The Night is Always Darkest Before the Dawn

Review: The Dark Knight


I’ve been waiting for this film. I’ve been waiting since I watched a magical film known as Tim Burton’s Batman over and over again as a kid. I’ve been waiting since I got into comics and read Frank Miller’s Year One & Dark Knight Returns along with Alan Moore’s The Killing Joke. And I’ve been waiting since Chris Nolan put Batman and Gordon on a rooftop at the end of his fantastic Batman Begins, had them talk about escalation and showed us a Joker Card. It was then that a pact with the audience was made. Not just for a sequel, but one that could rule them all. A cinematic version of Batman the likes of which has never been seen on screen. A truly disturbing, maniacal Joker, a truly detective Batman, a Dark Knight. Three years later, promise fulfilled. And then some.

The Dark Knight is everything I hoped it would be and more. This is not only a phenomenal Batman film, it’s a great film. Period. End of story. I’m not gonna call it the Godfather 2 of superhero movies. Though it is a great crime film. I will call it Batman’s Empire Strikes Back. But not only that, the reason why you have to see it. The reason why everyone will be talking about it is that its done what comic fans have known for a long time.
Comics can be adult too.

This film is for everybody who cringes when someone’s total view of comics is the SLAM, POW, BOOM, of the old Adam West Batman series. Yes, comics can be corny and lightweight, just like movies can. But just like the film medium, they can also be adult, strikingly intellectual and dramatically heartbreaking. And that’s what tale that Christopher and Jonathan Nolan along with David Goyer have crafted.

And this is craft, from all the people involved. From a beautifully tragic script, to often stunning cinematography by Wally Pfister, everyone is firing on all cylinders. I can’t heap enough credit on Nolan. He went in and declared he was going to make the film his way. And boy did he ever. I adore Batman Begins. Until this, it was the purest representation of the Batman I love to be realized onscreen. Some however had beef with how Batman’s fight sequences were depicted. I have heard the “choppy editing” criticism many times. I personally had no problem with The Begins sequences. I felt the montage gave Batman an almost mythic quality, a force of justice and fear that he never fully had onscreen. It made the “Batman sneaks up on crooks” scenes the way they should feel, frightening. Well it’s like Nolan heard the criticism from some and took it as the throwing down of the cinematic gauntlet. Most of Batman’s fights are choreographed in continuous long takes where you simply watch Batman just dismantle hood after hood on his path to his target. Nothing will get in his way. And it’s Bale, and you know he’s unstoppable. It was the biggest “take that” Nolan could do. There’s one scene where Bruce Wayne, in a tux no less, just tears through a henchman and dismantle’s his shotgun with the ease of rolling out of bed. It’s just one of the many badass moment’s within this film.

Another thing I simply have to mention is the pacing. In Begins, the first forty mintues flew by. And those first forty hold a lot of powerful stuff, so much to the fact, that on first viewing, I felt they almost didn’t have enough time. That’s a criticism that has changed over multiple viewings. However Dark Knight moves like a freight train. It hits the ground running and never stops. It’s a rollercoaster tragedy. The pacing, like the film itself, pulls no punches, and just constantly moves, grows and astounds you. This isn’t even a Batman film. It’s the ensemble of Gotham City. Every character, large to small gets their due. I’m talking about bit part cops on Gordon’s crew included. What the Nolan’s have done with these characters is make them real, and with giving each of them a spotlight to create a tangabile world. Gotham is a place of graft and greed like no other city you’ve seen. The only good people who survive it, do so with major causalities. But they do survive. And they continue on, even in the face of insurmountable odds. And because of that, despite all the death and darkness, The Dark Knight is actually about hope and the prices you pay for it.

So let’s talk about performances. Heath. Everyone will be talking about Heath. And rightly so. His Joker is electrifiying to watch onscreen. He totally disappears into the role. And does what so would deem the unthinkable, makes it his own in the face of Nicholson’s performance. That’s a bold task to achieve. And a achieve it he does. They way he deliver’s “Do you want to know how I got my scars?” is absolutely classic. His Joker has his own psychology that is totally askewed form a normal reality, yet wholly intact. The performance is beautiful to watch, down to the ragdoll like skipping away from the hospital. He just nails it. It’s such a shame that he’s gone. This performance would have shot him to superstardom.

