spindrift
Super Freak
- Joined
- Apr 26, 2009
- Messages
- 13,360
- Reaction score
- 148
I saw this a third time at my local dollar theater this week, and, I have to say, I genuinely love this movie. So many people go crazy about the characterizations and say that "Snyder and Terrio just don't understand the characters," but I'd posit that you have to have a pretty damn good grasp of the characters, in order to deconstruct them as well as this movie has.
The amazing thing, for me, is that, without being confined to an "ultrarealistic" setting, like Nolan's trilogy, I'd argue that Snyder and Terrio have most certainly created the most realistic depictions of these characters in history, and I feel like it works, because, exactly as Snyder said, he tackles their character flaws head-on.
I feel like Batman's dream sequences work fantastically, if you really take the time to think about them. Our first real interactions with Bruce Wayne are within his dreams, and it really lets us know just how far he's fallen. You see his origin, and the descent into the cave, and then, he tells you everything you need to know: "in the dream, they carried me into the light. It was a beautiful lie."
I think that's the amazing thing about this movie, and I think it's why so many people hate it. In Batman's case, you can't spend twenty years wading through **** and expect to walk away clean. Writers have made Batman the king of deus ex machina, to the point where you can barely consider him any more relatable than his demigod compatriots.
When Batman talks about not crossing that line in Under the Red Hood, this is what he was talking about. A guy who looks in the mirror and considers himself just as much a criminal as those he fights, whose bitterness and bloodlust have corrupted the fundamental ideals of justice that inspired his crusade.
I feel like Superman's arrival only exacerbates his feelings of insecurity, though, in that they cause him to look at his own mortality. Here's a guy who dedicated his life to this, criminals are still popping up "like weeds,"and, simply put, any differences he might have made have been rendered obsolete by the arrival of a god.
You can't get much more literal than the giant bat-creature shattering through Martha Wayne's memorial and dragging her grieving son into the darkness. The very entity Bruce Wayne created to avenge his parent's death has overshadowed them, and you can tell just by how he talks.
There's a callousness to the way he speaks about them, while he's taunting Clark. "I bet your parents taught you that you're here for a reason; that you mean something. My parents taught me a different lesson, dying in the gutter for no reason at all. That the world only makes sense if you force it to," and that truly sums up Batman in this movie. Born of tragedy and meant to change the world, only to be changed by it, instead, and constantly trying to justify his actions so that he can still live with himself.
There's a beautiful duality to that battle, though. While Batman is very much the physical victor, I firmly believe that it is, without a doubt, Batman, at rock bottom; a pawn in Luthor's game, willing to murder a man he doesn't even know, all because of an irrational fear of an idea, and, to me, that's what makes the "Martha" moment so poignant. Behind all of that bitterness and anger, paranoia and hatred, is a lonely kid who misses his mom.
I love the way they represent it visually, as well. When we see him standing there in the rain, the signal lit, it's almost as though he's becoming that batcreature, mired in darkness, any humanity hidden by his heavy battle armor, and, by the time you reach that point, with him hoisting the spear above Clark's head, it's him at his most volatile, but, also, his most vulnerable, and I love that you can see Bruce Wayne's face peering through the darkness as he recognizes the error of his ways.
Ultimately, the greatest battle to take place in BvS is the battle for Bruce Wayne's soul, and I feel like that's where the disconnect with audiences seems to be; they want an infallible hero, and having a hero with the same character flaws and insecurities as everyone else makes them uncomfortable.
Similarly, in Superman's case, you can't deal in the moral absolutism that would earn you the reputation of a big, blue boy scout and not be, at least, a little bit out of touch with the rest of the world.
I actually love the role the media plays in the film, in that, just like in the real world, it preys on said insecurities. While I do think Clark's detachment from the casualties he leaves in his wake makes him seem a bit like a superpowered Lennie from Of Mice and Men, you can kind of understand his frustration and resentment towards Batman when people are questioning his methods and his intentions 24 hours a day, seven days a week, on every channel, just for trying to help people, and when he discovers a guy who's murdering people in cold blood and passing sentence on whomever he sees fit, and Perry White's just like "nobody gives a ****, Clark. Now, do sports!"
It's an interesting dichotomy, though. Bruce Wayne is almost desperate for any sort of recognition, as he continually ponders whether his life's work meant anything, and Clark Kent just wishes people would stop asking what it all means and just accept it when he helps people.
At the end of the day, if the goal of a superhero movie is escapism, Batman V Superman is an utter failure. I mean, hell, arguably, the central thread of the movie is that one of the greatest heroes of all time becomes a violent, angry hate monster because an egomaniac with crazy hair manipulates him and preys on his irrational fear of an outsider. BvS isn't escapism, it's a wake-up call.
Bravo!!!!!
