Post by rrw on Jul 21, 2008 16:42:18 GMT -5
So I'm going to try and sit here for the next 30 minutes and write a review of the new Batman movie... Can it be done?! I'm not sure. When a piece of art is as chucked full of inspiration, fantastic ideas, human empathy and... a few glitches, its difficult to write about it. But here it goes:
Batman: The Dark Knight is a powerhouse movie! It is a heck of a very bleak joyride through human existence that is at its core a morality play that puts to test the human spirit. I know, I know very highbrow terminology for a movie based on comic book characters, but still it has a lot to say about the human condition and it does it with crisp dialogue and some breathtaking action sequences. The main idea that this movie deals with is: There's a very fine line between being a hero and being a villain... and once that line is crossed its hard if not impossible to get back on the right side. Where that line is, is best described by the scene between the two boats, one filled with the "good citizens" of Gotham and the other filled with convicts. Each boat is given a choice: Blow-up the other boat and live, or do nothing and die. The final choice that the two groups make IS the meaning of this film... When you are self sacrificing, your the hero; when you choose to put you're needs and desires before everyone else, you are the villain... And life is as simple as that. This movie explores the idea so fully and completely with great action sequences and wonderful moments of philosophical enlightenment that slow the pace down a little but does give us needed time to just... take a breath.
There are a few glitches. The scene where the Joker threatens to give one of the mobsters a permanent grin with his trusty paring knife falls a little flat... probably because of a need to edit for the PG-13 rating... shame on the production team if that is true. Another is the visuals of Batman's Cell-Phone-X-ray-Vision (I don't know what else to call it). It doesn't work well... we've seen the technique too many times in other movies. The last glitch is that the character of Rachel Dawes is just poorly written and acted. She just doesn't fit in the movie. The problem may well be that a new actress took over the role from Katie Holmes and they just didn't know what to do with her. The only solution: Kill her off. Bad choice.
But the rest of the cast is superb! Bale, Caine, Oldman, Echhart... Heck! All the way down to the small part of a convict played by Tom Lister, Jr., all the actors own their roles. They have taken their comic book characters and have breathed the life into them. The writer, director and the cast should be applauded for turning these one dimensional comic book characters into three dimensional human beings that are at any given moment good, evil or a combination of the two.
In a real gutsy move, the production team created the character of the Joker. He is the "Wild Card," the fly in the ointment ("Yippee-ki-yay, MF!"), the terrorist that comes out of nowhere to test the metal of each and every character in the movie. How will they respond to this living moment of crisis? Some become evil, others become heroes... still others die. I'm not gonna say much more about Heath Ledger's performance other than it was totally right on and a tremendous acting job. Man, his character was so evil:
Acting like what Ledger did in this movie is not beyond description... but if you want to know how he did it, come take my acting class and learn how. The point is that the writing, direction, costume design and Ledger's acting made this an iconic character. Long live the Joker!
Batman: The Dark Knight is a powerhouse movie! It is a heck of a very bleak joyride through human existence that is at its core a morality play that puts to test the human spirit. I know, I know very highbrow terminology for a movie based on comic book characters, but still it has a lot to say about the human condition and it does it with crisp dialogue and some breathtaking action sequences. The main idea that this movie deals with is: There's a very fine line between being a hero and being a villain... and once that line is crossed its hard if not impossible to get back on the right side. Where that line is, is best described by the scene between the two boats, one filled with the "good citizens" of Gotham and the other filled with convicts. Each boat is given a choice: Blow-up the other boat and live, or do nothing and die. The final choice that the two groups make IS the meaning of this film... When you are self sacrificing, your the hero; when you choose to put you're needs and desires before everyone else, you are the villain... And life is as simple as that. This movie explores the idea so fully and completely with great action sequences and wonderful moments of philosophical enlightenment that slow the pace down a little but does give us needed time to just... take a breath.
There are a few glitches. The scene where the Joker threatens to give one of the mobsters a permanent grin with his trusty paring knife falls a little flat... probably because of a need to edit for the PG-13 rating... shame on the production team if that is true. Another is the visuals of Batman's Cell-Phone-X-ray-Vision (I don't know what else to call it). It doesn't work well... we've seen the technique too many times in other movies. The last glitch is that the character of Rachel Dawes is just poorly written and acted. She just doesn't fit in the movie. The problem may well be that a new actress took over the role from Katie Holmes and they just didn't know what to do with her. The only solution: Kill her off. Bad choice.
But the rest of the cast is superb! Bale, Caine, Oldman, Echhart... Heck! All the way down to the small part of a convict played by Tom Lister, Jr., all the actors own their roles. They have taken their comic book characters and have breathed the life into them. The writer, director and the cast should be applauded for turning these one dimensional comic book characters into three dimensional human beings that are at any given moment good, evil or a combination of the two.
In a real gutsy move, the production team created the character of the Joker. He is the "Wild Card," the fly in the ointment ("Yippee-ki-yay, MF!"), the terrorist that comes out of nowhere to test the metal of each and every character in the movie. How will they respond to this living moment of crisis? Some become evil, others become heroes... still others die. I'm not gonna say much more about Heath Ledger's performance other than it was totally right on and a tremendous acting job. Man, his character was so evil:
"Doctor Lecter, the Joker's here for his appointment."
"Tell him I'm not here!" (Hides under desk.)
"Tell him I'm not here!" (Hides under desk.)
Acting like what Ledger did in this movie is not beyond description... but if you want to know how he did it, come take my acting class and learn how. The point is that the writing, direction, costume design and Ledger's acting made this an iconic character. Long live the Joker!
Thanks again for writing this......musie
and 
all
time for me 
echoes, hope you all are doing well 
