Movie Review: The Dark Knight (2008)
Starring: Chriatian Bale, Heath Ledger, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman, & Gary Oldman
Director: Christopher Nolan
Writer(s): Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan
Studio: Warner Bros Pictures
Rating: PG-13
Official Bar Score: 
THIS REVIEW AND COMMENTS MAY CONTAIN UN-AVOIDABLE SPOILERS TO PROPERLY SCORE THE FILM!
This film for me anyways, is easilly a classic status- and a great bookend to Heath Ledger’s acting prowess.
Bat Trivia time :
* Matt Damon was Christopher Nolan’s first choice for the role of Harvey Dent but turned it down. Before Aaron Eckhart was cast in the part, other actors considered included Hugh Jackman, Ryan Phillippe, Liev Schreiber and Josh Lucas.
* As a joke, one bat suit was made with nipples, as in Batman & Robin (1997). It was presented to Christian Bale as the real bat suit, but he knew instantly it was a joke, having seen a few design pictures during preproduction. He did pose for some publicity photos in the “nipple” suit.
* This is the first Batman film to not have “Batman” in the title.
* Christopher Nolan has a son named Rory, for whom the working title of the film (”Rory’s First Kiss”) was named.
* Robin Williams, Lachy Hulme, Paul Bettany, and Adrien Brody all expressed interest for the role of the Joker before Heath Ledger was cast.
* When asked, “Why Heath Ledger as the Joker?” Christopher Nolan said, “Because he’s fearless.”
# To prepare for his role as the Joker, Heath Ledger lived alone in a hotel room for a month, formulating the character’s psychology, posture and voice (the last one he found most difficult to do). He started a diary, in which he wrote the Joker’s thoughts and feelings to guide himself during his performance. He was also given Alan Moore’s comic “Batman: The Killing Joke” and “Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth” to read. Ledger also took inspiration from A Clockwork Orange (1971)’s Alex and Sid Vicious.
# Director Christopher Nolan and co-writers Jonathan Nolan and David S. Goyer decided not to explore the origins of the Joker in order to portray the character as “absolute.”
# Christopher Nolan cites the film Heat (1995) as a major influence on this movie.
# Costume designer Lindy Hemming based the Joker’s look around his personality, in which “he doesn’t care about himself at all.” Hemming was inspired by countercultural pop culture artists like Pete Doherty, Iggy Pop, and Sid Vicious. She avoided his design being vagrant, but made it scruffier and grungier, therefore making his movements slightly twitchier and edgier.
# An explosion was filmed at the Battersea Power Station in London. The fireball created calls from panic-stricken local residents, who assumed a terrorist attack was on the out-of-use Station.
# Nestor Carbonell who plays the Mayor in “The Dark Knight” coincidentally also played “Bat Manuel”, a parody of Batman in the comic-based live action “The Tick” (2001) TV series.
# The Batman Comic Books “The Long Halloween”, “The Killing Joke”, “The Man Who Laughs” and the first two comics to feature the Joker character served as an influence on the film’s storyline.
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This movie was the shit, the Joker stole the movie in my opinion and Heath took the role of The Joker way beyond Jack Nicholson’s wildest dreams. He gave a five star performance, But I wouldn’t give it classic status, 4 beers is stretching it, the film had to many flaws and a lot of down time for as long as it was.
Just to name a few.
1.The fact that The Joker “carefully choreographing the elements that would radically change the lives of the people of Gotham, and reign terror and chaos that brings Bruce Wayne, Batman, to the edge.” Contradicts the chaos theory that he himself spoke about in the film. But then again he contradicts everything he says.
2.The little boy who found out his father died, didn’t seem to care when he realized that he was still alive (A little flaw but worth mentioning).
3. The sonar machine that was built to track down the joker, when the hell did Bruce have time to sneak in under Morgan Freeman’s nose to build the thing.
4. They never explained what came of the Joker.
5. Katie Holmes should of returned to her role, the other chick sucked.
6. 2-Face changed his tune way too fast.
Other than that the film was on point and probably the best attempt at a Batman film to date. I give Ledger a lot of shit for playing a fag and starring in the Knights Tale but I don’t think ANYONE could of played the Joker Better. The film should of been called “The Joker”.
