Loading ...Movie Review - The Dark Knight
User Rating:
(8 votes, average: 3.63 out of 4)
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2008 / 150 Minutes / PG-13
Reviewed by Dale J. Nauertz
For the past few years, every summer gives me the opportunity to bitch about how shitty its crop of blockbusters has been…until now. Aside from “Indy 4″ (which wasn’t very good) this has been one of the best summer movie seasons in recent memory. “Wall E” was clever, inspired and heartwarming with a dash of pointed social satire and a unique style (miles above the standard kids movie dreck but par for the course coming from Pixar). “Iron Man” was the most fun a person can have at the movies, with great performances, wonderful character development, and nifty action sequences. Heck, “Get Smart” was downright ingenious considering it was an adaptation of a musty, old TV show. But even so, Christopher Nolan’s “The Dark Knight” stands head and shoulders above this distinguished company. It is one of the meatiest, most thought-provoking, most flat-out stunning films that any summer has unleashed. In fact, after two viewings, I am tempted to proclaim it the best comic book movie ever made. It is so good, in fact, that calling it a mere “comic book movie” hardly does it justice.
Speaking of “justice”, that is one of this film’s major themes. As the film opens, Bruce Wayne/Batman (played to damn near perfection by Christian Bale) has to contend not only with wannabe Batmans who see his brand of vigilante justice as a call to arms, but also with criminals that have responded to his presence by getting either a) more sophisticated or b) completely insane. The mob has gone the former route. A wild card psychopath known simply as “The Joker” has gone another. When the two eventually pool their resources (The Joker offers to put his insanity to use in ridding the criminal underworld of “the Batman” and Gotham’s mobsters are just desperate enough to take him up on it) Batman finds himself put to his most difficult test thus far. How do you stop someone who doesn’t seem to have any motive? How do you figure out their next move when they don’t seem to know it themselves? How can he stop someone as committed to anarchy as he is to law and order (possibly even more so)? How far is he willing to push himself? What rules is he willing to break? How far is he willing to go?
These are intriguing questions and, in pondering them so comprehensively, “The Dark Knight” becomes the most potent and, as I dared to say before, BEST comic book hero movie ever made. I have long championed Tim Burton’s marvelous 1989 “Batman” as the best that superhero movies could possibly achieve. It’s a dark funhouse ride of a movie with two wonderful performances, a nice bit of psychological case study in the Batman and Joker characters, and some glorious sets (also, Danny Elfman’s musical score is amazing). It’s one of my all time favorite movies, in fact, because it’s just so damned much fun. Nolan’s movie may not be as “fun” but it’s a richer, more audacious and, at the same time, a much more down to earth experience. The Gotham City in “The Dark Knight” is not the oversized, twisted funhouse of the Burton films (nor is it, Thank God, the garish eyesore it became under Joel Schumacher’s excesses). The film was shot in Chicago and if you look closely you can still see a lot of that city’s landmarks in the background. This may not look as stylized, but it gives the film a different, more plausible atmosphere. Nolan gives us a Gotham City we can relate to. This grounds the movie no matter how extreme its characters or operatic its themes. The crime in this film isn’t flamboyant or outsized. No one freezes a street in order to send a troop of hockey players down it. Nor does anyone attempt to poison the entire city with Smilex gas. The crimes in “The Dark Knight” are brutal and gritty. The explosions have a weight that they lack in most movies. So do the kills. When a main character (I’m not telling who) dies in this film, it’s not just another casualty, it’s a punch to the gut. Hell, even when some of the extras die it’s quite disturbing. Nolan has honored the conventions of the superhero movie in his own way, without overdoing it and without submitting to the ridiculous as even so many great filmmakers have done within this genre. He pays tribute to the work of golden age comic artists by not making light of it. He plays down and dirty with time-honored heroes and villains, reinventing them for the twenty-first century by stripping them down and making them more human than they’ve ever been before. Also, he explores obsession and devotion and seems to wonder what separates the two. Where does justice end and revenge begin?
This particular question is explored during the large subplot involving Gotham District Attorney Harvey Dent (masterfully played by Aaron Eckhart). Dent is the White Knight to Batman’s dark one. In many ways they are opposite sides of the same coin. Both men are put to the same test in this film and the way that each of them responds speaks volumes about their characters and exposes who each man is deep inside. Much has been made of Heath Ledger’s fiendish portrayal of the Joker (and he does give a magnetic, iconic, powerhouse performance) but despite Ledger’s real-life death Eckhart’s performance carries more tragedy and pathos. Ledger’s Joker is a fascinating performance, to be sure, but Eckhart’s is the more haunting.
In fact, “haunting” is the perfect word for this film. Unlike any other comic book adaptation I have seen, “The Dark Knight” stuck with me long after the final frame had faded to black. Each actor in this film is given a lot of themes and text and subtext to explore. Everyone aside from Maggie Gyllenhaal is given a great deal of heavy lifting to do, and they all rise superbly and effortlessly to the challenge. (Gyllenhaal is fine here with the character that Katie Holmes originated in “Batman Begins” but I can’t help thinking that certain moments of the film would have had more gut impact had Holmes returned to the character). Bale, Ledger and Eckhart all redefine Batman, The Joker and Harvey Dent in ways that no one will ever match or outdo. I thought Keaton and Nicholson would never be topped in their roles, but I stand corrected. I never would have suspected how powerful Bale and Ledger would be. Incidentally, every other review has raved about how disturbing and dangerous Ledger is in this film but let me just add that his performance is also unexpectedly hilarious. Many have speculated that this dark role had something to do with Ledger’s untimely death. I say that’s horseshit. In this movie, Heath Ledger is completely committed to his performance, true, but he also appears to be having a ball. And, like Michael Caine and Gary Oldman as Alfred and Jim Gordon (they’re awesome too, by the way), Eckhart imbues Dent with layers that I never imagined were missing. The awesome performances are matched by slick, dark and vibrant filmmaking. Nolan has clearly learned a thing or two about staging an action sequence since “Batman Begins”. The action scenes pulse with gravity as well as excitement. Nor are these simply action for action’s sake. As the songs in a great musical advance the story so should the action in a great action movie, and the action here is a glorious extension and expansion on the ideas of the film itself. Despite being realistic, “The Dark Knight” is anything but drab. Its style is slick without being hollow, dark without obscuring anything and gritty without sacrificing a hint of beauty.
It has a few flaws (so minor they don’t bear mentioning, really) but its strengths are incredibly strong. My review may sound like exaggeration (I know I was skeptical when I read the glowing reviews of others) but I assure you it is not. “The Dark Knight” pushes comic book filmmaking to a whole new, more mature and thoughtful, level. That other comic book films will have to rise to that level in order to compete now is both exciting and a little scary. Will directors like Sam Raimi and Zach Snyder have the talent and hubris to even attempt what Nolan has done here? Only time will tell. But one thing is abundantly clear: the bar for blockbuster filmmaking has definitely been raised.
