Viewed: In theatre
Release Date: July 18, 2008
writers: Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan and David Goyer
director: Christopher Nolan
Four days later and I'm still trying to process it. I've seen two big summer releases in the interim and they pale in the shadow, and my initial reaction was "that made Iron Man look like a cartoon". The Dark Knight is epic filmmaking, not just because of it's budget or it's 2-and-a-half hour run-tim but how it makes you feel. It's a tense thrill ride, indeed, but it tugs at your innards, makes you a little ill at times, it breaks your heart and makes you laugh and you begin to seep empathy the moment your pulse starts to calm down. It takes you everywhere any movie could possibly take you, defying simplistic categorization. It's not horror, or action, or adventure, or espionage, or police procedural, or drama, or love story, or tragedy, or simple superheroes, but all of them an more. Batman has always been a versatile character and his world has always been pliable, but it's never been use like this, so tangible, so ground-level, so affecting.
I haven't been to a new release movie that I've had to line up for in years... Spider-Man 2 I think was the last, about 4 years ago, and that was opening weekend. The Dark Knight is now in it's third week and it's still selling out shows and pulling line-ups, and getting into the IMAX version has become the hot ticket most evenings. What is it that's drawing the crowds? Is it the hype? Is the the freakshow curiosity surrounding Heath Ledger's (may he rest) final performance? Is it the glut of inescapable advertising? Yes. And Yes. And Yes. But, it's also a damn, damn good film that plays on so many levels that it will impress a vast assortment of people who look for different things from their cinema. For those that don't want to think and those that do equally, it will hit them hard with action, with drama, with intensity. There's marvelous performances here from Christian Bale, Aaron Eckhart and, yes, Heath Ledger that will impress virtually everyone (there's always a cynic in the crowd), and it virtually does have everything you could want out of a movie.
The plot spirals around itself like DNA, at times juggling four separate character threads (if not more), there's layers of players and levels of involvement. The film asks a lot, but gives a lot back in return. If you haven't seen it yet, chances are you will, and although knowledge wont spoil the experience, I'm hesitant about recounting details of the film, simply because it's not an easy chore.
Release Date: July 18, 2008
writers: Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan and David Goyer
director: Christopher Nolan
Four days later and I'm still trying to process it. I've seen two big summer releases in the interim and they pale in the shadow, and my initial reaction was "that made Iron Man look like a cartoon". The Dark Knight is epic filmmaking, not just because of it's budget or it's 2-and-a-half hour run-tim but how it makes you feel. It's a tense thrill ride, indeed, but it tugs at your innards, makes you a little ill at times, it breaks your heart and makes you laugh and you begin to seep empathy the moment your pulse starts to calm down. It takes you everywhere any movie could possibly take you, defying simplistic categorization. It's not horror, or action, or adventure, or espionage, or police procedural, or drama, or love story, or tragedy, or simple superheroes, but all of them an more. Batman has always been a versatile character and his world has always been pliable, but it's never been use like this, so tangible, so ground-level, so affecting.
I haven't been to a new release movie that I've had to line up for in years... Spider-Man 2 I think was the last, about 4 years ago, and that was opening weekend. The Dark Knight is now in it's third week and it's still selling out shows and pulling line-ups, and getting into the IMAX version has become the hot ticket most evenings. What is it that's drawing the crowds? Is it the hype? Is the the freakshow curiosity surrounding Heath Ledger's (may he rest) final performance? Is it the glut of inescapable advertising? Yes. And Yes. And Yes. But, it's also a damn, damn good film that plays on so many levels that it will impress a vast assortment of people who look for different things from their cinema. For those that don't want to think and those that do equally, it will hit them hard with action, with drama, with intensity. There's marvelous performances here from Christian Bale, Aaron Eckhart and, yes, Heath Ledger that will impress virtually everyone (there's always a cynic in the crowd), and it virtually does have everything you could want out of a movie.
The plot spirals around itself like DNA, at times juggling four separate character threads (if not more), there's layers of players and levels of involvement. The film asks a lot, but gives a lot back in return. If you haven't seen it yet, chances are you will, and although knowledge wont spoil the experience, I'm hesitant about recounting details of the film, simply because it's not an easy chore.
Bruce Wayne, in Christopher Nolan's interpretation of him, is a man with a goal in mind, to liberate everyday citizens from fear and turn it instead on the criminal underworld seeking to prey upon them. Bruce's biggest desire is to no longer be the Batman, though he is rather compelled to be, and escaping the cowl is not going to be an easy chore.
