![]() ![]() Perhaps they instinctively understand that themselves.Sleuthing enthusiasts rejoice: Holmes and Watson are back in the best-looking detective game to date, with a handful of murders, dozens of suspects and too many pieces of evidence to count. There are no references to Batman’s childhood, but we certainly remember it, and we realize that this conflict is between two adults who were twisted by childhood cruelty - one compensating by trying to do good, the other by trying to do evil. Now it is the Joker’s turn, although his past is handled entirely with dialogue, not flashbacks. Nolan also directed the previous, and excellent, “ Batman Begins” (2005), which went into greater detail than ever before about Bruce Wayne’s origins and the reasons for his compulsions. Caine is the faithful butler Alfred, who understands Wayne better than anybody, and makes a decision about a crucial letter. His stand has current political implicstions. Freeman, as the scientific genius Lucius Fox, is in charge of Bruce Wayne’s underground headquarters, and makes an ethical objection to a method of eavesdropping on all of the citizens of Gotham City. Two of the supporting characters are crucial to the action, and are played effortlessly by the great actors Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine. The screenplay by Christopher Nolan and his brother Jonathan (who first worked together on “ Memento”) has more depth and poetry than we might have expected. Heath Ledger has a good deal of dialogue in the movie, and a lot of it isn’t the usual jabs and jests we’re familiar with: It’s psychologically more complex, outlining the dilemmas he has constructed, and explaining his reasons for them. ![]() The tricks are more cruel than he realizes, because the Joker doesn’t know Batman’s identity. He includes Gordon and Dent on his target list, and contrives cruel tricks to play with the fact that Bruce Wayne once loved, and Harvey Dent now loves, Assistant D.A. The plot involves nothing more or less than the Joker’s attempts to humiliate the forces for good and expose Batman’ secret identity, showing him to be a poser and a fraud. Through these heights, the Batman moves at the end of strong wires, or sometimes actually flies, using his cape as a parasail. He presents the city as a wilderness of skyscrapers, and a key sequence is set in the still-uncompleted Trump Tower. Chicagoans will recognize many places, notably La Salle Street and Lower Wacker Drive, but director Nolan is not making a travelogue. The movie was shot on location in Chicago, but it avoids such familiar landmarks as Marina City, the Wrigley Building or the skyline. They focus on the expected explosions and catastrophes, and have some superb, elaborate chase scenes. Yes, the special effects are extraordinary. “The Dark Knight” slips around those defenses and engages us. It is customary in a comic book movie to maintain a certain knowing distance from the action, to view everything through a sophisticated screen. Eckhart does an especially good job as Harvey Dent, whose character is transformed by a horrible fate into a bitter monster. By the end, the whole moral foundation of the Batman legend is threatened.īecause these actors and others are so powerful, and because the movie does not allow its spectacular special effects to upstage the humans, we’re surprised how deeply the drama affects us. Throughout the film, he devises ingenious situations that force Batman ( Christian Bale), Commissioner Gordon ( Gary Oldman) and District Attorney Harvey Dent ( Aaron Eckhart) to make impossible ethical decisions. In one diabolical scheme near the end of the film, he invites two ferry-loads of passengers to blow up the other before they are blown up themselves. His clown's makeup more sloppy than before, his cackle betraying deep wounds, he seeks revenge, he claims, for the horrible punishment his father exacted on him when he was a child. Will he become the first posthumous Oscar winner since Peter Finch? His Joker draws power from the actual inspiration of the character in the silent classic “ The Man Who Laughs” (1928). The key performance in the movie is by the late Heath Ledger, as the Joker.
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