I’m not going to hide it, but ever since I saw Adam West don the spandex, I’ve been a Batman fan. I’ve slugged through the good movies (Batman, Batman Returns, Batman Begins), the goofy movies (Original Batman movie) and the travesties (Batman Forever, Batman and Robin), all in the name of a love for the cape crusader. With this in mind, I eagerly as possible in a post-Phantom Menace world, I’ve awaited the release of Dark Knight, the newest movie in this linage of batman movies.
Its been 24 hours since I was let out of the movie, and all I can say is this:
The Dark Knight is amazing.
While there is no denying that the Dark Knight is an action film at its core it is really an ensemble film. Each core member of the cast, Bale, Ledger, Eckhart and Oldman in their respective roles of Bruce Wayne, The Joker, Harvey Dent and Jim Gordon are given equal screen time both together and alone. This results in the movie being as much a study in character as it is about exploding buildings. The biggest question addressed by the movie is of how these characters deal with their responsibility. Ultimately many of the characters, both major and minor, are shown to shy away form making any firm choices where they would ultimately be responsible. This is shown from the mob unleashing the Joker on the city to Dent’s reliance on his double headed coin.
The biggest part of this move that everyone will be talking about is the portrayal of The Joker by Ledger. Gone is the joke buzzers and mayhem of The Joker from his previous incarnations, and instead in its place is a calculating man who is severely left of centre. This Joker is an agent of Chaos who prefers to cut his victims instead of gassing them. The horror of this character is further strengthen by drawing from elements in the comic, The Killing Joke. Most notably is the idea of The Joker attempting to show that any man, no matter how good they are, can be destroyed by a really bad day.
Being a new take of the character, the film makers also made some interesting changes to his origin. The biggest being the refusal to give him any origin or motivation for his actions. As Alfred says in the movie, ‘Some men just want to see the world burn’, and The Joker is this man. While the rest of the cast is shown to struggle with the weight of responsibility and the choices that must be made, and lived with, The Joker is shown to be a primal force of nature. He comes in like a hurricane, causes his damage, and when he is finally dealt with, all are different for the experience.
Ledger, like Eckhart and Oldman owned their roles. I got chills watching the scenes where Ledger and Eckhart interacted with each other. Each monologue by Ledger is also a treat to watch, and the attention paid to the finer details, such as body language do nothing but build his case for an Oscar nomination this year. In general the casting for the film is strong, with perhaps the weakest point in it being the title character Batman. Bale is shown, and continues to be the best Bruce Wayne to grace the screen, but his Batman, and his raspy voice is at times distracting.
We cannot discuss this movie without addressing the one question on everyone’s mind, is the Dark Knight better then Iron Man? If you looking purely at the generation of money, then yes, Dark Knight will be the better movie. If you look at the question in terms of acting and story, then the answer becomes less clear. To compare Iron Man and the Dark Knight this way is like asking a father to pick between his two children.
And as comic fans, we are all the better for having two children then just the one.