Everything I was hoping for in Batman movie, but didn't get in the 90's

Rating: 10/10 (21 July 2008)

I saw it this weekend and I think the entire first hour was filled with anticipation as I watched things begin to unfold. The clearest reason I can give for that is because I was definitely enjoying it already, and since I knew there was much more to come I could only hope that the movie kept up the pacing and tension, I wasn't let down either. The ending was much better than the previous Batman movie too for me, there's much much more tension to it than just a near miss on "guy gets girl". This one also had less mystical overtones and more relevant social commentary with the portrayal of Harvey Dent as a great political hope for Gotham...
******SPOILER******** Also, Bruce Wayne's use of technology to tap several million cell phones, and Morgan Freeman/Lucius Fox's response to that was an EXCELLENT poke in the eye of the current administration's policies (imo), especially in light of the most recent FISA bill.
The contrast between the White Knight and the Dark Knight was well done, especially in light of the fact that these are purely iconic symbols that don't actually reflect the person that embodies each symbol. In the earlier scene where Harvey Dent was threatening the schizophrenic and Bruce showed up to tell him that the people couldn't have their One True Hope be seen like that was excellent foreshadowing and painted Dent's willingness to give way to psychopathic behavior quite well.
Harvey Dent's characterization of Two Face was great, though that aspect of the story was much smaller than the overarching Joker storyline. I personally like the gritty realism that his character had so much better than earlier portrayals of him as just some comical side-kick. The use of the two-headed coin as a symbol of Rachel's death and his newfound two-faced persona played out nicely.
The focus of the emotional tole on Christian Bale didn't come out as well as it possibly could have, but there is room for that in future movies. ******/SPOILER********
Incidentally I'm not sure I can recall the last movie to have a score that high on IMDb after 45,000 votes. Usually movies start out with high scores (obviously due to studio's gaming the IMDb voting system at movie release) but after a few thousand the initial attempts at swaying a score are more normalized. People seem to have enjoyed this one, and it's definitely worth it. Very happy at the length of the movie too though I did notice that some people were squirming shortly before the 2 hour mark.