 percent of Dark Knight fans will “take off a few hours or the entire day” on Friday to catch the movie.

Regardless of how the movie opens, The Dark Knight is not expected to close anytime soon.

“I think The Dark Knight is going to have legs,” Dergarabedian says. “It totally deserves it, and it’s going to generate terrific word of mouth.”

The HBO First Look special on The Dark Knight has landed onto YouTube in two segments that we have below for you to watch, along with a new car chase clip from MTV. Check out the clips below

HBO First Look Part #1

HBO First Look Part #2

The buzz surrounding “The Dark Knight” has become so intense that theaters in the Bay Area and throughout the country are scheduling midnight showings for Thursday and morning screening for Friday.

In some cities, the first screenings of the film are already sold out – particularly at theaters showing a special Imax version of the movie.

All the South Bay multiplexes showing “Dark Knight” have now scheduled midnight shows and are prepared to add overnight shows if there is sufficient demand.

In addition, some theaters that don’t normally open their doors until early afternoon on weekdays have added morning shows on Friday.

South Bay filmgoers who want to see “Dark Knight” in the Imax format will have to truck on up the road to the AMC Loews Metreon 16 in San Francisco. It has early screenings at midnight Thursday and 3:30 a.m. Friday.