A mess

Rating: 2/10 (25 July 2008)

I'm sorry but did I miss something? When did the rest of the world lose their brains? How did this film come to be the all-time number one? Has someone gone back in a time machine and deleted every film ever made before? I don't think I have felt so let down and annoyed by movie hype.
Dark Knight is a complete mess and the director, editor, soundtrack composer and fight choreographer should be tied together and dangled from the nearest skyscraper until they repent. What a hideous assault on the senses. And, as a 12A, it's also got the most inappropriate rating.
I went to see a 9pm screening of the film alongside a bunch of beer-bellied, thirty-something dads who are clinging to their youth by wearing crop trousers, bright-white trainers and fat laces. These guys laughed at the lame jokes and grunted in appreciation of the confusingly, overextended fight and car chase scenes, and then they came home, logged on to IMDb and gave the film "a 10, dude, cos like it rocks, this is like the best film EVER in the world, the universe, infinity". Meanwhile their offspring - ranging from tiny babies in carry-cots to pre-teens - bawled their hearts out in the seats next to them because they were completely overwhelmed and should have been at home in bed.
The cybermen scared the hell out of me until I was 10 - so how does a child (regardless of whether they're accompanied by an adult) deal with this level of violence and noise? How is Sweeney Todd an 18 when this film is just a 12A? The former was gory but camp and theatrical. Dark Knight is just plain nasty - there's very little wit and no light and shade. My two out of 10 score is simply to thank Gary Oldman and Morgan Freeman for turning up.
To all the people that gave this film a 10, I say go & put your kids to bed, settle down in your sofa and watch the Shawshank Redemption, X-Men, Alien and Aliens, Heat, David Lean's Great Expectations etc, etc and then recast your vote.