Bat

Vampire Batman?

Guano

Tinkle, tinkle, little bat,
how I wonder where you shat,
down beneath the dirt so low,
like a dungeon in a hole.
Tinkle, tinkle, little bat,
how I wonder where you shat.

James Rovira on The Joker . . . Plus my Extrapolations

James Rovira

LinkedIn

In reflecting on all three Batman films by Christopher Nolan, I had wondered about the absence of the Joker in the third film. I know of course that the actor who played the Joker is dead, so that particular version of the Joker could not easily return, but what happened to the Joker, after all? Wouldn't he have been in that prison whose inmates were liberated by Bane? Or was he imprisoned far away from Gotham City? Well, the Blake (and Milton!) scholar James Rovira offers an explanation, namely, that the violence carried out by the Joker is there all along, in all three films, not because the Joker is personally behind it but because the point of the violence is destruction for the sake of destruction:

I think we need to get this point to really understand these films, perhaps then understanding why the character of the Joker -- who personifies chaotic and random destructive force following nihilistic impulsiveness -- was necessarily central to the trilogy. The Joker, as far as plot development is concerned, was irrelevant to the plot line that was established in the first film and then completed in the third film. His presence does not follow directly from the events of the first film and is unnecessary to any of the action that takes place in the third film. Keep in mind that the material in the second film essential to the third film -- Dent's corruption, death, and then the lie told about it -- could have been set up on any variety of pretexts. These events could have been developed in less time at the end of the first film, excluding any need for the second film altogether. But thematically, the Joker exists at the center of the trilogy. He embodies the reason why we must not attempt to politicize the evil criminality that runs through Nolan's Batman trilogy from beginning to end. The Joker reveals its true nature by revealing that the pretexts for destruction are equally interchangeable and equally pointless regardless of their supporting political rhetoric. Only the destruction itself matters. (James Rovira, "The Dark Knight Rises," James Rovira: What I'm Thinking. What I'm Doing, July 27, 2012)

This doesn't actually respond to my question, but I never asked Mr. Rovira directly, anyway, and the analysis is interesting to consider. I don't entirely agree with this view, for I think that politics and religion in the films are about more than destruction for destruction's sake. But I like Rovira's analysis of the Joker's significance, and what I would suggest is that he represents the logical extension of violence carried out for destructive judgment when that judgment lacks the quality of mercy, for then must everything suffer destruction, such that Bane, as the most extreme member of the shadowy League of Shadows, may speak of liberation -- whether political or religious -- but he intends only willful destruction. Rovira cites Hegel in the Elements of the Philosophy of Right for explicating the significance of willful violence:

If it [the will abstracted from intellect, or what Hegel calls "the freedom of the void"] turns to actuality, it becomes in the realm of both politics and religion the fanaticism of destruction, eliminating all individuals regarded as suspect by a given order, and annihilating any organization which attempts to rise up anew. Only in destroying something does this negative will have a feeling of its own existence [Dasein]. It may well believe that it wills some positive condition, for instance the condition of universal equality of or universal religious life, but it does not in fact will the positive actuality of this condition, for this at once gives rise to some kind of order, a particularization both of institutions and of individuals; but it is precisely through the annihilation of particularity and of objective determination that the self-consciousness of this negative freedom arises. Thus, whatever such freedom believes that it wills can in itself be no more than an abstract representation, and its actualization can only be the fury of destruction. (cf. here)

If Rovira is right, and his analysis is intriguing, then Bane is the devotee of a willful deity, a deity who promises mercy but provides none, a deity who visits only destruction upon the world and is capable of destroying the world in an instant and recreating it in an instant merely for the willful pleasure of destroying it in the next instant, an evil occasionalist deity whose followers are created in his image in their destructive willfulness absent of reason.

Not that Nolan saw quite so far as this, but we hermeneuts can extrapolate to this uber-cosmic joker of a deity . . .

Manohla Dargis Again: On Batman

Dark Night?

