NOLAN BROTHERS!!! RULZ!

Sounds like Nolan is just happy to be working.

you're all wrong. The movie that deserves the oscars is tamtako's movie the irristible
likeness. Check it out

Jonathan is a good man. Maybe was a blessing in disguise to not be nominated. Sitting at the auditorium and watch other people win, giving boring speeches. Who cares. TDK dodged a bullet in my opinion.

Plus, there are the "surprise presenters". What a load of shit.

No point jumping into the 'Dark Knight did/did not deserve to be nominated' debate as I'll miss work, but it's nice to see Jonathan Nolan acknowledging the fans and what they were doing, it's things like this that bridge the gap between observers of a film and those that create them.

Is it just me, or is everyone involved in making TDK that we've heard from just a cool person in general?

The Nolans do seem like cool guys, and I'm glad they at least appreciate the nominations the film did receive. Hopefully it sweeps those categories to help drive their film home. But hey, do I really need to list the absolute timeless classics Spielberg made before he finally won an Oscar?

Stevo22, Slumdog is a better film. Ive seen both many times and i can probably be considered a TDK fanboy, and im sorry to say that right after I watched Slumdog, i immediately knew it was better than tdk. I dont want to write up a long review for both right now im tired as all hell, but if anything the reader deserved to be kicked off the list rather than slumdog for tdk.


If you have seen Slumdog you would understand.
pce

I have seen Slumdog, that is actually the reason I do not understand.

I just don't understand the logic behind nominating Slumdog Millionaire but not The Dark Knight.

Well if you follow the Oscars there are definite patterns and relationships between the major award ceremonies for who will get nominated and who will not. The Globes is usually a good indicator of who will get nominated. There were very few surprises this year. Mostly the Globes Actors in a Drama is carried over to the Oscars, the one exception is that Richard Jenkins took over for Leo (very good choice). If you look at the Best Picture noms it was taken from The Best Dramatic film list from the Globes, save Milk, which was snubbed at the Globes. I think a lot of Hollywood is very politically oriented so they had to vote with their conscience for the big homosexual film especially after the failing of Prop 8.

To get to your question about Slumdog, it cleaned up at The Globes and various other award ceremonies. It IS the critics darling. It has danger and excitement, it is exotic because of its locale, but most importantly it has a happy ending. It is an excellent film all around, I can't think of a single criticism about it. It is paced well, it isn't too long (like The Dark Knight). Slumdog has beautiful visuals, an excellent structure to the story, it breaks away from the rest of the films released this year in all of the "right" ways. It also has an excellent word of mouth. The Dark Knight has faults, no matter what you fan boys think. It is not perfect, it is flawed. One of the main beefs that I have with it is the third act, it was written and directed with too many loose ends and wonky pacing. It is a very good film, but not without its flaws.

Also, I don't know how The Academy really feels about comic book films. I think they still feel of them as lesser films. . Something that can certainly rake in the money, but still sort of childish. I am not saying that this sort of thinking is right, but it might be how they feel about those types of movies. They tend to take movies that are traditional dramas. I think if more comic book movies come out like this in the future, Oscar gold will be within the crosshairs, and possibly sooner than you think if Watchmen is as amazing as everyone claims it to be.

The Dark Knight had its flaws. One of the biggest for me was Bruce Wayne complaining about a dog bite but then spiralling down onto a parked taxi cab from a considerable height without so much as a groan...

However, Slumdog Millionaire had its over-the-top convenient fairy tale plot that allows one to think Who Wants To Be A Millionaire can be won by sheer luck - that or that culture's trivia is extremely limited to tidbits acquired during the life lessons of impoverished young men. Both had their flaws, but I see no reason Slumdog should be nominated over The Dark Knight. None whatsoever. I'll even go on a limb and say the performances in The Dark Knight were better.

As for the Milk comment... I can't decide which was my favorite film of the year between Milk, Let the Right One In, The Wrestler, and The Dark Knight. Milk was an extraordinary film that probably got in on its merits alone - though I won't deny some political fluff might have helped its chances. Still, The Dark Knight had just as much a right to be there. It was above average quality filmmaking on par with the rest.

