We Are Tonight's Entertainment

Rating: 10/10 (20 July 2008)

We Are Tonight's Entertainment... by amyhughes7380 (Jul 20, 2008) Our world of the cinema has changed over the previous century. What once worked, works no more. We as an audience are ever evolving, learning from previous stories, on the lookout for formula, character types, and timed explosions. What was once an entranced audience at the merest flicker of a cinema reel, has changed into a vastly educated mass capable of spotting CGI from 30 paces...
So with this "education" we entered the Summer Movie Season. Clinching our popcorn in our hands, our Twizzlers, and a firm determination to "go along for the ride" my husband and myself took in The Dark Knight.
To Say it was a triumph, isn't a word that really and truly works here. Triumph is reserved more for those costume dramas you get closer to award season. Riveting is also a word that has a nice impact, but doesn't fit on the scale. Phenomenal? Fantastic? Exceptional? None fit in my mind the experience I had in the theater this evening.
The word I believe best fits here: Intense. There are few movies in this world that keep you in your seat not searching for your phone to check the time, or for your popcorn to stuff your face. There are plenty that will wow you with explosions, but die off in the area that truly matters: story. Some films have fantastic plots, story arcs, and a great director; but they lack in talented actors with a presence to make that story take flight. The Dark Knight, excels beyond measure in all of the key areas.
This film moves you not in a sense you will be reaching for a tissue. But it calls to the very basest of our needs as a movie going public, to go along for one Hell of a ride. The running time was 2.5 hours. I would have gladly sat there the entire evening watching more and more of this film unfold.
If I said here that Heath Ledger did not own every scene he was in, I would be lying. The Joker lives and breathes in a way that we who grew up with Cesar Romaro and Jack Nicholson could never have imagined. Psycopath, Sociopath, Pathological Liar, Pure Evil? Thankfully we never find out. I believe that would have taken the fun out of it. Unfortunately in the times we live in, I believe many could understand the Leger version of the Joker far more than any other rendition. You watch him, not for what he reacts to, but what others will have to react to from him.
Christian Bale is as always a deft and powerful force on screen as well. Paced against The Joker, how could he not be nearly as capable, but on a different frequency? His Batman & Bruce Wayne call out to what needs to be presented for this character. No hokey Bat Dance, or suits with nipples. But a man/guardian that is constantly at odds with his mind. Looking for a clear step and never finding it along the path he has shaped for himself.
New addition to the series, Aaron Eckhart, is a welcome albeit painful face as Harvey Dent. Again, not campy, thankfully. Your heart breaks more for him in the final 5 minutes of the film than any other time. Dent as a role has never interested me much, but this movie truly made me care about not only him but what is interpretation meant to be a hero for his city. It is in this that Eckhart soars, and with such dedication to his place in the story you believe every optimistic line he utters.
A starring cast though excellent is nothing without a fine list of well heeled actors there to bounce back what they dish out. In such hands a movie is made or suffers tremendously. And let me just say, whoever has done the casting for this film deserves some kind of award if there is such a thing. MIchael Caine, Gary Oldman, Morgan Freeman and Maggie Gylenhal make their roles not only well worth the time, but something even to be looked forward to. These actors turn what could be commonplace standby lines into such veritable human emotion that it feels as though the story has long since been rounded out in very careful and trained hands.
Christopher Nolan, who directed and co-wrote, has such a knack and understanding for these characters and for story telling as well. This film can run the gamut in 30 seconds of terror, action, sadness, and into social commentary. Some directors go their entire careers blowing up buses and bridges without ever snagging on to a single human emotion aside from "Wow, that was cool." Nolan takes these characters, and this franchise, to heights previously unexplored in any franchise. And you are sure glad he did.
The backdrop of Chicago, the darkness, the effects are all shot with a careful hand. I am going to return to see it on IMAX later in the week (when I hopefully can get a ticket.), and from what I understand you are even more fully immersed than before.
The cast and crew deserve all of the praise the movie going public can give out, as well as their peers in the movie making industry. This film is the reason we go to the movies.