DARK KNIGHT
Ever since 1939 Batman has been a household name. The "Dark Knight" patrols the streets of Gotham getting rid of the crime. The comics and movies are all along the same story line of Batman fighting the villain who's trying to wreak havoc on the city. Then Batman defeats the villain and saves the city. However, this isn't necessarily the case of Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight. If your looking for a mindless movie to watch this isn't for you. The movie jumps right in with the first scene as an intense bank robbery full of action and violence. Although its plot is similar to past Batman movies, it has many significant story lines going on at once along with many different characters. Therefore, it's vital that you pay attention the entire time, because if you don't you will be lost. Christian Bale plays a slick and charming Bruce Wayne. Heath Ledger is The Joker, and does a great job of becoming a believable, terrifying, sociopathic clown. I am a fan of Heath Ledger from his performance in Brokeback Mountain, however I feel his best role has been The Joker. Along with Batman, Harvey Dent, played by Aaron Eckhart, is a lawyer of Gotham city fighting hard to get all criminals in jail. Dent's actions grab the attention of The Joker and make him The Joker's next target. Another lawyer named Rachael Dawson, played by Maggie Gyllenhaal, also finds herself in the line of fire as Batman's ex girlfriend and Dent's current.
The entire movie is shot in extremely dim lighting causing mystery and suspense. At times I did not enjoy the lighting, because I was unable to see and follow some of the action and fighting. One thing I extremely enjoyed about the movie was all of the shots of the city, but maybe it's because It was shot in our very own city of Chicago. Almost every scene began with some type of birds eye view of the city. And, sometimes we would get a shot of Batman on top of a large skyscraper looking over the city, which I felt was amazing camera work. Most scenes also began with a long shot showing the full characters along with full view of the entire room. Later this shot would turn into a medium shot, where most of the movie would take place in (unless it was a fighting scene then it would stay full length). However, when showing The Joker the camera would always be in a close up. This exaggerated his scarred up face, crackling make up and truly emphasised his bad dental hygiene. It was a gross image that forced me to look away at times.
One scene I enjoyed is a party scene at Bruce Wayne's. Hundreds of guests, including Dent and Dawes, were enjoying themselves when The Joker crashed the party looking for Dent. Wayne and his smooth way of handling danger quickly hid Dent while The Joker searched the house, and harassed all the guests. He quickly found Dawes and grabbed her, giving her his famous "wanna know how I got these scars?" speech that caused me, in the audience, to begin to panic. However, Batman came and saved the day as The Joker dropped Dawes out a window. Batman jumps out after her, grabs her, then breaks her fall with his own body. They both survive the fall despite the fact that is was an 80 story drop. The movie clearly has it's unrealistic aspects of Batman knocking out a room of guys with one hit, yet surviving the 80 story drop. It has many cheesy fighting scenes, but that's expected in a superhero movie. The main aspect of this movie that sets it apart from all other Batman or superhero movies is the special effects. They were extremely impressive and left me in awe. Even though there are cheesy fight scenes and it was hard to follow, I still felt this was an amazing movie. Rotten Tomatoes gave it a rating of 96%, and I agree very much with this rating. I personally would give this movie a 4/5, but if the fighting was more realistic it would no doubt be a 5/5. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie and would very much see it again.