Well if you follow the Oscars there are definite patterns and relationships between the major award ceremonies for who will get nominated and who will not. The Globes is usually a good indicator of who will get nominated. There were very few surprises this year. Mostly the Globes Actors in a Drama is carried over to the Oscars, the one exception is that Richard Jenkins took over for Leo (very good choice). If you look at the Best Picture noms it was taken from The Best Dramatic film list from the Globes, save Milk, which was snubbed at the Globes. I think a lot of Hollywood is very politically oriented so they had to vote with their conscience for the big homosexual film especially after the failing of Prop 8.

Haha what a cooool comment! Excellent work now get back to writing batman 3!!!

I can't wait til we actually get some actual Dark Knight sequel news.

what an ass hole

thats exactly why this guy is my favorite writer.

a great film

but not a great Best Picture winner film

still a great film

Personally, I have not seen The Reader or Frost/Nixon but I feel like TDK had enough umph to trump both of them.
I like Nolan's attitude regardless. Academy Awards are lame... but I like them so much...

Oscar films tend to be smaller or more personal. They are far more interested in drama as opposed to flashy comic book movies. If you wish to know more about this, at the history of the Oscars and what films they nominate and chose to win

I know why they did use that story line, but I felt for the flow of the movie and the integrity of the character it was rushed. Two-Face is a very interesting character with great potential, might have gotten a full movie out of it. They used Two-Face for the foil to Batman. Which was used well with the White Knight/Dark Knight theme.

Both this is useless, the film was well made and very enjoyable. It is a movie that I get exhausted watching it once.

Oh man tell me about it, I haven't watched the movie since December because I can't find 2 and a half hours to watch a movie. I enjoy the movie and always want to watch it but never get around to it.

Very good letter.

Here's hoping for a third Batman.

I'm not saying they should, but I'm hoping that the Nolan's only feed off of the snub and vow to make a third Bat film that is smarter, bigger, badder, and cooler than the last one. In the end, this really may be the best thing that any Dark Knight fans could hope for.

It would be nice to see. I think we'll be waiting awhile for the right story to come along to beat The Dark Knight though.

I like how all of you fan boys are getting upset about the lack of nominations (which is not much, just the majors). Most of you don't realize that there is a whole culture behind the Academy, a set of rules of what criteria in a film make it good/bad. I am sure if I read a comic that was vastly popular with the wider readership but not by comic book nerds, I would get laughed at. This is one of the few comic book movies that have transcended the genre, like all things it takes time for acceptance into the elite films. Any change takes time to occur, how long did it take the civil rights movement to take hold? How long did it take the Oscars to recognize the New Hollywood films? When Easy Rider came out it didn't get nominated for Best Picture, it got nominated for Best Writing and Jack Nicholson, but it is arguably one of the first films of that era and one that made a lot of money. Also look at Star Wars (which is probably a better example) it won a bunch of technical awards, but failed when it came to Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay. Did you realize that Dark Knight DID get 10 Nominations?!?!!

it actually got 8

I stand corrected. 8 is more than most films got that were wonderful otherwise. I personally loved The Wrestler, it was raw, beautiful, and emotional, it got two nominations, both of the major acting roles in it. Did Bruce Springstein get nominated for his song? Nope.

Did Standard Operating Proceedure get nominated for Best Documentary? Nope. That was a fascinating film, but no one saw it. There were plenty of films that didn't get nominated and were perfectly great films. The last time that a film completely cleaned up was LoTR with 11 for 11, I think that was more because of its epic size. Do NOT worry, Nolan will get his dues with time. Scorsese finally got his 30 years after making Taxi Driver.

I will agree with you for using Scorsese as an example. I know one day Nolan will have his time to shine but this year was obviously not it. I know we haven't seen the best of the Nolan's just yet.

