The last laugh

Rating: 8/10 (27 July 2008)

An engaging and psychologically rewarding character study that paints the word 'dichotomy' across the screen in blood red lipstick and forces you to reflect on it over two and half bleak but for the most part well judged hours. Why so serious? Because Joel Schumacher is always watching that's why.
If characterisation is the yardstick, The Dark Knight is the most dense and finely drawn Batman movie yet made - interweaving the motivations and moral complications of its cast with a magician's slight of hand and a calculating intelligence. The ambiguities thrown up by the plot aren't subtle by any means but that it feels less signposted than we've come to expect in comic book fare is attributable to Nolan's deft handling of the material and his refusal to over egg the pudding with laden dialogue or simplistic conceptions of good and evil.
As entertainment it fares less well. One of the sublime pleasures of Tim Burton's 1989 Batman movie was your total immersion in a hyperreal Gothic dystopia, augmented with a score that perfectly partnered the aesthetic.
Nolan's Batpics have one dirty foot in the real world making them less cartoons than Film Noirs with costumes but there are times during this 150 minutes when the lack of stylized backdrop or sweeping score make it a relatively still and cold experience.
Nolan takes his directorial cues from the likes of Johnathan Demme and Michael Mann but doesn't frame action or build suspense with their assured touch. That isn't to say that TDK isn't involving but there's a workmanlike quality to some of the spectacle here and nothing to wrongfoot the audience with the same verve as say Silence of the Lambs did 20 years ago.
An occasionally elliptical narrative and confused framing in fight scenes sometimes suggests that Nolan's realisation of his script was more sure footed than his choices in the editing suite but where he scores major hits is in his handling of tone and the drawing out of the comic book's more challenging themes. This is a Batman movie that has been futureproofed in being aimed at Adults and consequently it should have a long and respected self-life when the likes of Spider-man are filling space on charity shop shelves marked up for 75 pence.
One disappointment with this Batflick, particularly given the prominence he was afforded in 'Begins' is that Christian Bale gets somewhat lost amongst a large cast with character trajectories more integral to the plot. The deceased Heath Ledger is very good, giving a creepy, dread soaked performance. He's the bastard child of Seth Brundle in mid-transformation and Hannibal Lecter with all the discomfort that implies while Aaron Eckhart's Harvey Dent/Two Face is less involving but well handled and performs a public service in permanently wiping all memory of Tommy Lee Jones horrific turn in Batman Forever. God Bless you Aaron.
Ultimately its easier to admire than to love but TDK is superior, involving fare which talks up to it's audience without ever really getting their pulse racing. The storytelling values displayed bode well for the series but if this can married with a little more care in constructing setpieces and please please please a proper score rather than this ambient mood music (two composers and not a single, memorable note), the next film might be a real treasure. As it stands this is just very good but with the likes of Michael Bay forever circling I'll take that with thanks.