Heartless or Hardened

Last week on facebook:

"Those who are heartless once cared too much" - Word Porn

vs

"Those who are heartless are heartless. No excuse!" - Truth Porn

And me: Yeah, Truth Porn! Go, go, go (for it)!

Even those with a hardened heart are only able to commit heartless acts, if they talk themselves into a blind rage, so they cannot or need not reflect in their minds what they are actually doing. A lesson one could have learned from Batman v Superman, if one had cared to see what was actually going on.

The Premise

Or why should two positive role models actually fight each other?

First thought: There are fangirls/-boys siding for the one and others siding for the other and at some moment they would challenge each other saying what if...What if your hero fights mine, who would win?

Second thought: There are no really good villains any more, villains who would be a match to the superpowers the hero is invested with. So let's resort to the heroes fighting each other.

To both thoughts Batman v Superman poses a cruel reply.

First of all it sets up a conflict that would make the one want to kill the other - it's not competition, it's wanting to destroy. It's a battle for life and death. Then at the centre of this is a villain, who is the great manipulator, something quite contemporary. In a weird twist Lex Luthor and his call for battle: "The greatest gladiator match in the history of the world: God versus man; day versus night; Son of Krypton versus Bat of Gotham!", echoes the fangirls/-boys themselves who had been yearning for it - cruel and unusual.

Who Am I

to disagree with Jeremy Irons, though I have a certain have some bones to pick with him concerning Michael Pennington, because he snatched the lead in The French Lieutenant's Woman from him, though apparently this was more down to Meryl Streep ;)!



Alfred is simply brilliant and this might be just a reason to watch the movie - this odd couple, these partners in crime - hilarious. Don't let anybody tell you there is no humour or fun in this movie, Alfred definitely is. And yes, the desire is there to see more of this. Nag, nag ;)!
There was this moment where I had to laugh very hard, after the crisis was over and Alfred of the dry wit was completely lost when asked to describe what was going on with Doomsday ;). Oh finally the good fight - the fight to prevent and protect from utterly destruction.

PS

PS I forgot to mention the fearmongers who profit by terror. Lex Luthor knows masterfully how to manipulate people by this means. But at the end of his Prometheus speech  he almost gives himself away. "Knowledge without power is paradox."

Something That Sort of Made Me Wonder

is the fact that Batman v Superman is so topical.



Of course there is this issue of xenophobia that is always and everywhere rearing its uggly head, but with the civil war in Syria and the subsequent refugee crisis it regretfully is becoming more prevailing. Just replace the word Superman each time he is referred to as an alien by muslim and see what happens. Regretfully some of my dearest friends on facebook have turned away from it because there is a lot of xenophobic hatred going on and they cannot bear it.

Then there were the bombings in Brussels and the first positive review I've come across was in a Belgian magazine. They called it an experience. Although their desire to escape from the dire reality outside was frustrated, for as they stated the same destruction was going on in the movie, they loved it. Their favourite scene was when Batman told Martha Kent that he was a friend of her son's. And I can see why: There is a need for redemption, possibly most urgently if one has experienced terrorist attacks and lives in fear of fear, and here it is fully accomplished.

And there was also a friend who would comment on the fact that a lot of people are campaigning to legalise torture to extract information from terrorists, who have been caught, in this case Salah Abdeslam. My friend, who is a lawyer, argued against it from a legal point of view stating the unconstitutionality of torture. My additional point was rather Alfred's comment that Bruce Wayne had 'interrogated' six and found out nothing - torture is not even a potent device to extract information.

Batman's Tenderness

 Actually copied from my post on imdb.com ;)

Having watched the movie for the second time and having not been very fond of the Doomsday subplot I must admit that there is this one scene that makes the whole Doomsday battle more than worthwhile for me. It was an absolute surprise to see Batman this hardened man, the very first glimpse of whom apart from the fear in people's faces and the terrifying screams by his victim is that of a nightmarish demon lurking in a corner coming straight out of one of Füssli's paintings , this very man tenderly putting Superman’s hand on his chest and gently lifting his body down into Lois Lane’s lap. What a change in personality - and one that to me certainly is comprehensible in the light of his most recent expierences. Furthermore this most probably promises that the next movie has to present a much lighter version of the Dark Knight.




or even better this version ;) - cause hey, it's Noel Gallagher ;) And Paul Weller drumming ;)!

The One Percent Solution

or "You let your family die"

Batman's motivation

Apart from his nightmares there are other features explaining why Batman is aiming to build himself this terrible monument killing Superman.

There is of course the fact that Superman actually threatens him telling him to stop unless he will kill him.

Alfred pronounces it and when I was watching it for the second time in the Netherlands at least one child was repeating it "powerlessness". The feeling of powerlessness lets some people resort to cruelty in order to protect their community, their family. And this sentence "You let your family die" written on the returned cheque and the destruction of the Capitol Hill is what finally is bound to drive Bruce Wayne over the edge - Lex Luthor really is cleverly pulling the strings and he needs to know a hell of a lot. Having witnessed Superman's powers - mainly the destructive ones - and being traumatised by this experience Bruce Wayne is not willing to watch his family die once again - his family here being not only his relatives or his employees, but his nation or humanity as a whole, even if there was only a one percent possibility that this might happen. His motives are noble and the fact that he is putting his life on the line is also, yet I got the idea that he also realises that this monument he is about to errect isn't a happy or joyous one. Maybe one that more suits the criminal he perceives himself to have turned into.

Lois is the Key

or why the main female characters are so much more than the damsels in distress.