Ron Phillips/Warner Brothers Pictures
New York Times

I've already posted a blog entry noting this review by Manohla Dargis of the Christopher Nolan film The Dark Knight Rises: "A Rejected Superhero Ends Up at Ground Zero" (New York Times, July 18, 2012). But I didn't offer much on her analysis, and her writing is so rich and intriguing that I have to quote from it again, this time specifically on the 9/11 connection and its ironies:

In "The Dark Knight Rises" Mr. Nolan, working from a script he wrote with his brother Jonathan, further muddies the good-and-evil divide with Bane. A swaggering, overmuscled brute with a scar running down his back like a zipper and headgear that obscures his face and turns his cultivated voice into a strangulated wheeze, Bane comes at Batman and Gotham hard. Fortified by armed true believers, Bane first beats Batman in a punishingly visceral, intimate fist-to-foot fight and then commandeers the city with a massive assault that leaves it crippled and -- because of the explosions, the dust, the panic and the sweeping aerial shots of a very real-looking New York City -- invokes the Sept 11 attacks. It's unsettling enough that some may find it tough going.

Watching a city collapse should be difficult, maybe especially in a comic-book movie. The specter of Sept. 11 and its aftermath haunt American movies, often through their absence though also obliquely, as in action films that adopt torture as an ineluctable necessity. Mr. Nolan, for his part, has been engaging Sept. 11 in his blockbuster behemoths, specifically in a vision of Batman who stands between right and wrong, principles and their perversions, because he himself incarnates both extremes.

Mr. Nolan has also taken the duality that made the first film into an existential drama and expanded that concept to encompass questions about power, the state and whether change is best effected from inside the system or outside it. [Police Commissioner] Gordon believes in its structures; Bane wants to burn it all down. And Batman? Well, he needs to work it out.

On Gordon, I differ a bit. He doesn't truly believe in Gotham's power structure, but he thinks that the structures can be manipulated -- must be manipulated -- in the interests of justice. Dargis is right about Bane, of course. As for Batman, he doesn't believe in the structures of power, nor does he seem to believe -- unlike Gordon -- that those structures can be used for justice. Rather, he works outside of those structures to effect justice, as he sees it, but he doesn't, fundamentally, challenge those structures, perhaps because order, even if imperfect, is better than disorder. Or maybe because he simply loves his city.

As for the film's religious allusions, which interest me, Dargis also sees them, for she mentions the "true believers" and the "Sept. 11 attacks," but she doesn't play these up, preferring to view events politically, and perhaps implying that audiences will as well:

So will viewers, explicitly given the grim, unsettling vision of a lawless city in which the structures of civil society have fallen, structures that Batman has fought outside of. In a formally bravura, disturbingly visceral sequence that clarifies the stakes, Bane stands before a prison and, in a film with several references to the brutal excesses of the French Revolution -- including the suitably titled "A Tale of Two Cities" -- delivers an apocalyptic speech worthy of Robespierre. Invoking myths of opportunism, Bane promises the Gotham citizenry that courts will be convened, spoils enjoyed. "Do as you please," he says, as Mr. Nolan cuts to a well-heeled city stretch where women in furs and men in silk robes are attacked in what looks like a paroxysm of revolutionary bloodlust.

Does Dargis see 9/11 purely politically? Maybe not, for she does refer to Bane's "apocalyptic speech" -- though she promptly calls it "worthy of Robespierre."

Of course, Islamism is overtly political . . .

Bane and Fire?

Flame On!

Walls Zone

What's the story to Bane and fire? Fire seems almost a religious motif in Bane's motivating ideology. Ignore his public speeches to the Gothamites, full of specious guarantees assuring that the people will live, and Gotham survive. He means to burn it up, as he admits to Bruce Wayne, or as he assures one of his fanatical followers who has to die in a plane crash:

Bane: No! They expect one of us in the wreckage brother!

Follower: Have we started the fire?

Bane: (nodding) Yes, the fire rises!

That convinces the follower to go down with the plane. Why? Now, maybe one or two men could be persuaded to die for Bane's aim of burning down Gotham, but Bane has a rather larger number, each intent on dying in the flames. Politics can motivate fanatics, of course, but religion generates greater fanaticism . . . usually.

What is it, then, about Bane and fire? Any link to the name "Ra's al Ghul," which I noted yesterday means "Head of the Demon," demons being associated with fire?

They Both Wear Masks . . .

