Movie Maven

Directed by: Christopher Nolan
Written by: Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer

My God, it's such a mess. The plot is packed to the gills. There are nameless characters that flow in and out, spouting pertinent dialogue, and then dissolving away with no explanation. It has the look of a film that was obviously carved up from a much longer movie like a Thanksgiving turkey. It jerks in fits and starts, allows the audience no way to stop and catch their breath. There are plot and continuity holes that you could drive a truck through. And the themes (Duality! Moral ambiguity! Patriot Act! Patriot Act!) are dropped sometimes with an audible thud.


And it went to his head. He lost control, created a monster. He became drunk with power, and every little idea that popped into his head was given to him (i.e.: 'Hey, I know! Let's do illegal wiretapping! With sonar!'). He was a mad scientist, not remembering from his "Memento" days that sparing is usually better, that if you want a film to brood on the moral ambivalence of human kind, it needs to whisper sometimes, not bellow.


Primarily though, the film is salvaged, and even wrestled into something vaguely coherent, by its spectacular cast. Christian Bale is an even better Batman than his last go-round, and a thousand times better as Bruce Wayne. In the first film he had a tendency to stiffen his dialogue, thinking that a haunted nature could be expressed by simply excising one's personality. He learned his lesson, and in "Knight" Bale says forty different things simply with a turn of his head, or the merest clench of his (admittedly yummy) jaw. Katie Holmes has been forbidden from spreading her crazy within 500 yards of a Batman set, and as such has been replaced by the luminous Maggie Gyllenhaal as Rachel Dawes. Gyllenhaal manages to imbue her damsel in distress a brain and a soul. Nolan never quite gives her her due in this blue-toned boys club, but at least she manages to hold her own.

But why do I prattle on about Bale and Gyllenhaal. We know who you really want to talk about.

It would have given me that surge of malicious glee only critics can feel to say that Heath Ledger's performance was over-hyped. There's something about the populist love of a person that makes the elitist in me want to run over that love like road kill. And it's impossible to ignore the fact that perhaps his performance would not be considered as Oscar-worthy had he not died an awful, pointless death.

But the stunning, improbable truth is that I didn't remember Ledger the man at all as I was watching him on screen. Such was the power, the absolute engrossment of his performance. His Joker is like something out of a Coen brothers film: there's a move involving a pencil that is both horrifying and outrageously funny in much the same way as Steve Buscemi's wood chipper scene in "Fargo." His movements are lurching and twitchy; he hunches his shoulders and leans slightly to one side, his tongue slithers out of his head, and yet it never feels overdone. His characterization is so wonderful you want him on the screen every moment; when he leaves you can't wait for him to appear again. And though the plot might be convoluted and even absurd, you couldn't care less as long as he's there in his frosting makeup and carved grin. You don't even remember it's Ledger until the movie's over, and you realize that this particular Joker is no more. There will be no sequels for Heath Ledger's Joker. And I don't envy the man who might replace him.

There is lots of tongue-wagging about "The Dark Knight," and the records it will break, the cinematic value it will have in the future, the filmic culture it will inspire. I'm not sure it'll ever beat "Gone with the Wind" or "Titanic" either in terms of box office numbers or place within the film canon. But, flawed as it is, it has filled me with hope. The mainstream film industry has been lagging, putting out an absurd amount of schlocky films every week and filtering them in and out of theaters like water. Cheap Wal-Mart pieces that you forget about five minutes after seeing it. The idea of movie-going as a true communal experience, something that you share again and again has really been lost within the last few years. Perhaps "Dark Knight" won't make as much money as "Titanic." But if it's allowed people to regain just a little bit of the wonder we used to feel going to the movies, then it has truly accomplished something great.

Photo found on Lee Side Story