I finally had the extreme pleasure of seeing
The Dark Knight last week.
We have witnessed a vibrant summer season this year, full of various comic-book adaptations from traditional types like
Iron Man and
The Incredible Hulk to more eccentric examples like
Hancock and
Wanted. When the market was dominated by superheroes I couldn't stay indifferent to this hype and started reviewing these summer films as I saw them, not caring one bit that hudreds of other bloggers were doing the very same thing. It's summer after all; the time of the year when popcorn tastes the best and hundreds of people (including me) go to see grand-scale blockbusters which relentlessly compete with each other for the biggest box-office numbers. Mindless entertainment is never more tolerable.
You will see my review of
The Dark Knight here shortly, as a two-volume article that also covers
Batman Begins, since I have realized that Nolans' Batman adaptations make more sense together than they do individually.
The Dark Knight is one of those rare examples of film sequels where a director's ambition overcomes his indolance and/or his greed, and where the resulting product becomes the irreplaceable part of a much bigger whole rather than an exploitative sequel that, in an attempt to increase complexity and sophistication, mess everything up.
But before that article, the magnificence of
The Dark Knight inspired in me an urge to re-think about the best comic book adaptations I have ever seen (including films that are not based on superheroes) and consider where to place Nolan's film on that list. As a matter of fact, I am also intimidated by my recent streak of unfavorable reviews for films like
Spider-Man 3,
The Incredible Hulk and
Iron Man - I don't want people starting to blame me for not loving the comic-book genre. So before anybody sets out to do that, I have decided to make my own 'Top 10 Comic Book Adaptations of All Time' list, in order to prove both to myself and whoever I have angered with those reviews that I am not an American Film Institute member who still thinks best animation of all time is Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (or best fantasy is Wizard of Oz for that matter).
Both comic book and graphic novel adaptations were eligible for this list. Considering the numerous sequels and trilogies as far as these films are concerned, I have grouped relevant and equally-successful films together in order to increase variety.
Here we go.
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10. X-Men & X2 (2000 & 2003) by Bryan Singer
Granted, nothing was the same after the departure of Bryan Singer from this project. Fox should've known better. Replacing the director of
The Usual Suspects with the guy who is responsible from the
Rush Hour series was a bad idea all along - Ratner's film left such a bad taste in people's mouths that they didn't want to hear the name 'X-Men' anymore. The whole franchise suffered because of the last installment, which is commonly known by the cinephiles as 'The Matrix Syndrome'.
The story, as we all know, is about some mutants whose numbers far exceed the threshold between an ignorable exception and a legitimate minority. This is a significant social difference in terms of our superheroes at hand - when they cease to be creeps in the public eye and become a notable nuisance instead, they are in a position to engage in negotiations and make demands. As a result, the personality and identity problems of a typical superhero is replaced by a set of questions regarding racial prejudice, discrimination and mankind's evolutionary steps.
The intellectual depth of these films is limited to the rather superficial implementation of these ideas (stopping a few steps short of Nietzsche and his conception of 'Übermensch'), but they promise a great deal of quality action and suspense. When the subject is not one superhero but many, the entertainment value multiplies and reaches new limits. Maybe the greatest success of these films is how they were able to give every character the amount of attention and screen time that he/she deserves (more or less - a lot of people still complain about the first film being too much Wolverine-oriented. And the absence of Gambit, who probably has more fans than any other X-Man in the series, is nearly as absurd as the absence of Tom Bombadil in The Fellowship of the Ring). Practically everyone I know has their own favorite X-Man (since their childhood) and it's exciting to be able to see them take the stage, one by one, to show off their supernatural skills and try to outwit their opponents.
Guess which one is my favorite?
09. The Crow (1994) by Alex Proyas
Another film that marks the tragic death of a young actor; yet another sad example where a role is indirectly responsible from an unexpected death. Ledger's passing was due to an accidental overdose of sleeping pills; he had started taking them in order to cope with this sleeping problems which presumably arose after his obsession with the Joker role. Lee's death on the other hand, was much more theatrical (if you don't mind me saying that): he was shot on stage during the filming of
The Crow. What happened to the original footage of the incident is still a mystery. To this day I like to think that what we see in the film
is that footage, though I am aware that it's highly unlikely. If I was an actor that would die an early death, I would love to be shot during a dramatical scene and die knowing that millions will get to watch something that they don't see every day.
