Lets put a smile on that face

Rating: 10/10 (29 July 2008)

The opening moments set in motion everything you need to know about a villain: amidst a bank heist each criminal takes his turn to blow away a fellow criminal until there are just two left, the idea being that their share of the loot grows with each death. At this point the Joker reveals himself to be one of the last two and promptly kills off the final thug leaving the money all to himself; the grenade he leaves behind as a thank you only emphasises the evilness of the deed as the Joker calmly drives a school bus full of money into a stream of other school buses to complete his getaway. Not since Darth Vader strolled powerfully onto the screen in 1977 has a shadow character been so menacing, and the audience knows that Batman is going to be given a torrid time in dealing with an enemy that proves to be a force of nature.
If that wasn't enough then on the other side of Batman is the White Knight: Harvey Dent who as Gotham City's District Attorney seems to finally be cleaning up on the shadow world. If the Joker is a chaotic trickster character then Harvey Dent is the epitome of the truth and righteousness, a true hero. So in spite of the Joker's presence Bruce Wayne starts to consider whether he needs to continue as Batman and even envisages a day when Gotham doesn't need him anymore; naturally this dream is complicated by the fact that his long term love Rachel Dawes is Harvey's girl at the time, but never the less Bruce is really taken with Dent's ideals which after all hold the possibility of his own redemption/reward.
So into this arena steps the Batman and I can safely say every event that follows draws emotion and inspiration then turns them into horror. I think for the first time we see why the Joker was created originally, twisting the laws of logic into a grotesque and anarchic vision of how he believes the world should be.
For me when a character is so well defined and then translated onto screen the best part of what you get out of their performance is connection and questions; questions about your own morality and how we choose to live our lives. In my opinion these questions are most apt when coming from a good villain, after all the evil in them is the repression that haunts us all. The problems they create and things they destroy lead ultimately to an affirmation of the hero's ideals and help him to define what his role is with greater conviction. In this the Dark Knight delivers it all and has left me running back over and over it in my mind since last night.
This is an outstanding piece of work from Christopher Nolan and his brother and I don't say that lightly because the last time I was this affected was after the first Lord of the Rings film back in 2001. Make no mistake this is not a kids film by any stretch of the imagination and my advice to parents is to seriously consider not taking anyone under twelve as the subject matter requires more maturity; that said this is a movie of wit and guile that will fully deserve multiple awards next year.