The Dark Knight Rises Review.

So my first review on my blog will be for one of the most anticipated reviews of the summer.

TDKR is one of Christopher Nolans masterpieces.
Nolans gritty Batman trilogy finally comes to an end and it ends things on a high note.
The film kicks off almost instantly with a scene straight out of  a James Bond movie, Introducing Bane as a menacing villain, before slowing down to introduce a script well written that produces some of the supporting casts best performances.

There have been mentions before and since about Banes "Unintelligible" voice and for one, i have to say i understood over 95% of the speech. It was one of the shining things about the film. His voice gives him a menace not seen so far in the trilogy, whilst also giving him an air of intelligence.
Its a far cry from Jokers (And Ledgers Oscar winning performance) pure out violence whereas Bane doesn't do anything that isn't part of his long term plan throughout the film.
Hardys performance makes up for Banes previous showing in the awful 1997 'Batman & Robin'.

The film slowly builds up, set 8 years after the events of 'The Dark Knight', it shows Gordon (Gary Oldman) clearly struggling under the weight of the lie created by himself and Batman (Christian Bale) about Harvey Dent in the previous film.

The films action scenes are few and far apart, requiring the cast to step up and provide some of the best performances of their careers.
Hathaway makes a decent attempt at Selina Kyle, who doesn't really get enough screen-time to build up the character like others.
Cotillard, her character shrouded in secrecy before the release provides one of the films great twists at the end and has some great chemistry with Hardy/Bale.
Freeman is back as the humor based Fox. He has a bigger role to play in this film than before and shines in his screen time.

The stand out performances are definitely Levitt and Caine. (Caine being my early pick for Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars when they come around.)
Levitt plays a street wise cop, loyal and very justice orientated. He is a great companion to Batman and Waynes, their on screen chemistry is a joy to watch and is more evidence of Levitt being an actor (like Hardy) improving all the time and ready to take a film on their own shoulders instead of supporting from now on, especially with Hardy set for the Mad Max remake.

Caine though, steals the show. In his best performance yet, which considering some of his other films, is a huge achievement really brings his A-Game.
His scenes, which are very few are emotionally charged and really do bring a tear to the eye, the only problem being that there really isn't enough of him in the film.

Overall, this film hits all the spots.
This Isn't 'The Dark Knight' though. This is more about the characters behind the masks and personas like 'Batman Begins'.
In the sense that 'Begins' is the origins of Batman, TDKR is the finale. The story comes full circle and ends with probably the best 20 minutes of the trilogy.

There are a couple of cons to it though.
It is a very long film and a lot of people i have spoken to have commented that for them, it was too long. As a massive comic fan, the film is a culmination of brilliance. The story-arcs take some of the best of the comics and expands upon them.
It will irritate a lot of people that have only been introduced to Batman through Nolans trilogy though. It is typical Nolan essentially which always seems to separate opinions but one thing is sure, this is a must see film.

The main question is this. Where does Batman go from here?
For me, it doesn't. Nolans Batman will never be surpassed and whoever takes on 'The Cowl' will have a tough job to follow on from.