Though Lex Luthor abuses Lois Lane as a decoy to set up Superman by making him save her twice, this should not remain the impression she leaves.  First of all she is the tough journalist she claims to be and Lex Luthor should well beware of her. She is pretty close on his heels. She knows and even has the proof that he is responsible for the massacre in Africa. And if she had but had the time to investigate who knows what else she might have dug up. But even more, like The Flash states, she is the key. It's her and nobody else who unravels the truth about Martha and saves more than just this one day.

Then there is Diana Prince/Wonder Woman, who is a warrior in her own rights and certainly doesn't need anybody to save her.

Last but not least there is Holly Hunter's Senator Finch, the only character who directly confronts Lex Luthor and would not give in to him. More than this she openly tells him that she believes that he is manipulating people.

These women have one thing in common they are far less susceptible to manipulations than the male characters or like Douglas Adams put it: "It won't affect me. I'm already a woman."

I'm Gonna Eat You Alive II

or what about all these nightmares?!

Apparently a lot of people did not like the dream sequences, it is often suggested that they are only there to serve as teasers for some future movies or some allusion for the initiated, the true comic fan who knows every single storyline ever. This might be true but to me these dreams made a lot of sense within the narrative of the movie.

These dreams or nightmares were rather an important device to me, similar to the soliloquy or the monologue in theatre these nightmares told me a lot about Bruce Wayne's/Batman's motivation or state of mind - and  I'm really glad that screenwriter and director chose such a cinematic way to convey it.
The first vision, dream or memory of young Bruce Wayne being lifted up by bats already sets the tone. What should be a happy vision of bearing the child back to the light is called a lie in voice-over. Thus the genesis of Batman becomes a fall rather than an ascend.
The next nightmare was in my experience during two screenings a quite shocking one, a lot of people like Bruce Wayne gasped, some even screamed because they did not see it coming: There is, in Martha's grave, a demon and one that is shockingly alive and frightening. Bruce Wayne's initial trauma. The fact that he witnessed his parents' death.
Finally the third nightmare told me two things. First of all Bruce Wayne's fears concerning Superman. There is this devastated wasteland, a desert that once might have been a thriving city.  Ergo Superman definitely has the physical might to bring about such destruction. And then there are these Fascist troopers kneeling to Superman and worshipping him like a god. These are two threats that if Bruce Wayne takes them for real or possible he needs to address now, for as his nightmare shows him, at some point it might be too late. These are Bruce Wayne's concerns and yet there is still this look that intrigued me so much. This unconquerable look of hatred, disregard and contempt is his attitude to Superman. In this state of mind he would never ever listen to anything Superman says even if it cost him his very life, he would absolutely stop at nothing. Oh boy, he's got his mind set on the kill. Being long past the possibility to talk or listen, he would not respond to Superman's accusations. So all in all Batman will and must seek the confrontation and he will kill.

I'm Gonna Eat You Alive I

The actual incentive for me to go and watch this movie was this look taken from this teaser.



Usually I'm not a fan of movies based on comic books and even moreso if they feature something like A vs B. It always feels like people drawing from several established franchises urging all fans to find out who will win. I'd rather say "win" than "kill" because no franchise ever wants to terminate its existence by being killed.
And then there was this look and it caught my imagination: What the hell is happening there? Why this relentless look of "I'm gonna eat you alive", especially in this situation?! Kudos to Ben Affleck for this depiction. I definitely wanted to find out, though the first part of the the teaser also suggested to me that it must be unreal, nightmarish  because I could not figure out Superman turning into a kind of fascist semi-god worshipped unconditionally by those kneeling when he passes. Something I admit that turned me down a little bit because firstly: How would this fit in? and secondly: Is the emotion depicted by this look for real? Will there be a legit explanation or is it just some goodlooking aberration serving nothing but its own purpose? Mmmhh I took a chance and followed my first impression and it turned out more than fine.

Sometimes the Truth is Painful

This will mark the beginning of a whole series of posts where I will deal with different aspects of why I admire Batman v Superman. Please do not read any further if you haven't yet watched it, there are some major spoilers ahead.

Since I was alreeady thinking about Scrooged and the ghost of Christmas present and accidentally somebody on facebook commenting on a totally different issue also mentioned the ghost, my first post will deal with what most people see as one of the major flaws and why I love it - "Martha".

The whole trouble is that at this point things are happening so fast that some people do not get all of them. The initial situation is clear: Batman has struck down Superman and is about to kill him, when Superman tells him that Martha needs to be saved. Of course this name resonates in Batman/ Bruce Wayne - we even get a flashback for those who might have forgotten that this name featured at least twice in the movie already, with the nightmare scene really shocking a lot of people when I watched the movie - and it helps to sober him a little bit from the blind rage against Superman into which he had been talking himself all the time during their fight, like Superman doesn't know any fear or comparing his miserable childhood to Superman's supposedly better one. Yet since Superman is not fit to explain what Martha means to him, Batman rage returns even more violently. I imagined at that point that Batman thinks that Superman knows something about his personal trauma and might be taunting him. So who really saves the day is rather Lois Lane who finally solves the riddle and tells Batman that Martha is Superman's mother. And here comes the moment I love the most about this movie, the - like somebody called it - "what-the-fuck"- moment, and it must be painful to Batman, probably as painful as the Ghost of Christmas Present has been to Bill Murray's Frank Cross and on the inside it sort of made me laugh as hard. He has to realise what a damned fool he was because here is somebody who is crying out to his mortal enemy to save his mother. This person never ever would pose any threat to humanity, this person may not know fear, but it also knows no malice, this person believes in his, Batman's, inherent goodness.



And still yet this is not even the end of what is happening because undeservedly the blessings Batman gets out of it are even more. Finally he gets the chance to address his trauma, to make it good, this time Martha will not die. The least he should feel is enormously grateful to Superman and yes, he is his friend.