And of course there’s Bale. He IS Batman. He now owns the role in my mind. Bale owns the psychology, the front of a goof playboy, the rage and force of nature that is Batman, and the moral compass that is the true Bruce Wayne. I love how it takes a village to make Batman too. Batman wouldn’t be Batman without the support structure he’s establish of Caine’s Alfred as his heart and conscisous, Freeman as his own personal Q, and Oldman’s Gordon as his partner in a war against crime. All of these men are stellar in their roles. Lets specifically mention Oldman though. Of the three of them, he is given the most to do, and God, does he do it beautifully. Oldman disappears into Gordon, one of the few good cops in a city of corruption. Who would have thought Drexel would become the truest representation of Gordon we’ve seen. This is the Gordon written about in Frank Miller’s Year One. The one that puts his job before everything, sometimes to the detreatment of his family. Can we talk about how badass and overdue it is to simply have Batman talk on a roof with the signal. Did it need to take five movies to make that happen?


Also great is Gyllenhaal, who brilliantly steps into the role of Rachel. Maggie has a thankless part here, but she plays it well. Her chemistry with Bruce seems real, and they look better together. Katie Holmes always looked to young for Bale, and I believed she was a an attorney about as much as I believed Denise Richards as a nuclear physicist in The World is Not Enough. Maggie is real, and her relationship with Harvey totally logical. Apparently Rachel loves to get it on with coworkers, it was subtly hinted that Rachel and a thing with the now dead DA form Begins as well. Office whore. Anyway, when Gyllenhaal is called upon, she absolutely nails it, and its heartbreaking.

Which leads us to the films unsung hero, Aaron Eckhart’s Harvey Dent. This is Eckhart’s role of a lifetime. I’ve always liked him, particularly in Thank You for Smoking and the little seen but tender Conversations with Other Women. Here, Eckhart shines as Gotham’s White Knight District Attorney. He is just a good man, trying to do his best in a dark world. His lines are instantly memorable and his work subtle. Eckhart gets to bring his nice guy image but add it with a hint of darkness that replaces the smartasses he’s usually called upon to play. His gentleness combined with his darkness creates a fascinating human being whose fall is Shakespearian in it’s tragedy. When Dent flips the coin, it really is a tossup as to what will happen. And Two Face, whoa, this ain’t your Tommy Lee Jones neon pink make-up. I’m so proud of how they have kept Two Face’s look hidden from the public. In this day and age of internet leaking, its astonishing and makes it’s reveal in the film all the more terrifying. This is Tim Sale’s Two Face all the way, and Eckhart owns the role, just as much as Ledger does his. I really can’t praise him enough, he’s almost the main character of the film and I hope gets recognized for his work.

In fact, I hope that this film does get the recognition it deserves (I’m looking at you Oscar). This film should be lauded across the board. It’s not just a comic book film, it’s a piece of art. It’s one of the best films of the year to date, followed by Wall-E, Iron Man, and Snow Angels. Check out that list. Who’d have thought I’d see the day where two absolutely fantastic superhero movies come out in the same year and are amazing for the exact opposite reasons.

My only qualm, is where do we go from here? How do you top this, or continue on? Even a great third film will be slightly diminished compared to this. Who do you use? Will we see a Zodiac style Riddler take the stage, throwing Gotham into Chaos again and leaving Gordon cryptic messages signed only by a question mark? Might the Penguin pop up as a secondary mob boss on Gotham’s transition to freak town? By the end of Dark Knight, all our heroes have taken significant losses, some more then others. What will Wayne’s arc be? He’s at a pretty low point by the end of the film, what he needs in the third film is glimmer of hope. Will they do this by making a first true Catwoman? Don’t get me wrong Michelle Pfeiffer is iconic as the Catwoman she was cast to be, but that’s not the Catwoman of the comics. Not the jewel thief with questionable morals. Not the woman who is a female Batman of sorts, who is his equal, and who finds him as wildly attractive as he finds her. To go there would be to do what Ledger has done here, go a completely different route form their predecessor and make the role their own. That’s a tough act to follow.

And so is this film, but Nolan and crew are more than up for the challenge. It is always darkest before the dawn. And the dawn is coming!

Go see this film, then see it in IMAX, then see it again. Trust me, you’ll be glad you did.


Sidenote: The Dark Knight grossed 66.4mil in it's openning day. The largest openning ever in 24 hours.