Bane vs. Batman

Ron Phillips/Warner Brothers Pictures
New York Times

I don't do movie reviews because I know too little about film, but I enjoy reading them, especially reviews of movies I've seen, like The Dark Knight Rises, the Christopher Nolan film that I mentioned seeing with my daughter a couple of days ago.

But to get to my point . . . I read Manohla Dargis's review of this recent Batman movie, and it's one of the most impressive reviews I've read: lucid, erudite, insightful, and instructive. It helped me think about the film -- and confirmed my decision to see this Batman movie again.

Actually, I'd like to re-watch the entire trilogy and reflect upon its exploration of the psychopathology of crime, particularly -- as grows ever clearer with each of the three films -- the way that Nolan "has layered [his developing story] with open and barely veiled references to terrorism, the surveillance state and vengeance as a moral imperative," especially in this third film, as Dargis points out ("A Rejected Superhero Ends Up at Ground Zero," New York Times, July 18, 2012).

One shortcoming of the recent film, though Dargis doesn't touch upon this, is that Nolan seems to understand terrorism in purely personal terms -- a reflection of Bruce Wayne's personal fight against crime in assuming the Batman persona, I presume -- and though this serves the dynamics of the film well and draws the viewer deeply into the developing story, it lacks the ideological aspect of terrorism that isn't merely an expression of personal vengeance. Bane wants to destroy Gotham City because it's Batman's city? Because Bane feels personally hurt by something Batman once did?

Okay, maybe, but why is Bane willing to die to destroy the city, for the plot would require his death? And what motivates his fanatical followers? They know he plans to blow the city up and them with it, so why are they willing to do this? Are they expecting an eternity of sexual pleasure with seventy dark-eyed houris? The viewer is left to infer that something like Islamist ideology inspires them, I suppose, but we're not given much evidence implying that, other than the character "Ra's al Ghul" (Arabic: رأس الغول‎, Ra's al-Ġūl "Demon's Head"), the Arabic name given to the "League of Shadows" leader from the first Batman film, who was killed by Batman and whose character recalls the "Man of the Mountain," legendary founder of the medieval assassins famous for their suicidal attacks upon infidels as well as upon Muslims considered not devout enough.

But I'm not sure that Nolan intended this, or if I'm inferring too much.

Out on Seoul . . .

Batman in Seoul?

Photo by Casey Lartigue

I took my daughter to see Batman yesterday. No, not the Seoul bar that Mr. Casey Lartigue stumbled upon a couple of years ago, but the recent movie, The Dark Knight Rises. Rather dark theme for a fifteen-year-old kid? Well, yeah, I guess, but she's not afraid to watch zombie films, stuff that I won't watch for fear of night terrors! Besides, she invited me to see the Batman movie. I had to pay, of course.

The theme was rather dark, even for me, but I have an interest in terrorism. An academic interest, I mean, not a personal one -- except to the degree that the 9/11 attack felt personal, and felt even more personal when I learned that one of my brothers knew a flight attendant who died in the first plane to strike the WTC.

The film was great, with several unexpected twists, and it explored some motifs of terrorism, if not very deeply, but the terrorist plot was believable only within the framework of this well-crafted movie. An army of terrorists gathered in the sewers beneath Gotham CIty where one expects to find merely alligators? And how many years would they need for mixing enough concrete and explosives to blow up bridges, streets, and a football field?

That football scene provided a somewhat amusing sight gag as an unsuspecting Heinz Ward rushes toward the endzone for a touchdown, the field collapsing just behind his feet at every step. As he turns around in triumph, he discovers an enormous hole where the field had been. The Korean audience got a kick out of that scene because Heinz Ward is half Korean and widely recognized here in Korea.

My daughter and I left the cinema impressed, with her remarking, "I'll have to see this again, with my friends!" We then headed for a nearby Vietnamese restaurant, where over a long meal we discussed the film and life, though we didn't touch upon the shootings at the premiere showing in Aurora, Colorado. I don't think my daughter knows about those, and I still know too little myself to comment in any way worth listening to, except to express sorrow for the victims.

But if you haven't yet seen The Dark Knight Rises and are still intending to see it, here's the official site, where you can watch four official trailers.

