Or not. I had intended to watch Batman Begins earlier today to prepare me for going to see The Dark Knight tonight. (And this just breaking across the news: amazingly enough, apparently the film made $18.5 million during its midnight — or I suppose we should simply say late-night — screenings, beating the previous record holder Star Wars Episode III: The Return of the Sith by more than $1.5 Million. That would be a great one-day haul, let alone late night screenings, for most films. Granted, Spider Man 3 opening day brought in $59.5 million, but that doesn’t seem out of reach. I’m now wondering if my $115 million three day prediction was tame instead of high!) I had even also considered renting through Amazon Unbox and TiVo the new animated Batman: Gotham Knight, the stories of which take place in between the first film and the new one.
But some time this morning as I was about to pop-in the Batman Begins disc, I decided … nah. I haven’t watched the first movie in several months — maybe a year. I decided to go into The Dark Knight a little fresher … with a little less baggage. I’m fairly certain I’ll want to see the new film again. I deliberately am not seeing it the first time in IMAX. With the first film, I did the same thing … saw it and then a couple weeks later watched it again in IMAX, and I found seeing the larger format after already having seen the film once (rather than being distracted by the IMAX or missing elements out of the corner of my eye) was truly rewarding.
So, I’m off to the theater to get in line. Fresh with only the memory of how much I loved the first film. And next go around, I’ll prep with a marathon. Ultimately, if the film can’t stand on its own anyway, no matter how good it is, it can’t be that great.
We shall see.
Out of Focus 