The Dark Knight

To avoid any confusion, I want to state up front that I think The Dark Knight is a good picture, with some fine performances. It is not, though, a great picture. Unless it's a dreadful year at the movies, it won't be among my favorites of the year, nor do I think it will deserve any major Oscar nominations. As superhero pictures go, it is not as good as its predecessor, Batman Begins (the best the genre has seen), and I didn't enjoy it as much as Spider-Man 2, or have as much fun with it as Batman Returns. It is certainly better than Iron Man, though.

Okay, enough of that. Directed by Christopher Nolan, The Dark Knight continues the revision of the character that owes much to the graphic novels of Frank Miller, which cast the crimefighting billionaire as a vigilante, a man who lives in the shadows and struggles with a moral code and his own sense of justice. As the picture begins, he is a hot topic on chat shows, as some wonder whether he hurts more than he helps. He has cut crime down, though, as all of Gotham City's mobsters fear him.

The tone of the picture is less comic book than crime melodrama. As others have pointed out, you'll be reminded of The Untouchables, Heat, and The Departed. The opening bank heist, reminiscent of Michael Mann, is well-done, and introduces the one criminal mastermind who not only doesn't fear Batman, he seeks to vanquish him. He is known only as The Joker, a psychopath in harlequin makeup and a purple suit.

The Joker, who has no back story in this film (which is a fine choice) also recalls Lon Chaney in The Man Who Laughed, as someone has carved a smile on his face. He has no particular scheme other than to be a mixer, stealing money from the mob and then making deals with them. In the annoying tradition of these things, he has infinite resources in personnel and and munitions, and seems to make things up as he goes along. I think it's summed up best when he tells Batman that he is like a dog chasing a car--he doesn't know what he'll do with it if he catches it.

There's a subplot involving Bruce Wayne's love, Rachel Dawes (played gloweringly by Maggie Gyllenhaal) who is now dating the crusading district-attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). Dent is eager to tackle organized crime, and through detective Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) meets Batman, who is technically a wanted man. Meanwhile The Joker wreaks havoc, and eventually will strike very close to both Wayne and Dent.

The first problem with this film is the handling of action sequences. The bank heist is done well, but then there is a fight in a parking garage involving fake Batmen (they are never fully explained in a satisfactory way) that is complete confusion. Nolan uses way too many closeups and quick cuts. I also had trouble with the sound mix, with lines of dialogue buried under the score.

Secondly, this film lacks the operatic sweep of Batman Begins. It's really just a well-done crime picture that happens to have the protagonist and antagonist wear provocative outfits. Their overarching theme has to with the duality of heroes and villains (which is bluntly spelled out in a twist that occurs to Dent's character) but we've really heard that many times before, and I didn't find this script particularly profound. In fact, I was getting annoyed with Wayne's butler, Alfred (Michael Caine) who sounded like a pop psychology book.

As for Heath Ledger as The Joker--well, I don't know what to think. I admired the performance, as he chose to lose himself in the character, unlike what Jack Nicholson did. His performance is creepy, employing a lizard-like tongue, rolling eyes and a menacing cackle. But, let's face it, this is the kind of role that an actor covets, which allows him to pull out all the stops and flex muscles never before used. I'm not sure he was any more brilliant than any other hot actor of the moment would have been. In contrast, Christian Bale as Batman doesn't have much to do, and his gravelly voice while wearing the cowl is starting to sound like self-parody. I think the best performance of the film belongs to Gary Oldman as Gordon, the workmanlike cop who oozes integrity. It's a difficult role to make sing, and Oldman is terrific.

Given the haul of this weekend's box office receipts, it would seem likely that there will be a third Batman film by Nolan, and I look forward to it, but perhaps not as much as I did for this one.