Batman sues The Dark Knight

Yes, this is more stupid than confusing.

Batman, a small city in Turkey, is apparently suing Christopher Nolan and the producers of The Dark Knight (not DC Comics though).


Hurriyet Daily News reports:

“The royalty of the name ‘Batman’ belongs to us … There is only one Batman in the world. The American producers used the name of our city without informing us,” Kalkan [Hüseyin Kalkan, the mayor] told to the Doğan news agency.

Even stranger is the above cited article's sub-headline: The mayor of Batman, a city recently under scrutiny due to unsolved murders and increasing rates of female suicides, will sue the director of the movie "Batman" movie.

But as much as this legal action smacks of desperation and inanity, the other shoe fits just as poorly. Meaning, that Warner Bros. is just as much in the wrong if this account of a Batman native who couldn't name his German restaurants Batman is true:

“I named my two restaurants Batman. But six months ago, a team of employees from the production company of the movie Batman made me change the title. Telling them that Batman was the name of my hometown did not change anything,” Dağ said.

Can't we all just get along?

Via io9.

Backyard Theater: Batman Begins

I almost forgot to update you guys on my foray into backyard movie exhibition.

Last Saturday (July 12th), one week before the release of the now legendary The Dark Knight, I hosted a Batman Anticipation Party. For the party, I fulfilled a long gestating dream and set up un petit cinema in my backyard for a screening under the stars.

There were no stars, but luckily the rain held off, and overall it was a success.

First we battled over Batman trivia, then we watched a wonderfully dated reel of drive-in concession stand commercials (my favorite is the one for movie pickles).



Next, I threw on a compilation of the trailers for all of the previous Batman movies, and finally we sat in awe of the TDK extended trailer. The main event was Batman Begins, a fitting primer for sure.

That was all set up on my laptop (using powerpoint, idvd, and quicktime) which I connected to a standard office video projector and a couple of speakers.

I set up the screen by attaching two old vinyl signs together which I then staple-gunned to three wood posts that I drove into the ground. Then I fastened a large sheet of black-out cloth to the signs (usually used behind curtains to protect them from the sun) with self-adhesive velcro to give the screen a smooth look. It ended up looking really good with almost zero imperfections in the image.

The photos (sort of) give you an idea what it was like:

I highly suggest you bring this idea into your own backyard/neighborhood. Let's stand for community rather than retreating into our personal home theaters!

If you want some more hints, definitely check out the great website/messageboard Backyardtheater.com. The awesome people who contribute really gave me the jumpstart I needed to put my urges for outdoor cinema into practice.

TDK: Early Review

click to enlarge image (ie. put this on your desktop now)
I saw The Dark Knight last night.

I've been waiting and thinking about this movie since August 1st 2007, and it doesn't disappoint one bit.

Brace yourself because this movie is... well, it's... it's a symphony, it's intense, it's an opera, it's bladerunner, it's frank miller, it's relentless, it's punk rock, it's joyless, it's dangerous, it's citizen kane, it's heath ledger, it's menacing, it's christopher nolan, it's an epic, it's frightening, it's an addict, it's moving, it's heat, it's black, it's enrapturing... it's one of the best movies i've ever seen.

TDK Mixtape

If The Dark Knight was a person, what kind of person would he be?

First off, yes, it would be a "he". And we know his favourite colour would be black, so your next question would probably be: what music does he listen to?

Here's the answer to that burning question. The Dark Knight's playlist:

Listen to the mixtape HERE and the entire songs on Muxtape.com (this nifty site seems a bit buggy, try switching your browser if it doesn't work straight away).

You can also sample TDK's tunes on this imeem player, but some songs are only 30sec long:


I got this idea from my friend over at his Nurture. Check out his take on it, where he connects brand identity to the idea of individual's defining oneself by the music they listen to.

It really does seem more and more that people have a need to publicize their music tastes (eg. myspace likes, ipod parties, etc). And the amount of media attention Barack Obama's recent ipod revelation is testament to how one's ipod has become serious cultural currency.

