You have been warned.The Dark Knight starts off with a Bank Robbery with clown-mask wearing robbers. Some guy called the Joker is calling the shots. It also seems that whenever someone accomplishes their task they are killed by the robber behind him, until only one remains. That one removes his clown mask to reveal a make-upped and scarred face. He is The Joker. I found it interesting that the Joker in this telling in fact wore make up to give him that pasty complexion. In Chris Nolan’s Batman, everything has to have a real feel element, and so if someone were to fall into a vat of toxins, they would die, rather than come out with white skin and green hair. This works for me. The next time the Joker appears, he is confronting a group of mob bosses, and starts to explain his plan. The mob bosses are mad at him, because it was their money he was stealing from the bank. The Joker then proceeds to do a magic trick, in which he makes a pencil disappear. This was probably the most shocking moment of the movie for me, because at this point we didn’t know what type of villain he would be, and bam… the pencil disappeared… eraser end first mind you. Yes, this was going to be a very intense movie. They weren’t pulling any punches with the Joker. He will go down as one of the best movie villains in the history of cinema. He was cruel, calculating, and quite frightening. He was also quite insane. I think my favorite Joker moment was when he was walking away from the hospital as it exploded. This felt right out of a comic book to me, which is why I enjoyed it so much. He started off the series of detonations *before* he was even out of the hospital. And then when the final kaboom didn’t happen… that was just classic. And to top it off his outfit made it all the more ludicrous. I can picture the scene in comic book format, and it is perfect. Yes, the Joker stole the show, but I don’t think he would have done without the characters he stole it from.
Don’t forget… there are spoilers present…
Batman… I absolutely love this Batman. He *is* the Batman from the comics. He is the bone breaking, shuriken throwing (albeit Batshaped shuriken), gadget toting, non-lethal Batman. I was 15 when Tim Burton’s Batman came out, and hadn’t read the comics. It didn’t bug me that Batman killed bad guys in Batman and Batman Returns. Then I found out that Batman doesn’t kill people in the comics, and those movies lost a little something. And then in Batman Forever, the Batman I knew would have saved Two-face. He was able to save Robin from the same death… heck, it would have been even better had Robin saved Two-face. Anyway, I digress. So when Batman chucked Joker off the building, in a split second I thought “Good… wait, no… Batman will have killed him if he hits the ground.” Then I think I sighed and rolled my eyes. Then the totally unexpected happened. Batman shot out his grapple thing, and saved the Joker’s life! I cheered! I was so happy! Chris Nolan understands Batman, and that is pleasing.
What? The spoilers don’t end there? Nope… in fact there’s some bad ones ahead…
Harvey Dent. He’s what the movie was all about. It truly was a Harvey Dent / Two-face movie, and Joker was the vehicle in which Harvey travels. Yes, Two-face had a different origin story in the comics, but this worked just as well. Actually it may have worked better. What better way for a man to snap then to have your girlfriend say she’ll marry you, and then hear her die. After the explosion, we finally get to see Two-face, and this was one of the few times Chris Nolan left his “grounded in reality” world of Batman. His scarred side was very shocking, and looked very similar to some of the comics, and the Batman Animated series, but honestly I was expecting something less… less being more in these movies. I figured his face would be that of a burn victim, which would have been shocking enough, but no… this time they went over the top, and I was a little disappointed by it. Character wise, Two-face was written very well indeed. And his final moments with the Gordon family and Batman were excellent. Including himself with the coin toss rotation, and the internal struggle as Jim plead with him, and then relying on the coin toss to make his decision. I was disappointed that Harvey died mainly because I was expecting him to be the villain in the next movie, but also pleased that Batman didn’t kill him. Batman saved the child and himself, and if he could have, he would have saved Harvey… I know he would have. That’s what Batman does.
Ahh… no more spoilers.
Soo… yes it did have a flaw here or there in my opinion, but they are very excusable. There was no sex / nudity, which in my books is a plus. There was no swearing that I recall, which in my books is a plus as well. And there was no over the top, graphic, blood splattering violence… that was shown. It was rated PG-13, and I wouldn’t recommend anyone under 14 seeing it, as it was quite disturbing and somewhat frightening. Having said that… this was almost a perfect movie from my point of view. I really hope that this group makes a 3rd movie, but only if they can make it as good as Batman Begins, because there is no way to top this one.
I give it 9.7 out of 10… it’s an arbitrary number and doesn’t really mean anything, but I think Two-face’s face not being grounded in reality lost a few points.
Oh yes, and if you have the means, see it in the IMAX… I totally recommend that.
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