On a closer look, even their makeup look similar. Scary.
Adapted from the comic book of the same name by James O'Barr,
The Crow is a revenge story with dark, haunting imagery and a perfectly-dense Gothic atmosphere. It tells the story of a rock guitarist named Eric, who witnesses his fiancée Shelly being raped minutes before he is shot by the rapists. But, as the story in the opening lines goes: "when a person dies, their soul is carried to the afterlife by a crow; however, if that person's soul is at unrest, the crow has the power to bring that person back to life so that they can right the wrongs that were done to them before they can find peace." The story, of course, is an excuse for the brilliant production values that this film has to offer; and this is not necessarily a fault, since similar things can be said about the original comic book as well. The setting is as dark, cruel and merciless as it gets -perfect for a come-back-from-the-grave vengeance tale- and in the backdrop of all the events is a metropolis that falls somewhere in between Gotham and Sin City in terms of malignancy and immorality.
The visual quality of the film polishes its existentialist undertones. As he swiftly blade-dances among the murderers and kingpins, Eric ironically becomes lonelier; and with each step taken on the rain-washed pavements of his gloomy city, he appears to be further away from the release he was desperately searching for. He constantly blends in and out of the shades like a child of the night but sometimes it's not clear whether he reigns over it or is helplessly lost in it. The title character is complete as it is written and perfect as it is acted - Brandon Lee takes one step away from his family business and stars in his first non-martial arts role, which unfortunately was to be his last. But more importantly he contributes to the visual and narrative style of the film with his suggestions, most of which were turned down at the time. One of those suggestions was to shoot the whole film in black & white, coloring only the flashback sequences, which makes me wonder where I would be placing
The Crow in this list if the executives had the nerve to take this martial-arts actor more seriously.
08. 300 (2006) by Zack Snyder
Action and nothing more. No other formula, no deep and hidden meanings, nothing. With its sylized, GCI-based visuality,
300 stands as a strong proof for two things: 1) There are delicacies to even making a simple action film unlike many people like to believe. Excusing the flaws of any film due to its simplicity is not a reasonable thing to do. 2) Pure CGI is not something to be scorned; when it's used properly, the resulting work can be as spectacular as any other film with more traditional kinds of special effects. GCI is not a goal but a tool - only those who can make the best of it will be worthy of a praise.
Of course biggest credit for this success should go not to Zack Snyder but to writer, illustrator and film director Frank Miller, who with his poetic narrative and the grandiose visuality, resurrects an ancient legend and enhances it with his own vision. All Synder does is to take Miller's work and turn every illustration into a scene like a kid who puts a blank paper on a drawing to copy it.
300 the movie is a reenactment, not a creation. Only two parts differ greatly, both of which are huge disappointments for the fans of 300 the graphic novel: He uses a much weaker opening sequence (in the original version Miller could grasp the reader's attention with the lyrical use of a simple phrase: "We march.") and a cheesy finale (where the only remaining survivor declares war on east's mysticism and tyranny - needless to say
300 works better without any forced political messages). Despite all this, Miller's work is so daring and original in its nature that the resulting product fails to be ordinary. And Snyder's firm command over computer generated imagery is something to be appreciated.
Upon its release, the film was at the center of a great hype, fueled both by the fans' appreciation of its visual quality and a couple of political discussions that never failed to mention Huntington's 'Clash of Civilizations'. Some thought Miller and Snyder turned the Battle of Thermopylae into a modern-day allegory while others blamed
300 for being orientalist. People listing historical inaccuracies were definitely the cream on top. I find it ridiculous that both the graphic novel and the film be taken
this seriously and be placed at the center of major social and political discourses; mainly because
300 is the kind of story that you tell your little kid before he goes to bed and it doesn't try to be anything more (although
300 the movie is not the kind of movie that you would make your little kid watch). It is, above all, a legend, an epic tale in the Greek folklore like Iliad and Odyssey, something that doesn't need to be realistic nor politically correct in today's standards. If people are in such a dire need to prove the breadth of their political and historical backgrounds that they engage themselves in serious discussions over a work like
300, I have nothing more to say.