But still, no matter how this inclination to broadcast taste is manipulated by politicians and/or corporations, I think it's still coming from a pretty great place. It stems from that incontrovertible essence of music as a collective medium that is best appreciated communally. Big record companies might try to force us to believe that music is a personal endeavor that should be savored in the privacy of our bedrooms, as they did in the 80s and 90s or at an officially sanctioned concert in a hockey arena, but technology is making it easier to re-invigorate music's shared capacities.

Technology like... muxtape.com (wiki entry), which apparently isn't likely to be shut down any time soon, since it's more about sharing discovery in music rather than wanton accumulation of mp3s.

And by the way, I know you were wondering... what's TDK's favourite movie? Batman Begins. Despite being a manic loner, he values family a great deal.

14 Days until The Dark Knight

To tide you over, here's a new poster...

Great Length

According to Hollywood Elsewhere (via BOF), when it hits theaters on July 18, The Dark Knight will clock in at 152min - yes, that's 2 hours and 32 minutes of Batman goodness.

Compare that to Batman Begins' 140min running time or Tim Burton's Batman's 126min.

I'm all for it in this case, but it definitely speaks to an overwhelming trend in the last decade or so. The practice of stretching out simple action-adventure pictures over the 2 hour mark seems to have really gained traction around the time the first Lord of the Rings movie was released in 2001 at 178minutes long (followed by the next two at 179min and 201min).

Read more and check out the research after the jump.


For my money, I prefer a tight 90min running time, but that's definitely not the style these days. 90min to 120min seemed to have been the standard for a while outside of biblical epics and art house fare. Lately you'd be hard pressed to catch a summer movie in under 2 hours.

To figure out if this is just my impression, I did a li'l research, and it seems that running times have indeed bulked up, especially as far as popcorn movies go. Maybe it's a justification of the high ticket prices, but I think it's probably more a symptom of the crazy budgets of these films. How do you chop out a sequence that cost $15 million of the special effects budget?

Anyhow, check out an abridged (and very unscientific) evolution of the running time:

2008 Top 5 Grossing Movies (So Far) [Average Running Time - 127min]

• Iron Man - 126min
• Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - 124min
• Horton Hears a Who - 88min
• The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian - 147min
• Sex and the City - 148min

1998 Top 5 Grossing Movies [Average Running Time - 125min]

• Saving Private Ryan - 170min
• Armageddon - 150min
• There's Something About Mary - 119min
• A Bug's Life - 96min
• The Waterboy - 90 min

1988 Top 5 Grossing Movies [Average Running Time - 112min]

• Rain Man - 133min
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit? - 104min
• Coming to America - 116min
• Big - 104min
• Twins - 105min

1978 Top 5 Grossing Movies [Average Running time - 118min]

• Grease - 110min
• Superman - 143min
• Animal House - 109min
• Every Which Way But Loose - 110min
• Jaws 2 - 116min

Looks like titles have gotten longer too...

Scuttlebut and Shuttlecocks

Looks like Milk, the Harvey Milk biopic starring Sean Penn, has an official release date: November 26 2008. Just in time for consideration from Oscars the grouch. EW has a "first look" of Penn in the role. First official look I guess, because pretty much all San Franciscans or anybody with an interest already's got the scoop.

More G.I. Joe pictures have hit the whole wide world (www). Empire reports that in order to combat unofficial, unfinished, cheap looking photos that leaked, the studio has now unleashed official, cheap looking photos. What's with all the black? Seems pretty uninspired and bleak. I still like the casting though, especially Sienna Miller as Baronness and Said Taghmaoui as Breaker. Check out Cinematical for all the photos. Popgunning's previous post on the matter.

More after the jump...

Heard rumors of Superbad's Jonah Hill joining the Transformers 2 cast as Shia's comedic relieving college roommate. Well, it's not happening. Seemed like a good fit. But does anybody really care? As long as the robots blow up stuff, and Megan Fox exposes her midriff, I think fans of puerile special effects extravaganzas will be happy.

In more exciting news, apparently there's already talks of a third Batman film after TDK. Word is no more Joker (recasting Heath seems like it would be a horrible idea) and lots more Two Face. I say throw in a new Batman villain that hasn't graced the screen yet, like Harley Quinn. Christopher Nolan will probably be at the helm (phew) but after a third one, not so much.


Lastly, there's also talk of a big screen, big budget version of "MacGyver". Yikes!



I think I need a trial separation from Hollywood.