A disaster on SO many levels

Rating: 3/10 (24 February 2009)

I actually agree with almost every comment in the "Hated It" category. This was an enormously over-hyped and overblown flick - but apparently the explosion-and-violent-chase fans are rating as one of the greatest movies ever, despite a collection of plot holes that resembles the face of a tennis racket. I can understand their enthusiasm, but what was going through the minds of the professional reviewers??? I've seen them pick apart unto death much better flicks than this. Their bitch meters should have gone straight to the infrared, but instead they turned into pompon-wavers. Were they paid off?
I have one extra comment on the plot. When the Joker is in police custody, one of the first things they would have done was wipe off all the clown makeup. Without it, this guy becomes a nothing - Samson without his hair. Then they just bury him in some out-of-state max security pen (and label him a child molester, by way of revenge), and all Gotham's troubles go back to same-old same-old. SSDD.
Unlike most, I saw this movie first on DVD. It damn near drove me crazy: if I could get my hands around the neck of the Sound Director, he'd be dead meat. The explosions and demolition-derby car chases like to blow out the speakers on my TV - and then half the dialog is done at a virtual whisper! I practically wore out the volume buttons on my remote: up and down, up and down, ad infinitum. You want to sit back and just enjoy a movie, not have to continually stop it and go back because muting down the explosions caused you to miss the first five sentences of dialog. I dropped my vote three places just for this alone. It was THAT infuriating.
As for the Oscars, Ledger's award HAD to be a sympathy vote. If he hadn't committed suicide (nobody can take that many different drugs accidentally), would he have even been nominated? His acting was pretty much just Jack Nicholson's Joker on angel dust. (Art imitating life???) Of course, the Academy keeps throwing statuettes at Nicholson, when in every role he's played he just played Jack Nicholson. He's got THAT character down pat.