How many times have we been able to say there is "no let up in the action" about a movie? Die Hard comes to mind immediately. How many times have we been able to say that "its an interesting look into our own minds" about a movie? Did you just say Fight Club ? How many times have we said "a refreshing super hero movie thats better than the prequel"? Spiderman 2, maybe? How many times has one been able to say all of it about one movie? Not until "The Dark Knight". Before you click the link to read further, be warned there are a lot of spoilers below. If you haven't seen the movie, you are going to feel quite miserable if you click that link. Even if you have seen it, its quite possible that you might feel miserable after having to read through my blog, but that an entirely different point.
Its easier for Bale fans to write reams about him in this movie. Heck, I would probably defend him in "Reign of Fire". I'd probably go on about his under-playing of the batman role to an extent where it looks like a Joker film at times, or his portrayal of his wayne-vs-batman conflicts - but coming from a fanboy, you are better of skipping to the next bunch of paragraphs.
That leaves us with a lot of people - Caine, Oldman, Eckhart - all who do their roles good service. But the one that towers above all them is the late Ledger. There are already talks of Ledger being nominated for an Oscar. First up, I don't understand the hype about Oscars. The academy snubs Denzel for "Hurricane" and awards him for "Training Day". Crowe gets shafted for "Insider", but wins for "Gladiator". Scorsese is screwed a tonne of times, for Good Fellas - no less, and wins it for a remake. So, whats all the fuss about Oscars?
There are also going to be comparisons between Nicholson's Joker and Ledger's. We could do well to compare SMG and SRT's ODI strike rates. Nicholson's Joker comes from a pseudo-comic-book world, where villains and heroes and everyone around them are a bit larger than life. Ledger's comes from our own confused times. His one dialogue sums it up: "I am like a dog chasing a car, I don't have a plan". And true to all the hype, he gives one of the memorable performances by a movie villain because of the way he has chosen to interpret his role. There are several scenes that stand out. The interrogation sequence, the hospital scene where the Joker actually convinces the disturbed Dent that he isn't the bad guy or the last sequence where the Joker says how Batman "completes" him. The way the movie is set up, the Joker is an integral part of the next movie and the sad part is that we wouldn't have Ledger to take this character to yet another level. However, is this the best-ever performance by an actor in a villainous role? Nope. Not even in the last two years. Anton Chighurh would have shot the Joker with a cattle bolt rifle and not ruffled his hair-do.
As a batman fan, I like the way all the characters from the batman universe find a role in Nolan's movies. Gordon, Fox, Pennyworth - they are all there and they have strong roles. However, I am a bit disappointed with the end(??) of Two-Face. Please tell me he isn't dead, but is safely stashed in Arkham and will be back for the next movie. Two-Face is perhaps the second-best Batman villain after the Joker because he comes from the same place as Batman does, but lost his way in the middle. Having Batman fight the Joker _and_ Two Face in the next one has me lining up outside the theaters for the midnight show right away.
The best thing to happen since inventing the Zip would probably be giving the reins of the Batman franchise to Chris Nolan. While other 'brothers' have lost their steam (read: Wachowskis) and some others have very different priorities (read: Scotts), the Nolans are spot on in whatever they do. The screenplay and tempo of TDK is just flawless. They take a superhero movie, which, by definition is super-human, but add so many human elements into it than anyone has. Be it the choices that people have to make, our conflicts with our own heroes, the thin difference between a good guy and a bad guy, our trust in the next guy, the never-ending debate of civil liberties vs security - Nolan has a way of including all these elements into the story. But what strikes me most is how reflective Nolan's work is of the core elements of Batman. As many of the pre-release articles indicate, I see a lot of similarities with Alan Moore's "Killing Joke". In "KJ", the Joker goes all out to prove to Batman that all that it takes is one bad day to reduce a hero into a crazed nutcase. Compare that with how the Joker tries to break Gotham's belief by destroying it's heroes - Batman and Dent - by intentionally switching the locations and have Batman go after Dent instead of Dawes. In the novel, Gordon who gets caught in the middle, survives and holds on to his sanity. In the movie, Dent loses it while Batman doesn't. Towards the end of the novel, the Batman and Joker share a lighter moment knowing that they have to live with each other. Although not in that scale, TDK ends on a similar note where both the characters realize that they are more entwined than they ever could have thought.
As a fan, what more can you ask from Nolan? He assembled a classic cast for both his movies, he saved the franchise, he gave us two great movies, each of which satisfies the entire spectrum of fans - both the casual movie fan and the comic/graphic novel fan, he gave a human element to both his movies much like how Raimi did with his Spiderman movies, but quite darker, he sets everything up neatly for a great third movie. What else can a fan ask from a director? Probably a promise to come back for the third movie. Probably a quick thriller like the "Prestige" in between this and the next movie. Probably picking up another 'considered-dead' franchise and bring it back to life.
The next few years are going to be fun. A new actor has to be signed for the Joker. Bale needs to find time between filming the Terminator movies. But we can all rest in peace as long as the franchise is in the able hands of Nolan. To paraphrase the Joker, "Here....We....Go".
Read on ... (at your own peril, obviously) ...
