Sorry, couldn’t help the title. In any case, prepare for a wall of text.
What can I say about this movie? It rocked, obviously - $66.4 million dollars on its opening day, to be exact. But you know this already.
I think that this is one of the best movies of all time, but only in the same way that movies made in the 1920s were the best movies of all time, and then were later surpassed as time moved on. But I digress.
I’m not saying it’ll stand forever as a beacon of how films should be made, but it does right now. And that’s plenty good enough.
In opposition to Iron Man which was about the blockbuster facet of a superhero movie, this Batman series is about the superhero psychology. It’s like my Psych class in first year college all over again, only this time it’s down a darker path, it’s much more enjoyable and I’m eating popcorn. There’s a reason for the title of Dark Knight, the movie really is on almost all of its elements - plot and setting, cinematography, dialogue, characters.
Christian Bale was solid, just like he was in the first film. Always brooding, weary with responsibilities, yet a starkly different person when going out as Bruce Wayne. I realized the raspy voice which I didn’t like in the beginning was a necessary part of the Batman character, since this version banked heavily on the fact that he could intimidate anyone greatly. This Batman had to be scary. He had to bark at his opponents, and when needed, bite.
But as everyone says, this was Heath Ledger’s movie. Of course his recent death increased the publicity of this whole thing on a massive scale, but even if he was still alive now I would say that this was one of his best performances ever. In fact, I would go on to say that this was the best Joker, ever. This character was the reason why some people are afraid of clowns. You could imagine that he could exist in real life alongside all of us, and that’s scary for the audience. Everything about him was there, and it all backed his presence up to a frightening degree - the disheveled hair, the running makeup, the scars, the mismatched clothes, the tongue mannerisms, the pinched voice, the insane laughter, and the real conclusions about the world as we know it.
I don’t get why some people say Jack Nicholson would have done a great job - to me his Joker was just not twisted enough for this film. While Nicholson was all comic-booky in the original Batman, Heath Ledger’s Joker was real. With Nicholson’s Joker, it was a spectacle. With Ledger’s Joker, it was… how would I put it? An experience. He pulled it off so, so, so well. He was that good. Just, wow. I have no more words.
From reading just up until here people might think I’m just giving so much praise to this guy because of the whole media buzz thing, but by going on further you’ll realize I’m really affected by how well they’ve handled this series. As a guilty fanboy of Batman, I want everything surrounding the character to be great - even his Hollywood movies.
What I think was overshadowed by the giant mystery of the above actor’s death was Aaron Eckhart’s performance. He was really good as Harvey Dent, and you could feel the transition from himself to Two-Face even before the physical transformation took place. The anger was there, it was building up. I liked how they managed to make him a sort of unwilling hero even with all of his anti-crime conviction (I believe in Harvey Dent!), right up until the point where he became the villain. Genius.
This movie, like my former teacher said, had the layers which all successful movies have. There was so much meat to the story, so many themes that were explored - justice, duty, the almighty gray area in morality - and I think each one was given enough exposition without it being too contrived. Definitely a well-done script.
The score was fantastic too. It really heightened the tension even more, especially in the scenes where a character was about to make a particularly big decision.
With Heath Ledger’s recent immortalization by the movie and his subsequent death, will there be any actor brave enough to take on this performance of a lifetime? That actor would have a LOT of people to convince. Also, I don’t see lots possibilities to go on from here story-wise; with Nolan’s tendency to focus on things that could happen, that could be reality (meaning no super/subhumans or overly-sci fi stuff), you wave goodbye to the likes of Penguin and Clayface. Bane’s always a possibility, but I like Zsasz more as a villain myself, he’ll seem to fit better with the overall direction and tone of the series. But then you can argue those aren’t mainstream characters, and it might not make sense for a big production studio to do, blah blah blah…
I really find it hard to think of any way in which Christopher Nolan can outdo himself with another one. Actually, to be honest, I wouldn’t mind if this did turn out to be the last Nolan Batman film - it’s shaping up to be so legendary, waaaay beyond the levels of other movies like 300 and Iron Man, what with the events surrounding it as well as its own merits, that anything following it could greatly pale in comparison.
Superb film. It not only outdid its precursor but itself as well. Watch it, period.
