I have been sitting here trying to decide if I had anything to say about the movie that has not already been said; I don't. The existing reviews all say the kinds of things I am going to say here, but since those reading it know me, you will continue reading anyway. So, here...we....GO!
Gotham City (looking a lot more like Chicago than New York, which I like) is in despair. The mob is running the city, but things get worse when a maniac bank robber actually steals from that mob. He goes by the name of the The Joker. He is pure evil; the kind of evil that is evil just because he likes it. He is not after money or even power really, he only wants to prove that all men can be evil. He also wants The Batman to unmask himself and until The Batman does that, he will kill people. The Batman, Lt. Jim Gordon and Gotham's hot shot new District Attorney, Harvey Dent, are out to put a stop to the madness. Batman/ Bruce Wayne and Gordon believe Gotham has finally found their true hero. Dent is not afraid to put mobsters away and he really wants to clean up Gotham. He is the white knight in all of the darkness. Thus, The Joker must break him. The Joker knows he has to destroy Gotham's hope if he is going to prove his maniacal point.
There is a lot more to the story, but the basics have been provided for you. The Dark Knight is a hard boiled crime thriller masquerading as a superhero/comic book movie. If Batman was a detective and 2 scenes were changed, this would be the kind of movie that got released in November vying for Oscar gold. It has little in common with the typical superhero movie. There is almost nothing light hearted about it and it is not at all for children. While it has virtually no bad language it pushes the boundaries of the PG-13 rating for the brutal violence and sheer intensity of story. The Dark Knight is a very serious film and is probably out of place in the middle of summer, except that it is massively popular. Christopher Nolan might be the best director working right now. The way he weaves the stories together and the way he allows Bruce and Batman play second fiddle in a movie that is supposed to be about Batman is nothing short of brilliant. This is Harvey Dent's story; this is Dent's movie. The way The Joker and Batman fly in and out of the story makes that even more apparent. In focusing the story on Dent, Nolan is able to to play with the morality of good vs. evil in incredible ways. We see Dent go from being a boy wonder all the way to being Two-Face and everything in between. There is a scene where Dent kidnaps a Joker lackey and considers the unthinkable to finish the Joker. That scene is perfectly situated in the middle of Dent's story. The middle point between good and evil.
Much has been said of Heath Ledger's Joker and all of it deserved, but do not let Heath get the only major credit here. Aaron Eckhart is the perfect "White Knight" of Gotham. He looks the part, of course, but he also nails the do-gooder part and watching his descent into madness is nothing short of spectacular. Christian Bale is back in the thankless role of Batman. He has less screen time than I would have thought possible, but he does get some great time as Bruce Wayne. The movie upps his playboy status and when he becomes Batman he is certainly intimidating. His Batman growl is my single gripe about the movie. He sounds so fake, it is hard to take him seriously at times. Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman are both very much game for their roles as Batman co-conspirators and Caine gets a really nice monologue explaining The Joker's possible motives. Maggie Gyllenhall emerges as Rachel Dawes, but she isn't given all that much to do. She does have a nice chemistry with both Eckhart and Bale, but she is merely on screen to move the story along.
Ledger, for his part, is among the most evil villains you will ever find on screen. His hunch, his gimpy walk, his Chicago like accent and that laugh are all purely satanic. All weekend on T.V, channels were running every Ledger film they have and I watched bits and pieces of Brokeback Mountain, 10 things I hate about you, The Order, Knight's Tale and Lords of Dog town and nowhere on the screen in The Dark Knight did I see Heath Ledger. A few years ago the unthinkable happened and Johnny Depp was nominated for an Oscar for a Keith Richards impression for a big summer blockbuster. So, it is not unheard of and it would be well deserved for Ledger. I was in the minority for liking the casting from the get-go and I believe that I would be saying this even if Heath was alive today.
Here comes the spoiler!
I have read and heard much in the way of the ending, about how pessimistic and cynical it is. Summer movies are supposed to give us a nice sense of closure at the end; we want to feel happy when it is over. Here, The Joker wins. Sure, he is caught, but he accomplished his goal. Not only does Gotham's White Knight disintegrate into a killer, Gotham's Dark Knight takes the fall to keep that secret. For the most part, The Joker lost. The people on the freighters did not blow each other up and only 5 people in Gotham know what happened to Dent, but we know. We see that evil can win. Evil can get the best of even the best men. It is very much a downer ending and it may leave you unsatisfied, but I think that is cool. The Dark Knight is not meant to be popcorn entertainment. It is supposed to leave you exhausted, sweating and it is meant to leave you gripping your seat. It is 150 minutes of dark intense drama emphasized by truly stunning visual effects and stunts. Hello, 18 wheeler being flipped!!
The Dark Knight deserves all of the praise and money it is earning and if the academy had any balls at all, it would award this picture with a Best Picture nominee. A few years ago it would have been unheard of for a Fantasy picture to be nominated and win, but The Lord of the Rings transcended that genre. The Dark Knight transcends The Superhero Genre. It transcends the blockbuster genre; it moves beyond a summer film. It is exquisitely directed, acted, paced, scripted and delivered and what more could we ask for in a movie?
Final Grade: A+
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