A "Superhero Movie?" Nope, much more.

Rating: 10/10 (23 July 2008)

Comic book movies are all too often a little hard to take seriously. Their sources, comic books, keyword being "comic" gives them a spin that they are just entertainment. In fact, many are just that. Maybe even most of them. Even if they are good stories they almost always have that element of ridiculousness. A favorite comic book character of mine, The Punisher, was put to screen in 2004 with an unusually dark "comic book" movie, but it still had that air of it is just a movie. A dark and brutal one, but even the most die hard Punisher fan knows, his/her hero exists in a world other than ours despite the fact that he has no superpowers.
Batman is slightly comparable to The Punisher in that he he has no superpowers, just his gear and brains. Admittedly Batman's gear is even more out of this world than the Punisher's, whose tools are just various weapons, and not custom made caves, hideouts and vehicles. However, Batman's appeal seems to be broader in that his story is broader. He isn't just one man out for vengeance due to a personal tragedy. He is a person who could easily live comfortably without risking his life, yet chooses to do so anyway. There is an inherent good that Batman possesses and it drives him to go above and beyond when he could just easily settle on a comfortable life. Batman as a comic book character, and especially in Christopher Nolan's rendition of him, has been elevated to an almost mythical status. He is obviously unreal, yet he rings true in more ways than one. Perhaps that is why Nolan chose to use Batman's nickname as the film's title, "The Dark Knight" as Batman is not a knight in shining armor, as the cliché goes, but a someone with a critical difference.
"The Dark Knight" perhaps constructs its greatest complexity by showing Batman not just as a realistic character with his own conflicts, but that society is conflicted about him. He isn't just Good. He is mostly Good, but part Ugly in his fight against the Bad that is equally impressively shown as The Joker. From The Joker's surprising introduction at the film's start to the end he wrecks hell and plunders for his own good, but he is far from the Black hat villain of old John Wayne westerns. A great scene, near the beginning is where The Joker sticks a pencil into a table and then "makes it disappear." That scene is a hilarious bit of dark humor and an act of savagery that bluntly sums him up. The chaos that The Joker causes affects everyone even causing some to "turn to the dark side" (pardon the cliché) but still in that complex manner that rings true and has not one bit of cheesiness in it.
The action sequences in the film are nothing short of first rate. Limited and smart use of computer graphics and real explosions and car crashes. So even if the film is seen just for the action it works as a great movie. Contrary to many recent action film sequences these are simply superb and not a confusing mess of non-stop editing and noise.
"The Dark Knight" is a great film because it works on many levels, is so well constructed on many levels. It can be watched as a straightforward superhero/villain film or a symbolic representation of struggle in our ever growing and urbanizing world. It is a engrossing tragedy that shows a cruel world where not every good guy makes it to the end, but also largely uplifting at the same time. And, I'll say it once again, it rings true. --- 10/10
BsCDb classification: 13+ --- violence