The Dark Knight Rises review round-up

The Dark Knight Rises is one of the most hotly anticipated movies of the year, so it will come as no surprise that the critics are raving about it.

Following on from 2008's The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight Rises has received glowing reviews.

MSN Movies critic Anna Smith gave the movie full marks calling it "epic" and explaining "the final part of Nolan's Batman trilogy may just be his best, combining spectacular action set pieces with thrilling plot developments and thorough characterization".

Praise where praise is due, critics are loving Nolan's latest addition to the Batman empire. Here's what they had to say:

The Guardian said : "Old superheroes never die; they simply hang up their capes and retreat to the shadows, awaiting the moment when fashions change and they're required again."
"The Dark Knight Rises may be a hammy, portentous affair but Nolan directs it with aplomb. He takes these cod-heroic, costumed elements and whisks them into a tale of heavy-metal fury, full of pain and toil, surging uphill, across the flyovers, in search of a climax."

The Telegraph said: "Many critics and cinema-goers have wondered whether or not The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan's second Batman film, was really, in its essence, a superhero film. The key ingredients were all there on a superficial level - the costume, the techno toys, the cackling baddie bent on citywide destruction - but Nolan had stirred and synthesised them in new ways to craft a lucid, sinewy crime epic closer to Michael Mann's Heat and Coppola's second Godfather film than anything Marvel Studios has yet produced."

Rolling Stone magazine: "The Dark Knight Rises is the King Daddy of summer movie epics. For nearly three hours, Nolan juggles themes that took root in 2005's Batman Begins and reached doomsday perfection in 2008's The Dark Knight with the late Heath Ledger's masterful, Oscar- winning performance as the Joker.
"Just let The Dark Knight Rises propel you into Nolan's carefully wrought maze. You may have to fight yourself out. But a movie this potent and provocative is well worth the battle."

Empire Magazine: "With spectacle in abundance and sexiness in (supporting) parts, this is superhero filmmaking on an unprecedented scale. Rises may lack the surprise of Begins or the anarchy of Knight, but it makes up for that in pure emotion. A fitting epitaph for the hero Gotham deserves."

The Independent said : "The Dark Knight Rises weakens the further we get from Bruce Wayne/Batman. Nolan has introduced several other characters, among them Marion Cotillard's enigmatic philanthropist Miranda Tate and Anne Hathaway's Selina Kyle/Catwoman."

"The references to the French Revolution as Bane "liberates" Gotham are heavy-handed. This is not a tidy end to the trilogy. However, Nolan throws in enough chases, explosions and fight scenes to ensure that, in spite of its vast running time, the film whistles by."

Full Dark Knight Rises review
Pics: Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway and Christian Bale appear at New York premiere