I liked it, but I think it failed in that Bateman's gravelly Batman voice just made me want to laugh, and that despite the Joker being an incredibly psychotic killer, I still ended rooting for him over the 'good guys'.

Note to directors: making people like the bad guys, when you are not aiming at creating a 1990s style sociopathic 'hero', is generally not a good sign.

Then again, it could have been worse. At least they didn't base it on Frank Miller's latest Batman comic series.

Batman was overrated, as was Ledger's performance. He didn't stink, but it was nothing special. The only reason he's getting all the accolades is because he died.

When I first heard he got the role I expected a weak rehash of Nicholson. The Joker in this movie was freaking nuts. I thought he did a great job, dead or not.

Hardly. No doubt some of it was over the top, in the best traditions of posthumous accolades to actors, but I felt his performance was very well executed.

I still don't get the accolades. He didn't even die in a way that encourages pity. The ultimate finding of "accidental" overdose rankles. It's not like he tripped and bottles of oxycontin, xanax, valium, and several OTC sleep medications mysteriously ended up in his gullet.

I'm right there with you Wolf. He "accidentally" mixed the wrong load of drugs... self inflicted death. Either way, he's dead.

I'm not sure I follow how drug abuse impacts on his acting ability. But anyway

http://img172.imageshack.us/img172/4...gument2cs5.jpg

Is that Nicholas Cage?

Anyhoo...John Updike died today. One of my favorite writers, right up there with Poe and DH Lawrence.

There's a song in here somewhere: all my writers are dead.

I was bummed out when Groucho Marx died and it got hardly any news coverage because Elvis died 3 days later.

Billy Powell RIP
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090128/..._skynyrd/print

he's a Freebird now - RIP.

Found this nice article about John Updike, and the following quote is how I feel about his writing:

One of my all time hero's John Martyn has recently died and i'm gutted been into the great man since I was at school which wasn't yesterday http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/...st/7858458.stm

Here's a clip of him at his best a few years ago
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg_Ut...eature=related

I never heard of him, but thanks for the clip.

That was one of the reasons i was glad Bing Crosby died 2 months after Elvis. It knocked him off the front pages for a while.