Don't Believe the Hype

Rating: 6/10 (19 December 2008)

I don't get the high ratings and glowing reviews this has received. Yes, Heath Ledger's performance is better-than-average. But this is a badly-flawed movie, largely because of its tedious conglomeration of plot points, all of which collide in mostly unsatisfactory ways. I was prepared to be blown away. Instead, I was squirming in my seat before the half-way point. And I have two questions: First, is Gary Oldman too big a star for someone to tell him to speak up and stop mumbling the ends of all of his lines? And second, how did Maggie Gyllenhaall get this job? She's a fine actress, but is woefully miscast here. OK, I lied, three: whose idea was it for Christian Bale to do the voice he uses when he's Batman? And how did the other actors keep from laughing whenever he spoke? I think that if Heath Ledger had not tragically and stupidly lost his life, this movie would have flopped like a live fish on the pavement. All that money and talent, and a script that should have been cut by about 30 minutes, after it had been rewritten for coherency. Thank goodness for Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman.