Superheroes and silly Swedish songs

Thursday night all over the country movie theaters offered late-night midnight movie showings of two movies debuting officially on Friday: “Dark Knight” (a sequel to 2006’s “Batman Begins” with the late Heath Ledger getting Oscar buzz for his role as the Joker) (see “Dark Knight”) and “Mamma Mia” (a film version of the Broadway show that incorporates songs by the 1970s Swedish band Abba (the best-selling Swedish recording act in the United States until Roxette and Europe) – songs like “Dancing Queen,” “Fernando,” and of course “Mamma Mia”).

We got to east Louisville’s Tinseltown movie theater at 8 p.m. and there was already a line of people who had bought tickets for the midnight showing of “Dark Knight” and were vying for the best seats. (There was apparently no such line for “Mamma Mia.”) The young man at the head of the line was made up as Joker and had gotten in line at 4 p.m. – so he would end up waiting for eight hours. Vincent and I are excited about the movie (Vincent and I – having seen “Batman and Robin” in Columbus years ago – saw “Batman Begins’ together in Louisville.) but we didn’t want to stay up that late and are busy over the weekend.

What we were there to see was another superhero movie: “The Incredible Hulk.” Vincent had seen the commercially unsuccessful Ang Lee version in Minnesota (and Stephanie remembers seeing the TV show). This movie had gotten not great reviews and is not doing great commercially, but I knew Vincent wanted to see it (and he’d agreed to see “Mongol” the previous night). I like the star, Edward Norton (from “American History X,” “The Illusionist,” and “The Score,” among other movies). But it turns out that Burns refused to do any promotion for the movie, because he disagreed with Marvel Comics, which made this and the superior “Iron Man,” about how they movie should be edited. I can see why. The movie starts promisingly enough in Brazil. But as soon as Burns turns into the Hulk (with Computer Graphic Imaging), the movie gets silly (all the more so at the end). I don’t think there are really sparks between Burns and costar Liv Tyler. Tim Roth and William Hurt are good actors but their characters also become silly. Burns is well cast in a role as a brooding character, but this makes it tough to have fun with this movie (opposite “Iron Man”), and most of the laughs are at the movie, not with it.

We’ll hope “Dark Knight,” even if it’s also brooding, is better.

-- Perry