Batman has managed - through vigilanteism, technology, and intimidation (and a little collaboration with Detective Gordon) - to send the Gotham underbelly a message, and they're beginning to take heed. Through his successes Bruce sees what he lost, his former flame, Rachel Dawes, taking up with the new District Attorney Harvey Dent. She couldn't find a better man, though, as Bruce sees in Harvey what he himself wishes he could be, free of masks and capable of fighting an even greater battle, against greater odds.
Working with Batman and Gordon, Dent manages to make a massive number of arrests, ranging in the hundreds, removing much of the middlemen from the streets. The charges he has won't stick to all of them but it's only a matter of time before some of them start rolling over and copping deals. The mob kingpins don't want to see it happen, and they take up the Joker on his offer (half their riches) to make sure it doesn't.
The Joker has been terrorizing Gotham for months, but just like the Batman, he's urban myth to most people. He does, however make the biggest splash to make himself known. He's a psychopath, demented beyond rationalism, and a maniacal genius. His machinations are known only to himself, and when they're revealed they send Gotham into a tizzy. As unfathomably illogical as they are, they also are effective achieving the results the Joker wants either, sometimes just as distraction, and sometimes as a distraction to the distraction. The Joker operates in chaos, gleefully.
Like the Batman - caped crusader, dark detective, dark knight of justice - the Joker is who you want him to be - a petty clown crook, an ingenious criminal mastermind, a deviant, a relentless murderer, a petty annoyance - but always he's the counterpoint to Batman's law and order: anarchy and chaos. For Batman's linear, scientific, detective mind, the Joker is an unruly vortex that sucks rationale clear away. He's the most dangerous person on the face of the planet. Heath Ledger breeds an eerily reserved iteration, prone to the quickest of outbursts and a sadomasochistic enjoyment of his own pain, and of others every which way. Ledger plays him as the enigma he's always been, showing many different facets to the character, all of them disturbing, some of them enjoyably so (which makes it even more so). The most frightening aspect of the character is the potential for there to be people like him, people that feed off anarchy and suffering, only there's less likelihood of a counterpoint like Bruce Wayne or the Batman. Nolan set out to achieve the Joker as force of nature. He succeeded.
Christian Bale fight to not be overshadowed by Ledger's performance and manages to avoid the trappings that Michael Keaton fell into: losing out to the villains. Bruce Wayne is on a journey and his confusion over what to do is a vital weakness for the character. For all his strengths, all his confidence, and all the fight in him, he still has self-doubts. His multiple-persona, from excessive playboy front to gravelly voiced superhero is impeccably well-handled by Bale, who infuses some delicate nuance to how the character acts around and treats his contemporaries in every respect, act being the operative word.
The surprise of the film was Aaron Eckhart's transformation from Harvey Dent to Two-Face, which happens within the film and plays out in an unexpected manner. Eckhart imbues a much different heroism in Harvey than Bale does in Bruce, one that's a little more unsteady and also more attractive. Like any hero, he falters, regularly, but is surrounded by people who can hold him back from going too far, a supporting cast of players he appreciates, which makes him a good guy... which is why what happens to him is so much more tragic. Harvey Two-Face... whose self-fulfilling outlook is every hero has to fall.
This is the Empire Strikes Back of superhero sequels, a series of down endings. A torrid tragedy that nonetheless is as compelling and enjoyable as it is relentless. Take note of James Newton Howard's brilliant score, at times minimalist and chilling, and other vivacious and thrilling. There's been calls for an Oscar nod for Ledger, second that for Howard.
There's a high dose of practical shooting in this film, staying away from CGI as much as possible (with the noted exception of Eckhart's transformation into Two-Face, however the CGI was made to look like a practical apparatus), which I hope is a continued trend for big budget movies such as these. With Nolan's direction, cutting from intense close-ups to dizzying helicopter shots, to long lens street level scenes, all lit to emphasize shadows but otherwise keeping the palette natural, the film effectively draws you into a world that hits your senses the right way (apparently the action scenes, shot in IMAX further exemplify this). I was reminded of the Michael Mann film Heat while watching the film progress, and it's beyond impressive to me that Nolan can recreate the intensity, grittiness and dramatic spark of a Mann film in the superhero genre.
Superheroes these days are striving to reach into the real world, but until now, I've never felt it wholly successful. You can't just make a costume out of leather or explain away superpowers and expect people to believe it's the real world... it's only a scant few characters that could operate in such a manner. Even Iron Man, which opened with some heady middle-eastern war commentary devolved into a mano-y-mano (or mecha-y-mecha) throwdown at the end. The Dark Knight did not resolve itself with fists, but ultimately character.
That's not to say The Dark Knight is flawless, but it's flaws are minor and forgivable. It's the There Will Be Blood of superhero movies. I need to see it again.
