The Dark Knight Delivers
The Clown Prince of Crime steals the show.
I'm sure everyone has heard the buzz surrounding Heath Ledgers performance in this movie, with talk floating in the air about Academy Award nominations and Oscar worthy acting. Perhaps all of it is nothing more then polite commentary after his tragic passing only months after the films shooting ended. Either way, I was eager to see it for myself, and I can honestly say that it lives up to every bit of the hype.
Any good comic geek can tell you that The Joker is Batman's antithesis in regards to morale justice and integrity. The yin to his yang, as it were, but what REALLY makes the 2 characters so much bloody fun to watch is that the line between the 2 characters is unimaginably thin.
The Joker has always seems watered down outside comics. Not quite campy, but not quite raw enough. The Dark Knight nailed it. The Joker is supposed to be messed up - I mean, REALLY screwed up in the head, and Heath Ledger's portrayal marks him as the best Joker of all time. It can easily be argued that The Joker steals the show, because every moment that he's not on screen, your waiting (and at the same time, silently dreading) the next time he will appear. He's eerie and mystifying, and every bit as messed up as The Joker should be.
I also bow down to Hans Zimmer & James Newton Howard, because they gave this movie the mood and feel that Gotham City deserves. The absolutely chilling violin crescendo, that eerily creeps louder and louder, adds to the tension and uneasiness of the characters and the film overall. Just wonderfully enhancing, chilling, and driving.
The areas and themes explored also oozed tension - self doubt, sexuality (separate loves), and the all endearing pure psychotic glee, to name a few.
The viewer is forced to watch as The Batman is helpless to stop this psycho path in fear of losing himself to the same madness. And The Joker IS mad. Completely mad. You feel utterly ill watching The Joker parade through Gotham City unchecked, like a cancer slowly digging its tendrils into the heart of the city. Dark, dark, dark - this movie is gritty as hell. It transcends the pulpy medium it was born into and rises it to an entirely new level.
This movie is real. It will resonate within every movie goer on some level. The second I knew this was going to the kind of movie I'd hoped for was when The Joker did his "magic trick" at the beginning of the film. That just, totally fucked up moment of humor that you know you're going to hell for laughing at, but all the while realizing that you're only laughing to easy the tension - you're actually not really "laughing" at all. Because you know that it's not funny. It's wrong. THAT'S why The Joker was so good. Excellent writing. Excellent acting. Excellent execution.
If EVERY Batman story were told with this kind of attention to character detail, it would be my favorite series hands down. I eagerly await the chance to see this movie again.
I'm sure everyone has heard the buzz surrounding Heath Ledgers performance in this movie, with talk floating in the air about Academy Award nominations and Oscar worthy acting. Perhaps all of it is nothing more then polite commentary after his tragic passing only months after the films shooting ended. Either way, I was eager to see it for myself, and I can honestly say that it lives up to every bit of the hype.
Any good comic geek can tell you that The Joker is Batman's antithesis in regards to morale justice and integrity. The yin to his yang, as it were, but what REALLY makes the 2 characters so much bloody fun to watch is that the line between the 2 characters is unimaginably thin.
The Joker has always seems watered down outside comics. Not quite campy, but not quite raw enough. The Dark Knight nailed it. The Joker is supposed to be messed up - I mean, REALLY screwed up in the head, and Heath Ledger's portrayal marks him as the best Joker of all time. It can easily be argued that The Joker steals the show, because every moment that he's not on screen, your waiting (and at the same time, silently dreading) the next time he will appear. He's eerie and mystifying, and every bit as messed up as The Joker should be.
I also bow down to Hans Zimmer & James Newton Howard, because they gave this movie the mood and feel that Gotham City deserves. The absolutely chilling violin crescendo, that eerily creeps louder and louder, adds to the tension and uneasiness of the characters and the film overall. Just wonderfully enhancing, chilling, and driving.
The areas and themes explored also oozed tension - self doubt, sexuality (separate loves), and the all endearing pure psychotic glee, to name a few.
The viewer is forced to watch as The Batman is helpless to stop this psycho path in fear of losing himself to the same madness. And The Joker IS mad. Completely mad. You feel utterly ill watching The Joker parade through Gotham City unchecked, like a cancer slowly digging its tendrils into the heart of the city. Dark, dark, dark - this movie is gritty as hell. It transcends the pulpy medium it was born into and rises it to an entirely new level.
This movie is real. It will resonate within every movie goer on some level. The second I knew this was going to the kind of movie I'd hoped for was when The Joker did his "magic trick" at the beginning of the film. That just, totally fucked up moment of humor that you know you're going to hell for laughing at, but all the while realizing that you're only laughing to easy the tension - you're actually not really "laughing" at all. Because you know that it's not funny. It's wrong. THAT'S why The Joker was so good. Excellent writing. Excellent acting. Excellent execution.
If EVERY Batman story were told with this kind of attention to character detail, it would be my favorite series hands down. I eagerly await the chance to see this movie again.
