Movie Review: The Dark Knight

The short of it: History has been made, folks. We officially have the first 8 Nation movie since I started doing this thing.

The long of it:

Wow.

Maybe BTC said it best when he texted me right after he saw it Friday afternoon and he said: "I have no words. Divine."

It was phenomenal, people. And this is coming from someone who makes no bones about admitting that I hold superhero movies up to a different standard when I watch them, ESPECIALLY Batman.

First things first - a little background: Here is an old post I put up about Batman Begins.

Now, about The Dark Knight. Some thoughts in no particular order:

1) Great storytelling all around. The pacing was amazing (2 and 1/2 hours flew by), and it made its points without being too heavy handed. The ferry scenes with the criminals and the "decent" people was a great example of that.

2) Casting was perfect, yet again. Gary Oldman has really made the Commissioner Gordon role his own, and Aaron Eckhart and Heath Ledger excelled in their respective roles.

3) Heath's Joker was the most believable Joker ever. I've written before about how much I love the Steve Engelhart, Marshall Rogers and Terry Austin run in Detective Comics, and it felt like the Joker from those pages had come to life. Just a tiny example: The Joker who gave deadlines for someone to die was straight from those pages.

4) I was also elated to see the Batman/Joker face to face across the desk scene. Why? That image is straight out of The Killing Joke (which I have said before and will say again - the best Joker story ever; and not just because Alan Moore wrote it). And the plot line about The Joker driving the most upstanding citizen in Gotham City insane to prove a point (Harvey Dent in the movie, Commissioner Gordon in the book) - straight from there too.

5) Chris Nolan - you know you have geek cred when the news broke months ago that the Joker in The Dark Knight looks that way because he puts on makeup, not because of the "falling into acid" reason that is part of the canon, and not that many complained vociferously.

6) Aaron Eckhart as Dent and then Two Face - great stuff. Again, the geek cred: the tweak in Two Face's origin (fire instead of acid, it occured during the rescue instead of during a trial), and no complaints.

7) Not enough can be said about how great Michael Caine as Alfred is. People sometimes forget that Alfred is Bruce's father figure and this was showed perfectly again I thought (see: burning of the letter).

8) Christian Bale IS Bruce Wayne, and IS Batman. Nothing's changed about that.

9) Nice to see Bats going back to his roots at the end; that of being a vigilante who works outside the law and is wanted by the cops.

10) It's a running joke in the comics about how Bats just appears out of nowhere to talk to Gordon and then disappears without Gordon noticing it, and glad they did that a few times here again (with Dent too!).

11) Nice cameo Cillian Murphy/The Scarecrow!

Anyway, this movie really has to be watched to be fully appreciated, because just like BTC, I feel like my words aren't doing it justice. Besides being great filmmaking, the people involved in making this movie have captured the essence of Batman yet again. This is a film for the ages, folks. And don't be surprised if it gets Oscar love in The Best Picture category.