The Dark Knight

Christpher Nolan waltzed onto the film scene in early 2000 with his (purposely) muddled psychological character drama Memento (based on a short story by his brother Jonathan) and it seems that he’s since made a career out of the dissection and analysis of the human psyche. In the age of the Comic Book Movie, no hero is better suited for Nolan than the Batman. After the franchise took a turn for the worse in the late 90’s, making Batman appear more like a member of the Pussycat Dolls than the fearsome Caped Crusader, it seems the character was shelved in Hollywood. However, a plethora of comic books took a turn for the dark side (The Long Halloween, Dark Victory and Hush, all compliments of senior scribe Jeph Loeb) and thus was the basis for the relaunch in 2005. Originally handled by Darren Aranofsky as an adaptation of Frank Miller’s Batman: Year One, the project was halted after the script was deemed “too violent” (ironic, really…) and was then handed off to Chris Nolan and writer David S. Goyer (Dark City and the Blade trilogy), which became what was to be Batman Begins. Now in 2008, Nolan returns to continue the saga with The Dark Knight.

Batman Begins was the unexpected kick in the teeth that the franchise needed out of a re-boot. Finally fleshing out Bruce Wayne’s transformation into the intimidating force we’ve all come to know and love, Nolan’s desire to ground the material in the “real world” as much as possible lent to the film’s staggering success. It’s just as important to understand where your character came from as to where they’re going, and Begins paved the way or at least laid the groundwork for what will become the standard for the Batman mythos on film. That being said, The Dark Knight does everything the perfect sequel should do. It’s bigger, darker, heavier and faster and it barely slows down at all before the final credits roll.

The only words I can think of to describe the story are Sprawling Epic. The scale of the film is monumental, and the comparisons you’ve been hearing in all the other reviews (Heat, The Departed, Godfather II) are all completely accurate and relevant. It seems the superhero element was lightly dusted around the Gotham City crime saga, whereas you can omit Batman and Joker and still have the makings of brilliance all around. Now that we’ve got the origin story out of the way, it’s time to take on the big guns, and as promised, those big guns are manifested in Bruce Wayne’s arch-enemy and eternal tormentor, The Joker. The story takes so many twists and turns, it feels as if you’re trapped in the backseat as the Clown Prince of Crime drives headlong off a cliff, laughing manically all the way down. Once it starts, there is very little time to catch your breath.

Now, without question, the late Heath Ledger took the Joker and knocked it out of the goddamn park. Watching him onscreen, he was nearly unrecognizable; disappearing into the character completely in what will likely be the quintessential Joker from this day forward. Joker has been somewhat of a wild card (both in character and portrayal) over the years. Cesar Romero’s depiction in the 1960’s camp-fest TV series was rather silly, with the white makeup encrusted in his moustache while just kind of laughing at everything. Jack Nicholson’s performance in Tim Burton’s 1989 film was good, but still didn’t bring anything new to the character. The Dark Knight gives us a Joker that we’ve never seen before, or even dreamed of. The result is actually quite frightening. With his scarred visage, psychotic laughter and sadistic temperament, Chris Nolan and Heath Ledger have given us a villain that is so maniacally unpredictable, you wouldn’t want to be in the same room as him, let alone try and stop his criminal rampage. His actions teeter on the brink of hilarious and terrifying, more than a few times I found myself laughing and cringing at the same time. In doing so, the Joker has become what his namesake represents; the wild card. He leaves a path of destruction in his wake and lets the pieces fall where they may, whether they serve his intentions or not. And it’s extremely tragic that we’ll likely never see a performance of that caliber again.

As far as the rest of the cast, each one knocks out a solidly comparable performance alongside their fallen cast-mate. Christian Bale has finally gotten comfortable in the skin of millionaire playboy Bruce Wayne. In this chapter, it becomes apparent that Batman is the driving force in his existence and Bruce Wayne is just a circumstantial passenger to his dark alter ego. Michael Caine’s Alfred the Butler is spot on, as expected. Gary Oldman returns as police lieutenant Jim Gordon, his character played up this time around, as he represents the dichotomy between the police force (order) and Batman’s vigilantism (chaos.) Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) is back, serving up more Bat Gadgets and also flexing his Wayne Corp muscles, keeping Bruce afloat and under-wraps. One of the ballsiest moves was the recasting of assistant D.A. Rachel Dawes. Replacing Katie Holmes is Maggie Gyllenhaal who truly takes the character to its depth, caught between her deepset emotions for Wayne and her current love interest; which brings us to Gotham’s “White Knight” District Attorney Harvey Dent (Thank You for Smoking’s Aaron Eckhart.) Polarizing the Batman dichotomy as the city’s hope for sanity, he represents one of the key themes in The Dark Knight. There are two sides to every coin. Right, wrong, order, chaos, due process, vigilantism, life and death are all represented and flipped on their sides, crossing lines that should not be crossed and thrusting characters into moral dilemma’s from which the results could be catastrophic.

Improving upon its predecessor by leaps and bounds, yet still remembering where it came from, The Dark Knight is essentially the perfect sequel. It has transcended the comic book/superhero movie genre into something else entirely; something truly epic.