07. American Splendor (2003) by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini
"Ordinary life is pretty complex stuff."
With this idea in mind, Harvey Pekar set out to do 32 years ago what was going to be one of the most ambitious and unique projects in the history of comic books: He created a superhero out of himself. Not one with a fancy suit, a couple of supernatural powers and a mask but someone like us, an ordinary person dealing with his existence and nothing more. He observed that in trying to cope with the numerous intricacies of our everyday lives, we were all becoming superheroes - and that our villains were the notorious landlords, sinister Jewish ladies in front of us at the queue in supermarkets, merciless bosses and severe illnesses. His style echoed for years in many other countries, where humorists, comic-book writers and illustrators looked out for the small, interesting details in our lives that we all fail to realize in the turmoils of more ordinary things.
He was a desk clerk when he started all this, and he continued to be one for more than 25 years. While his pessimistic and discontented attitude might give you the impression that he might've failed at anything else he would've tackled, one should not forget that his comic books were feeding from the experiences made available to him by this tedious job - after all, one cannot be a celebrity
and continue writing about the minute yet funny details of an ordinary life. What we all witness yet inadvertently ignore formed his subject matter; things that are not interesting to experience but quite amusing to observe from outside. He complained about many things and made fun of himself at the same time.
American Splendor was his outcry.
The film is not lazy when using this unique original material - directors and writers Berman & Pulcini are set out to explore all the possible interactions between the comic book medium and the movie they are creating. They are not afraid to break the audience's suspension of disbelief by juxtaposing real characters and actors who play them; comic book frames and their movie counterparts; illustrations and live-action scenes; interviews and narratives. Since Harvey's real life intermingles a lot with the happenings illustrated in his comic books, these transitions do not stand out. On the contrary, they recreate the spirit of the original American Splendor in a whole new medium, providing a fresh and unique experience. And that's about the most important thing when adapting from a comic book: coming up with a style that does justice to the original material rather than merely exploiting it.
06. Batman & Batman Returns (1989 & 1992) by Tim Burton
With
Edward Scissorhands, Tim Burton was going to become one of the most prominent auteur directors of our time; but before that he was a talented youngster in Hollywood trying to prove himself and sign his name under influential projects.
Batman came before we were used to his trademark opening credits, his Danny Elfman soundtracks, his twisted dark humor or his extravagant tales starring (most of the time) Johnny Depp and/or Helena Bonham Carter. How he managed to sign an A-list actor like Nicholson to his Batman adaptation is still a thing to marvel (no pun intended) since late '80s was a time when DC's Batman franchise was not as famous or well-known as it is now. Burton's intention to make a film out of it equals to any young director's ambition today to introduce new superheroes to the summer blockbuster market - it requires a great deal of effort, motivation and financially promising directorial skills. It must've been more difficult to do that back in 1989 than now, considering the state of the CGI technology and audiences' inclination towards the superhero genre.
Burton definitely wasn't free to create whatever he liked - when a relatively unknown director and millions of dollars are combined, the ways to deviate from the blockbuster norms are extremely limited. And what you get to see is a typical, high-quality action film, merely peppered with Burton's vision. However in this case, sprinkles were enough to create a river. He creates a colorful and vibrant world despite all the dark and gloomy nature of Batman stories; while some find this attitude too childish to be taken seriously, others (including me) admire the delicate balance between juvenile naivete and insidious malignity. His vision of Gotham City is unmatched with its unique gothic spirit and awe-inspiring grandeur. Keaton is somewhat typical but that doesn't matter because the Batman character itself is quite typical while Joker (or the Penguin for the sequel) is the real deal.
