Trailer:
“The night is always darkest before the dawn and I promise you, the dawn is coming.”
At long last we come to a film, which many people consider the greatest superhero film ever made. Are they wrong? Not necessarily. It just might be the best out of the lot, but it's less effective as a superhero film as it is a thrilling and tightly plotted crime drama.
The film wastes no time on petty origin stories. That’s one of the great things that Nolan realized about the Batman villains. We don’t have to know where they came from, just who they are and what they are capable of. Such is the case of the Joker, a person with a mysterious past that is already at large and robbing banks at the start of the film.
Batman meanwhile makes the mistake of putting the Joker on the back burner and teams up with Gordon and District Attorney, Harvey Dent, to go after the main bulk of the mob. This leads to new mob boss Maroni to hire the Joker to hunt down Batman. Yet the Joker’s real interest is to spread chaos and play games with the mass public. He couldn’t care less about reaching some end goal.
One of the things that the film finally gets right in the Batman mythos is the detective side. Now we saw a bit of that in Batman Begins, but it was sort of obvious to the audience where it was all going. Here it is a real unpredictable mystery pushed along by what can only be considered a constant state of cinematic climax. There is a sense of urgency in every scene and hardily ever lets up. The film also steps up the action. There is far less shaky cam this time around, making the action both easier to follow and more enjoyable to watch.
The movie also moves closer to the Tim Burton’s model of the character, in that the film is more about Batman and the villains than it is about Bruce Wayne. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing but it does take away some of the emotional drama in areas as Wayne doesn’t have much screen time.
Fortunately to make up for this, the film has one of the greatest villains of all time portrayed at his best. Heath Ledger was an odd choice for the role of Joker, as he was typically type casted as the polar opposite. Namely a “pretty boy”. Yet his portrayal of the character is so unique and well done that it has defined him for a new generation of filmgoers. He gets lost in his crazed psychotic performance to the point where you can’t even recognize the actor beneath the make up. He made Jack Nicolson look like an amateur and that’s hard to do.
Like the Crow, there is also a sad side to the role. It was one of Ledgers last performances before his death from drug overdose (the other being the Imaginarium of Doctor Parnasus). It’s just a shame to see such a talented actor go before his time and just when he is about to break free of his typecasting. He even won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, making it the first Comic Book role to win an acting award from that prestigious ceremony.
Aaron Eckhart also appears as the new character Harvey Dent. It’s amazing that the film manages to fit in more villains and characters into a film dominated by the Joker. Where the Joker supplied the mystery and threat, Dent gives the character development. In fact he has such a dynamic character arc that he even gets (significantly) more screen time than even Bruce Wayne. His transformation throughout the film is equal parts fascinating and heartbreaking.
You can’t feel too sorry for him though, right? After all he did steal Wayne’s girl. Katie Holmes is replaced by Maggie Gyllenhaal for the role of Rachael Dawes. Gellenhaal may have better chemistry with Bale (despite scenes between them being brief), but her role as a tough as nails assistant to the DA feels very forced at times. Her constant smiling gets irritating very quickly. It makes you want to yell at her “You’re about to be blown to bits! Stop grinning like an idiot!” It’s another case where Nolan shows that his female characters tend to be the weakest in the film. As a result you feel almost nothing when the character meets tragedy. The film just kind of moves on back into the next high-tension scene.
Overall The Dark Knight stands as a complement to Batman Begins. It has a different feel to it by centering on the action and crime aspect but doesn’t lose the tone of the original. Batman Begins might still be the better conventional superhero film, but this one is a better movie overall as a well developed crime drama. It’s made memorable by its fantastic actors and a plot that keeps driving forward. Though most of all, it finally delivers what a Batman film has really been waiting for….real mystery.
FINAL RATING: 9.5/10- (95%)
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