Movie Review: The Dark Knight

As the end credits began to roll and the house lights came up, I stood up to make my way out of the theater and I was shaking. This movie was that good. Quite frankly, I'm not sure any world that can produce a Batman movie as bad as 1997's Batman & Robin deserves one this good, but fortunately we've been blessed with it anyway. The old guard from Batman Begins is back and have upped their already considerable game. Christian Bale once again does a fine job as Bruce Wayne, at this point I'd have a hard time accepting anyone else in the role. Michael Caine is once again amazing, capturing the essence of Alfred: unflinching loyalty and a biting wit. Morgan Freeman is still a great Lucius Fox. There's a moment at the end where we see Lucius reacting to something he's seeing (I won't spoil it) and he flashes one of those great Morgan Freeman smiles and I was right there with him, part of me wanted to stand up and cheer. You'll know the moment when you see it. Then there's Gary Oldman. Words cannot do justice to how much I love Gary Oldman in this role. He is Jim Gordon straight from the comics page. The look, the voice, the attitude, this is the man who cleans up the Gotham PD.

The newcomers do good, too. Maggie Gyllenhaal steps into Katie Holmes's thankless role from the first film and really makes it her own. Nothing against Holmes's performance, but I think Gyllenhaal does a much better job with world weary. Aaron Eckhart is perfect as Harvey Dent. I totally believed in him as Gotham's white knight, but from the beginning the seeds of his fall were clearly planted. Anyone with a passing familiarity with the Batman mythos knows where Harvey ends up, but the cruel inevitability of it doesn't make it any less devastating to watch.

That brings us to the Joker. The only word that can describe this film's depiction of the Joker is "perfection." I always liked Tim Burton's Batman, but I'm not sure I'll ever be able to watch it after this. Nicholson's Joker was a gangster with a skin condition. Yes, he was crazy, but amid the craziness were understandable human motives, money, power, recognition. Heath Ledger's Joker is a force of nature. Money? Who cares. Power? Eh. Recognition? Not the point. As Alfred puts it: "Some men aren't looking for anything logical. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn." The Joker in The Dark Knight is truly scary, not because he's insane, though he clearly is, but because he's the smartest, most ruthless guy in the room. Every second he is on screen is filled with tension. There's a moment early on where the Joker does a "magic trick" and the audience will laugh when it happens. It's not an "Oh, isn't that funny" laugh, it's a shocked laugh, the sound of the tension being involuntarily released. It's sad that Heath Ledger didn't live to see the reception that his performance in this film, because this is probably some of the best work of his career.

The central question of the film is a particularly relevant one: If you're faced with an evil that can't be contained, that you can't intimidate or reason with, then what do you have to become, what compromises do you have to make, what lines will you have to cross in order to stop it? It's really always been the central dilemma in the Batman/Joker relationship. It's a conflict Batman can't win, he can only minimize his losses. Batman can catch the Joker, but the Joker will eventually escape (it's what he does) and go right back to causing death and destruction. If Batman kills the Joker, the Joker still wins because Batman will have compromised himself. The Joker will have proven his point, that rules don't matter, that when the chips are down, morality is the first thing out the window.

Christopher Nolan has raised the bar with this film. It'll be tough to match the level of quality here.

I feel like I should say something about the Watchmen trailer that played before the movie, but I'm still chewing on The Dark Knight, so I'll have to save that topic for a later date.