Culturally Preconditioned

I’m a pessimist.I’ll be the first one to admit that. I mean, why fucking not. if the worst that I was anticipating turned out to be true, I could go “Pftt I knew it.” Or better yet “I told you so”. But when things actually turns up better than I was expecting, well.. there’s no denying that it’s always nice when that happens - As opposed to being optimistic, where one is almost always get turned down when things don’t go their way. You set such a high expectation, then you get burned down. Setting yourself for a big let down. Why would you do that to yourself? That’s just sadistic. Optimistic? Nah, I probably wont describe myself as that. Pessimistic is the way to go. It’s a win-win situation. You cannot lose.

Being a pessimistic was fun this week. I received a phone call from this random girl on Monday. This was similar to a phone call I received last year. I almost brushed the caller off because I thought she was trying to sell me insurance. Turned out I won the grand prize of having the Meet and Greet session with the cast of Heroes in Singapore. Well, this girl on Monday turned out to be the fantabulous Suanie who told me that the haiku I wrote just won me a ticket for the premier of The Dark Knight  (sponsored by Nokia). Whenever I enter a competition, I am almost always positive that I’m not going to win. That way, you don’t set yourself up for a huge let down when you don’t. So it’s always a pleasant surprise when you find out you actually won. Again, this is opposed to entering some contest and hoping so bad that you’re going to win. But then you don’t. It happens 90% of the time. Why do so many people conveniently keep forgetting this fact? I’m not bragging (even tho I just won a Canon competition last week - LOLlers), I’m just saying being a pessimist is not a bad thing at all.

In fact, the haiku that I wrote too contains elements of pessimisms :

an ode to joker-san

world is now buzzing
an Oscar coming your way
even tho yo dead

I wrote that in jest, of course. What I really meant to say was “only because” and not “even tho”. Truth be told, I did not get the overhype over all the Oscar buzz. I did not think Heath ledger was a brilliant actor worthy of even a mention (I thought his role in brokeback was so fucking overrated - I swear I see a lot more emotions from the guys at menatplay.com). The haiku was drenched with sarcasm, whether you noticed it or not. I was more than convinced that the buzz was only because its the kind of the normal fabricated Hollywood fairytale. “ooh what a powerful performance before the final curtain drew on him yada yada yada.” I was convinced. And last night.. well I had never been more glad that I was a pessimist.

Heath Ledger fucking pwned it. Full stop.

The preview was fun. It was one of those hush hush restricted private viewings that had RELA members frisking you and scanning you with metal detectors to ensure that you’re not trying to take recordings of the movie. There were the media folks as well bloggers. Some new faces (lainie and tiffany among others), some really old faces. One face in particular face in particular, won the brand new Nokia phone for dressing up as a pretty convincing Joker - I had the privilege - or some may say, disadvantage, of sitting next to Klubkidd (the lucky bitch who won the phone) in the cinemas (where we almost resorted to some x-rated lesbionic actions).

It’s been ages since I last wrote a movie review (oh I can already feel my editors snickering at this statement). And when I do, it’s either because I feel strongly about the movie, or it’s because I am extremely bored and at my wits end, or just felt that I needed to resharpen my blunt writing knives again. Well, this is the former.

I have to admit the only reason that I was so looking forward to this movie is because of the golden trifecta of Christopher Nolen, Christian Bale and Michael Caine (the absolute anti-Christ of M Night Shyamalashit, a random A-list actor, a random A-list actress). They had proven with The Prestige and Batman Begins, that the movies that work in together, well.. works. I was initially cautious that the hooplah over the whole Heath ledger being dead thingy was going to overshadow the movie. And after watching the movie, I have to say that it did. But I mean that in the nicest way possible.

Without giving too much away, the sequel does not disappoint. It pretty much still has all the elements that we witnessed in Batman Begins.. and possibly even more. Figuratively and literally that is. The literal part may come off as a turn off to some people. The movie spans over two and a half hour, and some might perceive it as being too long (you know you are!) but that didn’t bother me. A lot of surprising and WTF moments in the movie, none of which really derailed the movie much from the main plot. An excellent balance of acting from one of the best ensembles on screen, a strong plot, terrific action sequences.. and some of those obligatory humanitarian lessons that leaves you thinking, as you walk away from the theaters (yes, I know that line is beyond gag inducing).

Batman Begins is one of my all time favorite movie ever, so The Dark Knight certainly had much to live up to. So did it live up to it’s expectations? The movie has its flaws, but to answer the question : a resounding yes, yes, YES! It may not be the best movie of the year (that title still belongs to The Kite Runner), but it is damn well one of the finests movies I’ve seen this year so far.

Normally I don’t care much for movie critics. All they care about is what they think. They will only like another review if it validates some of their points. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I do categorize myself as one of these elitist snob assholes. But for once, I think almost every one of the movie critics got their review for The Dark Knight right on the point. The good ones, and the bad one (singular). I know what you’re thinking. Just do me a favour. Be a pessimist and walk into the theater, and prove me wrong. I dare you.

ps. contrary to what you might believe, this review and post was not sponsored by Nokia. Or Menatplay.com at that.