The casting of Nicholson for Joker is simply brilliant, and he does justice to the role with his genuine Joker smile (even without any excessive makeup) and cheerful yet disturbing tone. Burton chooses to emphasize the funny and entertaining aspects of the character more than his sadism and frightening nature, but his affinity for chaos remains intact. The beautiful thing about both the Joker and the Penguin is that their complexity makes room for a variety of interpretations. Burton's choice here is coherent with the overall tone of the films, which is a good thing. If you are looking for more serious tones in a Batman adaptation, you might not like what Burton does but you have to concede that he is executing a unique vision; a vision that would be more influential in his later films such as Sleepy Hollow, Big Fish and eventually his masterpiece Sweeney Todd.
05. V For Vendetta (2005) by James McTeigue
Alan Moore's critically-acclaimed graphic novel plays on a fantasy that we all have; a fantasy that surfaces whenever we are confronted with immorality or corruption within the political circles in power. Or any wrongdoing according to our terms will do. Yes, I am talking about the fantasy of having the power to simply kill off everyone responsible, one by one, without any trials, defenses or deterrent punishments. Moore takes this situation to an extreme in search for a more solid legitimization: A fascist, totalitarian English state. Not only it constitutes a more justifiable enemy to rebel against, this fictional state also creates the perfect setting for Moore to voice his concerns about the serious tendencies towards fascism that he thought was present in his home country. In his 1988 foreword for V for Vendetta, he complains: "the tabloid press are circulating the idea of concentration camps for persons with AIDS. The new riot police wear black visors, as do their horses, and their vans have rotating video cameras on top. The government has expressed a desire to eradicate homosexuality, even as an abstract concept, and one can only speculate as to which minority will be the next legislated against. I'm thinking of taking my family and getting out of this country soon, sometime over the next couple of years. It's cold and mean-spirited and I don't like it here anymore."
Moore does not believe that class conflict is the major element in humanity's political evolution. Therefore his idea of political poles differ from the established idea of left wing vs. right wing - he prefers a political spectrum with fascism and anarchism at the two ends. With the aim of observing these two poles clash, he places a highly-capable anarchist hero at the heart of a fascist state; and instead of merely making them fight, he chooses to study the ideological battle between these two extremes. Although making them the despicable villains of this story, Moore does not treat his fascist leaders like cartoon Nazis - he tries to bring dimension and depth to these characters, observing their beliefs, their motivations and their reasons to go along with this particular ideology. This way, he is able to reach more worthy conclusions (or to ask more accurate questions), and enhance the hero value of his central character.
Commonly attributed to Wachowski siblings, the film adaptation of this graphic novel is altogether a different story - so much that Moore didn't want to be listed among the credits of the film after seeing the screenplay. Wachowskis recast the fascist-anarchist conflict with that between American neo-conservatism and current American liberalism. This is either a simplified version or a different one, depending on how much you liked the resulting product. Narratively, Wachowskis' version is much more compact than the ten issues written by Moore. At the cost of a simplified political message, Wachowskis have structurally improved the story by trimming unnecessary characters, plot lines and anything else that would've swayed them from the central notion of 'liberalist vendetta'. Their rationale is similar to that of Peter Jackson as far as his Lord of the Rings adaptations are concerned (he rationalizes the lack of Tom Bombadil by the fact that he did not serve the central storyline that concerns The One Ring and its destruction). The resulting product is not something you would like to think about but something to be lost in.
V For Vendetta the movie plays on your feelings, not your thoughts and that seems to be quite the opposite of the original graphic novel. The film is extremely theatrical as it's written (e.g. The 120-word V alliteration) and directed (e.g. The spectacular destruction of the Old Bailey, accompanied by Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture) but it doesn't feel forced thanks to Moore's extraordinary storytelling skills and to the harmonious atmosphere created with the characteristics of the hero V. The film can also be read as an optimistic counterpart to Orwell's famous dystopia Nineteen Eighty-Four.
