I had high expectations and they were met, if not exceeded.

Rating: 9/10 (18 July 2008)

Leading up to seeing this movie, I had read dozens of reviews, mostly of praise for "The Dark Knight". But amongst the praise was critiques, and there were many reviews with the same critiques, making me worried this movie would only be good because of it's flaws. One of the mentioned flaws was that this film was very slow paced. I don't know what movies some reviewers saw, but though this is long, it is not slow paced, in fact, you could say it's the exact opposite. Especially towards the beginning, this is a fast paced movie, with lots of action. Along with that, it's one of the best movies of the year, and though it may sound clichéd to say this in a Dark Knight review, Heath Ledger will be remembered for this role, if any, as his finest moment(s) on the silver screen.
Gotham City is in peril, and the only person who can save it is...Harvey Dent. New District Attorney Harvey Dent is bringing men to justice and throwing them in the clink, sometimes by the hundreds. Harvey's got a great girl, Bruce Wayne's (Christian Bale) old flame, Rachel Dawes (Now played by Maggie Gyllenhall). The Joker (Heath Ledger) is the new psycopath in town, and Batman, or Harvey Dent must stop him.
What makes the Dark Knight so great is how well it works as both a superhero movie, and an action drama. If this wasn't a Batman movie, it would still be a fantastic action flick, not to say Batman is a throw away character, because he certainly isn't. The direction is very good, though there are a few action scenes that could have been filmed better.
Heath Ledger is the performance that makes the movie, not because this was the movie that led to his unfortunate demise, but because he was amazing and captivating. Whether or not he will win Best Supporting Actor, he still has gotten critical acclaim for his portrayal of the psychopath. His performance is not a let down, he is just great. The other actors all do well too. Normally I think of Aaron Eckhart as being a B-movie actor, but here he shows what makes him a star. Christian Bale is good as Bruce Wayne, and okay as Batman. That annoying scratchy voice is, well, annoying. It's overused. Batman even uses it to talk to people that know he is Bruce Wayne. Maybe the suit cuts off his lungs or something. Maggie Gyllenhall is a fine actress in the role, though for varying reasons it felt a bit off having her playing Rachel. Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman added a lot in supporting roles, and Gary Oldman plays a heck of a Officer/Commissioner Gordon.
Now onto the negatives. The beginning of the movie had way too many short scenes of random characters that it felt like an anthology, and it didn't explain itself well enough until later. When the scenes began to be longer and stopped jumping from character to character, the movie got much better. One element missing from the film is drama that connects with the audience. Drama was plentiful, but I never felt connected with the characters enough to care what happens, probably because of the fast cut opening that helped to underdevelop the characters until later in the film.
I miss Danny Elfman. His musical score brought life to the first two Batman films, and the musical score here is just loud and annoying and adds nothing. Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard are talented, so what were they doing here? Overall, this was one of the better Batman movies, and is also one of the best movies of the year. It's not perfect, but perfection is hard to find, and even in it's imperfection, it outshines most movies this year.
My rating: *** 1/2 out of ****. 145 mins. PG-13 for violence.