Dark Knight, The: Rise and Fall of Harvey Two-Face

dwight fry may 8 2012

As soon as I saw that the hockey pads line had been cut, I knew that Harman and myself were pretty much on the same page regarding The Dark Knight. And we are, mostly. What people remembers the most about the movie is Heath Ledger’s Joker, which, while certainly a fine psycho performance, shows that there’s such a thing as too much of a good thing, as it overshadows the heart and soul of the story: Gotham’s two knights, white and dark. So, by cutting Joker back, Harman reveals that Dent was more than the glorified piece of furniture wasted that I thought he was in the theatrical cut. The original is a Joker movie, this is a Batman and Harvey Dent movie.

It is, however, not perfect for my tastes, particularly because of three things (outside redubbing Bale’s Bat-voice, but obviously I won’t ask for that much):

-Joker’s scars stories. I like both of them in the theatrical cut, but if you cut out one, you must cut out the other too, as if it’s the only one it instantly becomes true, which is not only much less interesting than making them up all the time, but puzzling that Joker is willing to share his tragic past story with anyone he just met. How I would cut the party bit: have Joker ask Rachel “Do you wanna know how I got ‘em?” implying he’s about to “show” her by cutting her face, then she kicks him.

-I wish that at least some of the speeches all along the movie that have characters (mostly, but not exclusively, Alfred) explain out loud the morals/psychological thoughts/philosophies of the story and the intentions of the characters to the audience. This is an annoying trait that’s in all Nolan movies and which makes me appreciate them a lot less than most people seem to. Show, Chris, don’t tell, and let us fill in the blanks with the brains you seem to think we lack.

-Please credit the real Batman creator, Mr. Bill Finger, alongside Kane.

I don’t know if Harman is still around, but since he never uploaded the promised DVD/HD, maybe when and if he comes back he’d consider some of this. Still, as it is, this gets a 9/10 from this lifelong Batman fan.

lonvox jan 30 2012

Rave, Rave, Rave, Rave! This is a completely fantastic edit of what was a good Batman movie to begin with. The pacing is better; the characters are more in line with their personalities; and it’s completely enthralling. There aren’t enough superlatives for this.

Video: 10/10
No pixelation or artifacts. This is near DVD quality.

Audio: 10/10
Excellent in a headset. No idea on 5.1.

Editing: 9.5/10
Sorry, but I had to take half a point off for a single cut – Removing Bruce telling Alfred that she’d wait for him. It was too abrupt and startling to me. I think it was the music that did it, but I’m not sure if there was enough of a gap for it to be taken without messing with the audio. It’s really strange that he would ask her if she meant that she’d wait for him, then not mention it later though. That part was confusing to me. However, in comparison to the rest of it… it’s completely minor.

Overall: 10/10
This is THE FanEdit for this movie.
Get. This. Now.

steelio2006 aug 21 2010

REVIEW:
What a difference a half hour makes. When The Dark Knight was released in theaters, I thought it was great and ground breaking. It wasn’t til some time later when I sat down to watch it again that I began to notice the small short comings of the movie. The movie felt bloated and long. Now, with Rise and Fall The Dark Knight gets his due with a movie that feels like the right pace. The story flows fast like a rollercoaster. It’s amazing how much better this movie is as the focus was shifted from the Joker to Batman and Harvey Dent. Solid movie that rates a 4 out of 5.

Likes:
- Joker being more behind the scenes
- Plot structure actually reminded me of the structure for Begins a little bit.
- Story moved at a brisk pace.
- Dent’s story is better now that the focus has been moved to the forefront.

Dislikes:
- Missed the Joker’s first story about his scars.

Verdict:
4.5 out of 5.

boon23 june 16 2009

Prologue:
After struggling with myself for a bit I have decided to review it, because obviously this fanedit is not getting the attention it deserves. Even though Harman “abused” me for previewing and helping, when I actually was too busy with my own current project, he showed great fanediting spirit by taking a lot of time to create step by step a flawless version of his fanedit. He took care of every issue I came up with and showed great frustration tolerance, because there always was something else and new to be fixed, which is a bit my fault because I always stopped watching on, when something truly bugged me, making this quality check and previewing session an incredibly long run.
I consider THE DARK KNIGHT a flawed movie. It wasn’t bad, but for me it was way not the masterpiece everybody was talking about. The plot was confusing and the pacing seemed just wrong. I did not like Batman in this movie and though Harvey Two Face deserved a lot more scenes. While Jorge’s Dark Knight remix is a genius take, it most of all is for me an artistic take and not what I want a Batman movie to be: an exciting Superhero action movie. And I think TDK deserved at least another take. Here it is.

As for all my reviews: this is just my personal opinion of this fanedit. I cannot tell anybody else, if he or she will experience it in the same way or the opposite. So my review is not objective and does not reflect the opinion of fanedit.org.

!!!!This review contains heavy spoilers!!!

The edit:
Reading through the cutlist I was not too impressed with Harman’s ideas, but watching it made the big difference, because it plays quite differently to the original, especially entertainment wise. Reducing the Joker scenes in the beginning does not like harman says it, just make him more mysterious, but it also switches the focus to batman and Harvey and that is what I think exactly what the movie needed to feel more consistent and be more exciting. Of course I could still have done without the Batman copycats and the weak appearance of scarecrow, but besides that I watched a great take with changes all int he right places to make this an extremely cool movie. Great pacing and a less chaotic plot through mild filtering. The more natural colors look great and do unlike my thinking add to the movie.
From start to finish I thoroughly enjoyed this fanedit.
There are a few weak spots: I already mentioned the Scarecrow appearance and Batman copycats. The deletion of Gordon’s death makes it strange to suddenly see him in disguise as a SWAT. The Batman blackmailer also seems to come out of nowhere.
But all these are minor flaws, which did not spoil my overall fun watching this fanedit.
editing: 9 of 10 (a few minor complaints to the plot)
entertainment: 8 of 10 (original 7 of 10)

Image and video quality:
Image and video quality were perfect. I am looking forward to the DVD release.
Video quality: 10 of 10

Audio editing and audio quality:
The audio editing is perfect true 5.1. I did not notice hard cuts.
audio editing: 10 of 10
sound quality: 10 of 10
resulting in a 10 of 10 for overall audio

presentation:
There is a DVD and a bluray coming, so I will not rate presentation yet. The fanedit comes with nice starting logos and very tiny alterations to the end credits which did not impress me.

Final result: 9 of 10
I recommend watching this fanedit.

I was absolutely blown away by ALL the changes you made. I loved the jokers first appearance especially! I would only suggest that some more useless exposition could be trimmed, but that's the Nolan trilogy in general. A fine job, it is replacing the original version in my collection.