Convoluted plot and lack of humor sinks overlong exercise in self-indulgent nastiness

Rating: 2/10 (15 April 2010)

Unlike their first entry in their Batman series, the Nolan brothers juxtapose their comic book characters against a well-lit Chicago urban backdrop—they seem out of place in the real world and would have been much more at home in a make-believe noirish setting.
The opening scene urges us not to take any of the antagonists seriously. As a bank robbery unfolds, the criminals end up double-crossing one another, shooting one another in the back. Only Health Ledger's Joker is left standing, collecting all the proceeds from the robbery. From the outset, the Joker faces no obstacles and appears almost omnipotent.
The next thirty minutes consists of a series of very slow-moving expository scenes. There's a clash between mobsters and a few Batman wannabes show up (The leader of the wannabes is later captured by the Joker and in a repugnant scene is tortured in a video clip shown on the evening news). Cut to Bruce Wayne's 'Bat Cave' which looks more like a concrete bunker fitted with large high definition computer screens (so much for the neat old Bat Cave!). Michael Caine as Bruce Wayne's affable butler has little to do except impart pithy advice to his boss. Then there's the relationship between DA Harvey Dent and his girlfriend Rachel, who Bruce has an interest in (the love triangle never seems to develop).
After Dent invokes RICO laws, the mobsters agree to allow one of their own, Lau, a Chinese Mafia accountant from Hong Kong to hold all their cash outside the US where the DA can't get his hands on it. Wayne then makes his way to Hong Kong where Batman manages to break into Lau's impenetrable skyscraper, kidnap him and return him to the DA where he's placed under arrest. Of course, this sideshow has nothing to do with the main plot which involves the Joker approaching the mobsters and agreeing to take half their cash in exchange for killing Batman. After the bosses refuse to go along with the Joker's proposal, one of the bosses, Gambol, puts a bounty on the Joker's head. The Joker then gains easy entry into Gambol's lair in a body bag, only to jump out and then kill the hapless criminal by slashing his throat with a knife (the point is made that the Joker is a sadist and the Nolans appear to congratulate themselves by emphasizing that fact over and over again without regard for good taste or an economical narrative).
The rest of the film's extremely convoluted plot mainly concerns the Joker's efforts to eliminate his nemesis, The Dark Knight. The Joker declares if Batman doesn't reveal his identity, people will die each day until he decides to act. When the Police Commissioner and Judge presiding over the mob trials are assassinated, the public blames Batman. DA Dent concocts a plan to draw the Joker out by claiming that he's The Dark Knight. As Dent is transported in an armored car, the Joker attacks but is captured by Batman aided by Lt. Gordon who is soon promoted to police commissioner as a result of his heroic efforts in capturing the Joker.
We never see how it happens but Dent and Rachel disappear and soon turn up as hostages at a warehouse. Batman gets a little rough with the Joker in jail and it's revealed that some corrupt police officials (they seem to be all over the place) were the one's who kidnapped the DA and his girlfriend. It turns out that one of the Joker's associates who he was imprisoned with has a cell phone implanted in his chest (don't know why he wasn't put through a metal detector) and when the phone rings, there's a huge explosion and the Joker and Lau both escape. Batman is able to save the DA but is unable to rescue Rachel. Despite surviving an explosion Dent's face is maimed and now he becomes the second villain of the movie, 'Two Face".
The unlikeable Joker proves even less charming when he declares he has no interest in money and torches Lau who is tied up in a warehouse on top of a giant pile of cash. Then in the most ludicrous part of the movie, the Joker visits Dent in the hospital and convinces him to take revenge on all the corrupt people responsible for Rachel's death. How the good guy DA could morph into a sinister criminal so easily just proves how silly the whole story is (instead of honoring his girlfriend's memory, he too conveniently becomes a bad guy!).
The finale features a bunch of convicts and upstanding citizens held hostage on two separate ferry boats. The boats are rigged with explosives (how did they get on the boats undetected?). Each person on the ferries have the ability to set off the explosions but out of the goodness of everybody's hearts, no one can bring themselves to act.
Finally, in the most distasteful scene in the movie, Dent attempts to kill Commissioner Gordon's son by throwing him over the side of a building. The killing of a child is not something that should be shown in a story that's supposedly taken from a comic book.
Despite the absurd, overlong plot, The Dark Knight wouldn't have been so bad if the filmmakers didn't take themselves so seriously. Did they really have to rehash their point ad infinitum—that criminals are sadistic? Somehow a little humor could have humanized all the comic book characters and made the film a lot more enjoyable. Instead, the Dark Knight is an example of lazy screen writing where there is no interest in explaining one implausible event after another.