04. A History Of Violence (2005) by David Cronenberg
We are all animals. It's a fact that is rather hard to give in, but a fact nonetheless. Despite all our technological achievements, complex communication methods and capabilities of thinking, we are still a part of nature. Our dominancy over this planet does not make us exempt from her rules. We command her, but we cannot deny the parts of her that are intrinsic to our existence, no matter how hard we try. Our laws, compared to hers, are nothing.
It is exactly this fact that Tom Stall finds out after the fateful event in the diner. At first glance, it appears that everything in
A History of Violence happened due this coincidental act but that's not really the point. The question here is not how Stall's violent nature surfaced or why, it's the fact that it exists. Partly due to his own past but more so because of the nature of mankind. The 'history' in the title alludes not to Stall's or his brother's violent background but to that of humanity. We are ancestors of a breed that survived and dominated this planet, not because it's moral, peaceful or compassionate but because it's strong. Because nature is merciless. Only the fittest survive.
Cronenberg's film, which is somewhat more tame compared to his previous works, is simple in style but not simplistic in its message. The expectations of a more explicitly-controversial film or the typical quirkiness from Cronenberg, combined with the minimal and realist cinematography, leads to a lot of misconceptions regarding the film. The result? A lot of unfavorable reviews for all the wrong reasons.
A History of Violence is not only a hard film to read but also a set of very legitimate questions are posed regarding the subject matter, for which straightforward answers are quite hard to find. Is there really no escape from a criminal/violent past? How much of this 'history' is hereditary? Or is it inherent, by the same amount, in every human being? If so, how do some uf us manage to suppress this instinct while others have a hard time dealing with it? What's the difference? Which identity of Stall is real the real one, Tom or Joey? Are we all a part of this giant hoax named 'a peaceful life'? What's the price for living against our instincts? Trying to come up with reasonable answers to these questions would produce a long, scholarly review of the film, for which I don't have enough space here.
Aside from all this,
A History of Violence is also one of the rare examples in this genre that proves not every graphic novel has to have a stylized visuality - realism goes a long way if you know how to make the best of it.
03. Persepolis (2007) by Vincent Paronnaud & Marjane Satrapi
Animated with somewhat of a more traditional methods as opposed to the ever-increasing technical excellence of Pixar,
Persepolis is one of the best examples of French animation which rarely disappoints. It's a different taste in both the animations industry (with its innovative 2-D visual style) and the comic-book genre (because, seriously, how many comic-book adaptations are actually animations?). But more importantly, it's a film about Iran and the Islamic Revolution, made in a European country and without any orientalist attitude. For this reason and nothing else, it might be unsurmountable.
People were extremely sceptical when it first came out and it's understandable - Sarkozy's France was making a film about Iran and people hadn't even finished discussing
300 yet. When I was seeing the film in a theater, the attendant even chose to lecture me about France's Middle-Eastern politics and how this film was merely a part of it. It's funny how people can overlook a couple of important details to prove themselves right - how, for instance, they can forget about nuns in the Austrian boarding house and how Marji's experiences there were practically the same as those back in her home country. This juxtaposition of Islamic and Christian fundementalism was one of the central issues in the film, yet people chose to ignore this and express discontent over how the West criticizes the consequences of Islamic Revolution. Either selective perception or ignorant hypocrisy.
The film is gripping as it starts, extremely dynamic and well-paced as it progresses and hearth-breaking as it ends. Although it touches a lot of important worldly issues, the central storyline in
Persepolis never departs from the coming-of-age experiences of Marji. Everything revolves around this girl, and the changes in her perception as she grows up are all reflected to what we see on screen. We observe everything through her eyes and this adds a whole new level of sincerity and intensity to the story, which would otherwise feel politically overloaded. If a film is as emotionally captivating as this
and technically innovative at the same time, you have nothing more to ask for.