An Instructive Exchange

Lorin Maazel

"a noted conductor"

(Image from Lorin Maazel: The Official Website)

Gypsy Scholar is pretty well-informed about things, but Jeffery Hodges is still rather ignorant and therefore tends to learn something new every day . . . as you shall see in today's borrowed dialogue.

Over at Waka Waka Waka, my online friend Malcolm Pollack noted my blog entry on Tawfik Hamid and was impressed by . . . well, you'll see what impressed him. In his own words:

There are those who would have us believe that the root causes of Islamic terrorism are poverty and political oppression, and that if we Americans weren't such swaggering imperialists, and could just get along a little more amicably with other cultures, we'd have less to worry about. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Our friend Jeffery Hodges (is he really out of bed and writing blog posts at 4:09 a.m.?) offers further evidence here.

Since Malcolm had asked for confirmation of what had particularly impressed him in my blog post on Tawfik Hamid, I provided it:

Out of bed at 4:09 a.m.? Me? Is that what the blog entry showed?

Ha! Ha! Ha! Of course I'm not.

No, I'm out of bed at 3:00 a.m., doing my best to save Western civilization. I don't know why the time recorded was so late. Maybe I websurfed too long. I'll try to do better from now on...

Malcolm, nontheist though he may be, sought divine explanation:

Three o'clock? Why in God's name are you up at such an hour??? Do you have cows to milk?

I shall charitably assume you simply haven't got to bed yet; after all, that's only an hour two after I usually hit the sack.

Although I do milk the cows of solitude during these early morning hours, my clarification focused on a greater than bovine task:

In God's name, I am up at that godforsaken hour because -- as previously mentioned -- I am doing my best to save Western civilization.

Pay attention!

Saving the West is a tough job, but somebody's got to do it, especially in those godforsaken hours when even the abstract entities are somnolent and neglecting their duties, so I do indeed rise early.

No need to thank me. Virtue is its own reward.

Which led Malcolm into an oblique allusion to The Dark Knight (itself possibly an even more oblique allusion to bats in somebody's Far Eastern belfry):

I guess saving Western civilization can only be accomplished while the banks are open in Los Angeles, or something.

But to get up at three a.m. (!!!) you must have to go to bed at about eight in the evening or so, an hour at which, in most of the civilized world (or here in Gotham, at least), one is more apt to be discussing an appropriate selection with the sommelier, or flipping through Playbill, waiting for the curtain to rise.

We appreciate your sacrifice, of course.

To which, I racheted up the degree of my great sacrifice:

I usually get to bed between 10 and 10:30, so my sacrifice of sleep in indeed great.

But saving the West -- unlike saving money (which nobody does anymore anyway) -- requires no open banks, whether in Gotham, The City of Angels, or my very own Seoul.

And I also gave evidence of the sufferings that I so quixotically endure:

Uh . . . "is indeed great." I guess that I need some more shut-eye to have better open-eye.

But orthography is merely one of those sacrifices...

For which, Malcolm graciously if indirectly thanked me:

Well, Jeffery, we in the West are in your debt. Your efforts seem to be paying off, so far at least: the seats are full on Broadway, and Lorin Maazel is still swinging the lumber up at Avery Fisher Hall.

Which led to my couplet of ignorance:

Malcolm, I'm tempted to quip:

Who in the hell
Is Lorin Maazel?

Which would be a nice couplet and my shortest poem but also demonstrate my ignorance, so I Wikied him and now know the man.

I'm gratified to learn that my early morning efforts are paying off my own debt to Western civilization.

Leading, in turn, to Malcolm's own amusing nod to the muse (and note his noteworthy pun):

If I may be your instructor --
He's a noted conductor.

A dialogue that I wrapped up (maybe) with a comment on the unfinished project of the West:

Thanks, Malcolm. I've been so busy defending Western civilization that I've not had much time to learn about it.

Next time you pass Avery Fisher Hall, give my regards to Mr. Maazel for swinging the lumber and directing his work crew in the ongoing construction of the West...

Gypsy Scholar readers, meanwhile, should feel free to laugh at my bold ignorance in its trajectory toward the coincidence of opposites that characterizes Nicholas of Cusa's learned ignorance...