Rating: 5/5
Batman has managed - through vigilanteism, technology, and intimidation (and a little collaboration with Detective Gordon) - to send the Gotham underbelly a message, and they're beginning to take heed. Through his successes Bruce sees what he lost, his former flame, Rachel Dawes, taking up with the new District Attorney Harvey Dent. She couldn't find a better man, though, as Bruce sees in Harvey what he himself wishes he could be, free of masks and capable of fighting an even greater battle, against greater odds.
Working with Batman and Gordon, Dent manages to make a massive number of arrests, ranging in the hundreds, removing much of the middlemen from the streets. The charges he has won't stick to all of them but it's only a matter of time before some of them start rolling over and copping deals. The mob kingpins don't want to see it happen, and they take up the Joker on his offer (half their riches) to make sure it doesn't.
The Joker has been terrorizing Gotham for months, but just like the Batman, he's urban myth to most people. He does, however make the biggest splash to make himself known. He's a psychopath, demented beyond rationalism, and a maniacal genius. His machinations are known only to himself, and when they're revealed they send Gotham into a tizzy. As unfathomably illogical as they are, they also are effective achieving the results the Joker wants either, sometimes just as distraction, and sometimes as a distraction to the distraction. The Joker operates in chaos, gleefully.
Like the Batman - caped crusader, dark detective, dark knight of justice - the Joker is who you want him to be - a petty clown crook, an ingenious criminal mastermind, a deviant, a relentless murderer, a petty annoyance - but always he's the counterpoint to Batman's law and order: anarchy and chaos. For Batman's linear, scientific, detective mind, the Joker is an unruly vortex that sucks rationale clear away. He's the most dangerous person on the face of the planet. Heath Ledger breeds an eerily reserved iteration, prone to the quickest of outbursts and a sadomasochistic enjoyment of his own pain, and of others every which way. Ledger plays him as the enigma he's always been, showing many different facets to the character, all of them disturbing, some of them enjoyably so (which makes it even more so). The most frightening aspect of the character is the potential for there to be people like him, people that feed off anarchy and suffering, only there's less likelihood of a counterpoint like Bruce Wayne or the Batman. Nolan set out to achieve the Joker as force of nature. He succeeded.
Christian Bale fight to not be overshadowed by Ledger's performance and manages to avoid the trappings that Michael Keaton fell into: losing out to the villains. Bruce Wayne is on a journey and his confusion over what to do is a vital weakness for the character. For all his strengths, all his confidence, and all the fight in him, he still has self-doubts. His multiple-persona, from excessive playboy front to gravelly voiced superhero is impeccably well-handled by Bale, who infuses some delicate nuance to how the character acts around and treats his contemporaries in every respect, act being the operative word.
The surprise of the film was Aaron Eckhart's transformation from Harvey Dent to Two-Face, which happens within the film and plays out in an unexpected manner. Eckhart imbues a much different heroism in Harvey than Bale does in Bruce, one that's a little more unsteady and also more attractive. Like any hero, he falters, regularly, but is surrounded by people who can hold him back from going too far, a supporting cast of players he appreciates, which makes him a good guy... which is why what happens to him is so much more tragic. Harvey Two-Face... whose self-fulfilling outlook is every hero has to fall.
This is the Empire Strikes Back of superhero sequels, a series of down endings. A torrid tragedy that nonetheless is as compelling and enjoyable as it is relentless. Take note of James Newton Howard's brilliant score, at times minimalist and chilling, and other vivacious and thrilling. There's been calls for an Oscar nod for Ledger, second that for Howard.
There's a high dose of practical shooting in this film, staying away from CGI as much as possible (with the noted exception of Eckhart's transformation into Two-Face, however the CGI was made to look like a practical apparatus), which I hope is a continued trend for big budget movies such as these. With Nolan's direction, cutting from intense close-ups to dizzying helicopter shots, to long lens street level scenes, all lit to emphasize shadows but otherwise keeping the palette natural, the film effectively draws you into a world that hits your senses the right way (apparently the action scenes, shot in IMAX further exemplify this). I was reminded of the Michael Mann film Heat while watching the film progress, and it's beyond impressive to me that Nolan can recreate the intensity, grittiness and dramatic spark of a Mann film in the superhero genre.
Superheroes these days are striving to reach into the real world, but until now, I've never felt it wholly successful. You can't just make a costume out of leather or explain away superpowers and expect people to believe it's the real world... it's only a scant few characters that could operate in such a manner. Even Iron Man, which opened with some heady middle-eastern war commentary devolved into a mano-y-mano (or mecha-y-mecha) throwdown at the end. The Dark Knight did not resolve itself with fists, but ultimately character.
That's not to say The Dark Knight is flawless, but it's flaws are minor and forgivable. It's the There Will Be Blood of superhero movies. I need to see it again.
Rating: 5/5