02. Batman Begins & The Dark Knight (2005 & 2008) by Christopher Nolan
Finally we come to the films that much of the hype today is centered around; and I'm sure many of you are not surprised to see them so high. Occupying the second slot is Christopher Nolan's dark and serious interpretation of Batman, which started three years ago with
Batman Begins where he unprecedentedly chose to explore the origins of this superhero. A brave attempt to say the least. He provided first-time answers to a set of questions such as to who this 'Caped Crusader' really is and how he came to be the hero we know. After establishing the past, the personality and the philosophy of the character, came
The Dark Knight, where Batman is given a villain of considerable strength, capable of challenging not one but
all his powers. It's like a building a neat and strong town in Sim City and then sending over a tornado to see how strong it really is. Joker is the perfect choice for this, as his power lies not in his muscles or fighting techniques but in his astute and chaotic nature. The fact that he loses when engaged in hand-to-hand combat with Batman is irrelevant. Needless to say, the sequel is less philosophical, more action-oriented and definitely more grandiose.
Inspired not by the traditional franchise but by the unique looks of both Alan Moore and Frank Miller, Nolan chooses the very opposite of what Tim Burton had set out to do - his interpretation is extremely dark and serious, where nights are longer than usual, scars are deeper and daylight isn't bright enough. The atmosphere is a perfect blend of Michael Mann's gritty realism and David Fincher's dreamy melancholia. Nolan takes this well-known superhero, smoothens all the extremities and comes up with plausible explanations for every single detail. As a child, Batman was probably the least impressive superhero to me, since I thought he could merely
afford to be powerful; that he was a hero simply because he had the money to be one. It is exactly this impression that Nolan shakes with this philosophical approach to a man who wears a bat suit and kills his enemies using expensive equipment. I will provide a more detailed analysis regarding this issue in the upcoming two-volume 'Nolan's Batman Tales' article that will cover both these films. For the sake of that article, I will stop now.
It is true that Nolan shows a superior command over cinematical tools of expression when compared to Tim Burton - thus I have ranked his films higher. It is also true that most of the time, philosophical depth is preferable to naive fun. But this should not mean that
Batman Begins and
The Dark Knight are everything that Burton's duology tries to be - both interpretations are vastly different and one does not necessarily substitute for the other.
01. Sin City (2005) by Robert Rodriguez & Frank Miller
The ultimate example for movies adapted from a graphic novel,
Sin City is also an important cornerstone in the history of cinema. It single-handedly increased the limits for digital filmmaking to new heights and proved that green screen is not merely for background decoration. It's also the first (and probably only) adaptation that stays 100% true to its original material, thanks to the visionary approach of Robert Rodriguez towards this highly-stylized, noir-style graphic novel.
Unlike
300 though, directorial touches can be easily spotted in
Sin City. Rodriguez did not simply sit back and enjoy Miller's vision being animated and this is definitely not a lazy adaptation. His film is not only a new age in the comic-book genre but also is the latest representative of hardboiled crime novels and their subsequent reflections on cinema.
Sin City holds a unique spot in film history as a film that is both reminiscent of its much older ancestors
and essentially a part of today's postmodern movement. Its visual language recreates the old existential tones in the classical film noirs with aggressive use of chiaroscuro that will remind you the best examples of German Expressionist silents. The screenplay is Frank Miller's poetic narrative as it's written, and a typical noir fiction as acted. On top of all these is the elaborate and innovative use of colors in a primarily black & white film that never comes off pretentious. It's a perfect film for both people who never even heard about the original material and those who are a fan of the graphic novel. The excellence is both in the execution of all cinematical elements and in the choices made regarding how to adapt this particular graphic novel. Considering the quality of the original material, nothing could've been better.
Watching
Sin City is the closest experience to actually
watching a graphic novel on screen - this will not only be an observation but also a profound feeling. Merely copying the original work, frame-by-frame won't give your film this quality - you and your whole team (especially the actors) should be willing to challenge some of the conventions and reflect this spirit to your work to the best of your ability.
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That's it folks. The result? A big kudos to the year 2005 for producing this genre's best examples and changing its face forever. With
Sin City,
A History of Violence,
Batman Begins and
V For Vendetta, the bar for the comic book/graphic novel adaptations has been set as high as it has never been; while some like to believe that this year's
Iron Man had a similar effect, I find it not even comparable to these examples I have listed.
So... now it's time for opinions, suggestions and -definitely- a couple of flames. Shoot.
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