The Dark Knight

Rating: 7/10 (28 January 2020)

After Batman Begins. Director Christopher Nolan went into a brooding nihilistic territory with The Dark Knight.
It introduces The Joker (Heath Ledger) a psychopath laced with cynicism and determined to create chaos. It starts off with a punchy bank heist which The Joker uses to creatively eliminate his cohorts.
In Gotham City, Batman (Christian Bale) is happy to see the new District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) to take on the villains. Dent is also seeing a lot of Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal.)
However The Joker creates an alliance with the ring leaders of organised crime in the city and then takes the fight to Batman. Meanwhile Dent realises the extent of corruption in the local police with James Gordon (Gary Oldman) the only honest cop about.
Nolan a fan of James Bond films has created several terrific action scenes. One set in Hong Kong is a more over the top homage to a Sean Connery circa Bond film.
Nolan also deftly introduces a second villain in the form of Two Face. Much better here than Tommy Lee Jones unconvincingly camping it up with weak material In Batman Forever.
Ultimately Nolan puts humanity to test here as The Joker places two bombs in two ships. One full of civilians and another full of prisoners being evacuated. The Joker wants destruction and turmoil. He simply wants to watch the world burn.
The Dark Knight is also bloated and at times cumbersome with its long running time.