Not a comic book film anymore... it went beyond that!

Rating: 8/10 (19 July 2008)

I've been dying to see it for a minute now like all the comic book nerds out there, and WOW was it AWESOME! It surpassed beyond any expectations I had. I was adamant about not writing a review about The Dark Knight since it's damn hard to do for a film this great; it would be like trying to write a love letter, all superlatives, where each word has to be more impressive than the latter. However, I'm sitting here now and still thinking about the film, questioning all the images I just saw in the two and a half hours.
The Good:
Here's where my love letter begins. The Dark Knight is not a comic book film. If you remove Batman, the Joker, and all the other characters, it would just be a spectacularly filmed crime drama; one that would probably garnish a few awards or Oscars. The overall story and "message" in this go around of the Christopher Nolan/Christian Bale Batman franchise goes so deep and complex that it's beyond imaginable a comic book film could be capable of doing such a thing. Throughout most of the film I literally forgot I was watching a Batman flick. That's how far comic book films, the better ones at least, have come.
The acting, direction and writing is just immaculate. You get a sense that everyone involved in the film, from the director on down, was very dedicated in their roles, and making this to be one of the best comic book films ever became personal to all of them. This is most notable in the late Heath Ledger and his performance (is that even a good enough word to use?) as the Joker. I was seven years old when the Tim Burton Batman came out, and I just remember how freaked out I was of Jack Nicholson's portrayal of the psychopathic clown. Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight just created a new beast of an animal that is THE Joker, which is going to ruin any child's chance of falling asleep at night ever again. Love letter words cannot describe what an amazing job this guy did. If you've seen the film already you know exactly what I'm talking about. Ledger stole the show. Posthumous Oscar? Definitely! I could tell everyone in the theater was just anxiously anticipating the next scene Ledger would appear in.
I don't think I can go any further on writing what is good about The Dark Knight. It's too tough! Just go see it already if you haven't!
The Bad:
Believe it or not I don't think The Dark Knight is perfect, nor is it the best comic book film ever (Spidey 2 gets my vote for that). However, as amazing the movie is there are still some minor flaws, mostly technical issues. The tone of the film in general is very dark, thus most of the scenes are appropriately set at night. Batman wears all black. He likes to do his crime fighting in the dark and in the shadows. It gets hard to see. Tack on the shaky cam technique that is so popular nowadays in every action movie, and you're basically watching shadows shadow boxing each other.
Comparing to the also kick ass first movie, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight is less cinematic. The camera shots are impressive for some scenes, but overall it feels clunky in many parts. It doesn't flow as smoothly as it could have, the camera moves too much, and there aren't many epic, wide shots so the audience can take in everything. The editing is also a little bit crude in some areas; one scene would finish and then transition to the next as if a snippet of film was missing. But that's really all that I can say negatively about this film, and of course non of these things took away from one of the best movie experiences I've ever had...
I WANNA SEE IT AGAIN!