Exactly. The Oscars are notorious for not nominating people early in their career, even the greats. Also there is a history of snubbing the best directors, Stanley Kubrick never got a win for best director, although nominated many times. I also think Hitchcock never did either, despite creating a niche in film for himself. Film legacies and Oscars are not mutually exclusive.

I will say that TDK did have pacing issues, which would have an effect on people voting for Best Direction of the film, also I believe that there issues with too much material being introduced for a 2 hr 40 min film, it could have been much longer or even two films. The Two-Face story was very condensed, which would have benefited from more screentime.

It was possible for the film to be split into two films but the way I see it, is the 2nd film wouldn't have been as good as the first one, and it wouldn't have been as long either. it would have been boring trying to eat up time by making Two-face seem more evil or something like that. Either way, I think we got the best possible movie out of it.

I'm glad to see them stay so humble. I think the academy nominated the right people, but that is not to say TDK was not a very good movie. It just isn't best picture quality.

exactly right. There were plenty of amazing films released this year if you would only watch them *cough* TDK fanboys *cough*

only the greatest movie of all time

After reading this letter, I will calm down. Love the Nolans. They are amazing people and filmmakers.

the dark knight. What is that?

Its nothing at all! go watch batman and robin its better film making...

Its nice seeing J. Nolan standing up and telling everyone its OK. I, as well as many others, feel completely ripped off by the Academy and too have one of the creators of many of ours favorite film stand up and tell everyone that awards aren't everything and that this film will live longer than any of us is really a testament to the integrity and class that the Nolan's continue to show.

The "no open bar" portion is genius. If this letter is definitely legit, from Jonathan, then it is certainly very cool. We have been looking at this as well, and TDK was a great film that if nothing else has been recognized as such in the court of public opinion. It's kinda like OJ's guilt of murder. Just cuz he wasn't convicted didnt mean we didn't convict him anyway.
The Rake
thefilmnest.com

the nolan brothers are great!

Nobody love Batman on here more than I do. I've read the comics, know the movies word for word when I was kid. Followed every ounce of TDK procduction , The animated series etc. couldn't wait for this movie, I even basically knew about the movie before the trailers But as great as Heath Leger was...the "movie" itself was kinda lackluster in the sense that it started goin ' all over the place I mean the movie coulda done without the parts with the ship and the part with Batman using everybody's cellphones to capture the joker I mean when I watched it when the dvd came out I fast forwarded that part (i see what they (nolans/goyer) were trying to do with making a statement about the citizens of gotham being good ppl by not pushing the button but...a ship?a button>? in real life everybody woulda fought for the button to push it nobody even put up a good argument). Alot of the dialogue was corny ( like the banter in the car between the bank robbers "3 of a kind!" or how about " what do you believe in huh? what do you believe in??" ugh! who would say that after hey just got shot?? or what about the batman copycats on the scarecrow scene tellin' Batman something like " what makes it okay for you to do it" lol.. it was a ridiculous thing to say for the tone of the movie)...the direction was great but c'mon it wasn't better than any of the nominated movies (you may poke fun @ "the reader and Frost/nixon" but they are deep!) So I got what really wanted and that's Heath's nomination so I'm happy. It's a great tribute to his talent. The movie made me say Batman's kinda lame skip the next one and just call the 3rd one"The Joker Begins" he was cool even though he killed like 12 ppl in the movie.I learned all about Batman since I was 7 and after the movie I feel like I don't know him.

The Nolans are very classy guys. i got to see them at a panel for TDK at Wizard World Chicago while it was filming two summers ago and they were just awesome

Yeah, they could... if they were the Coen Brothers!

All class. The Nolans are a couple of great filmmakers/writers and they seem like guys I'd want to hang out with.They're too good for the academy, not because they're elitist snobs, but because they don't succumb to the bickering and gloating that so many Hollywood ego participate in.

lol at the open bar comment

haha, that was good.

Pure class act, that Mr. Nolan is (and his brother). But honestly, nothing will truly make up for the incredible snubbing that they got back when Memento was eligible.

They twisted the rules a bit for Memento to get any noms when it came out, so kudos for them on that. But I think you're right that, for the most part, it was still snubbed.