The Dark Knight

*This article is about the film. For the Caped Crusader nicknamed "The Dark Knight", see Batman.*

## General Information

### Written by

**Screenplay:**
Jonathan Nolan
Christopher Nolan
**Story:**
David S. Goyer

### Music by

Hans Zimmer
James Newton Howard

### Next Film

*The Dark Knight Rises*

"*You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.*"
—Harvey Dent**[src]**
***The Dark Knight*** is the 2008 sequel to *Batman Begins*. The film is directed by Christopher Nolan and stars Christian Bale as Batman, Michael Caine as Alfred J. Pennyworth, Heath Ledger as the Joker, Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent/Two-Face, Maggie Gyllenhaal as Rachel Dawes, Gary Oldman as James Gordon and Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox. *The Dark Knight* was released July 18, 2008 in the United States.

*The Dark Knight* proved to be most more commercially successful than its predecessor and any other film in the franchise before or since. The death of the young actor Heath Ledger and the media sensation that followed had a significant impact on the public's awareness of the film. Another sequel titled *The Dark Knight Rises* was commissioned for a 2012 release with both Nolan and Bale returning.

## Plot

### Prologue

Taking place roughly 9 months after the first film, the film begins with the psychopathic Joker (in disguise as Bozo) and 5 of his clown-masked henchmen (Grumpy, Chuckles, Happy, Dopey and a nameless-masked bus driver) robbing the mob-owned Gotham National Bank, during which each henchman systematically double-crosses and kills the other for a larger slice of money. Eventually the only survivor is the Joker, who reveals himself from under the Bozo mask to the bank manager and then takes the money for himself, driving away in a school bus (after shoving and detonating a smoke grenade into the bank manager's mouth) to join a line of other buses just as the cops arrive.

### Taking on the Mafia

That night, multiple Batman impersonators, armed with guns interrupt a drug deal/meeting involving the Chechen and his gangsters and the Scarecrow and his henchmen. The real Batman shows up and manages to subdue everyone. However, he is hit multiple times and brutally bitten in weak spots of his armor by Rottweiler dogs and the Chechen manages to get away. Sustaining such injuries suffered during the confrontation forces Bruce Wayne to make the decision of acquiring a new, more versatile suit of armor.

Harvey Dent, the new district attorney, begins to place more and more criminals behind bars, even defending himself successfully against an assassination attempt from mob boss Salvatore Maroni during the crime lord's trial. Batman and Lieutenant James Gordon contemplate bringing Harvey in on their plan to eradicate the mob, and the possibility that Harvey will become the hero to the people that Batman cannot be. Harvey is nicknamed the ‘White Knight of Gotham City,' although Harvey mentions in argument with Gordon that he had a different nickname in Internal Affairs (revealed later in the story). At the same time, Bruce Wayne and Harvey are both competing for the love of Rachel Dawes; however, Rachel and Dent are romantically involved in a relationship.

Maroni, the Chechen, Gambol, and the other mob bosses see the combined effort of Dent, Batman and Gordon as a threat and decide to meet and discuss how to handle it. Their Chinese accountant, Lau, informs that he has secretly relocated the mob's money to Hong Kong to prevent the police from seizing it with an imminent bank raid. The Joker arrives and after killing Gambol's crony by way of a "magic trick" (involving sticking a pencil into the table, and then slamming the crony's head onto the pencil, sending it through his eye socket), he proposes to kill Batman for half of their money, and also tries to convince the mob bosses that Lau will give them all up to the police if he is caught. The Joker then makes an example of the problem's anti-crime result about Gambol, who takes it as an insult and offers $500,000 for the Joker dead and $1,000,000 alive so he can "teach him some manners first." The mob bosses don't accept the Joker’s offer, who leaves his ‘card’ behind for them to contact him.