I wanna see this again.
love that artwork.. alot.. hate that it’s tragic, but its still wicked.
Iron Man was way better though.
My final thoughts would be 5 beers. I was at 4 beers throughout the whole movie but as soon as the scene with joker at the police station hit my whole opinion of the film shifted.
Like Wendell I don’t care for Christian Bale much (I still hate his “Batman” voice) nor Heath Ledger but the film was great, without a doubt and I would hate to be the person to even attempt to fill the shoes. Sorry Jack, Heath stole the crown and will forever be the most iconic Joker in my eyes.
As for the “flaws” eh that’s the problem with film making, sure you can take the time and try to explain every little thing but then you end up with a five hour movie that has way too much down time. Instead you have to dwindle it down to explaining the important parts and keep the most action. I thought Dark Knight did a great job of keeping the story moving as well as developing the characters, which considering how many characters there were that’s a real task. The film also did a good job of keeping me entertained for the entire time and that’s the bottom line.
The only gripe I had with the movie was the fate of Harvey Dent.
Great movie that didn’t disappoint and I’m confident in saying it’ll be one of the year’s best.
Eric Roberts FTW
Yeah he sounded like he really needed a cough drop or some throat spray that nigga was hoarse. It is a great film though despite the very few flaws it has. I’m sure there isn’t a movie goer alive that will be disappointed.
Batman: The Dark Knight what a movie, a great movie! The Joker it should have been called. The Joker was the very essence of this movie. Never in any of the Batman films has one character commanded such respect. Heath Ledger is remarkable in his acting. This is by far the best performance of his career and sadly his final act. He played the Joker like no other has (Jack Nicholson) and no other will (possibly Johnny Depp). Heath delved into the demented mind of the Joker. He possessed the role of the Joker and the Joker consumed him and the results were stellar on screen! If I did not already know it was Heath Ledger playing the Joker than there would be no way I could’ve guessed it was him. He didnt sound like Heath, he didn’t look like Heath, he didn’t act or move like Heath and thats because for this film he was not Heath….he was the jOker. He lived the role. His performance was flawless, oscar worthy, and rememberable by far!
Heath as a person is a soul purer than most. a benevolent mixing pot of talent, passion, and gentlemanly stature. Now take such a man, give him a role, and allow him to find his motivation and out comes the Joker. A mad man, fueled by hate and twisted by schizophrenic impulse. A fearless dark iconic villain that steals the lime light right out from under the cape of Batman. That is acting at its best, to see such a kind hearted man transform on screen to the sinister force of the dark side of human nature. With out Heath this movie would’ve been mediocre despite the remaining star power. From the beginning to the end it was Heath, it was the Joker. This was his movie and Bale (Batman) was the supporting actor! RIP Heath Ledger you will be missed and your movies will live on and without a doubt this performance will be considered one the best performances given by any actor in any movie!
ummm…Shane, I am starting to worry about you. Do you have something to tell us, because you sound like you would do Heath Ledger? Damn that reply was longer then the review! This movie made like 18.5 million in one showing, that is pretty amazing!
http://www.imdb.com/chart/top
^ Not sure how long that will last but that’s pretty insane. #1 rated movie of all time on imdb, out of a list of 250 films that’s impressive
That is pretty impressive. We should leave this as a feature as long as we can get away with it.
Winston have you seen it yet?
nah gonna see next weekend at an IMAX. I’m excited.
Let’s leave it like this all week until Step Brothers gets a review. Somebody find me a background that loads faster though, that shit is annoying the fuck out of me.
It also now officially holds opening weekend record as well for those who didn’t pick up on that when Winny posted the #’s
Spiderman 3 had 151 million and the Dark Knight took in 155.
That’s nuts. Producer’s should start clipping their stars in all of their big movies.
Hey Mike at least it sounds like if I’d do a guy it would be a celebrity and not some random Joe down the street like you hahaha! I can’t help it that I know talent when I see it. I’m not afraid to give the man credit. He made the film, he owned it! He blew Jack Nicholson’s Joker performance out of the water and those are some big shoes to fill!!
This better be good. “Blew Jack Nicholson’s performance out of the water”? That’s a bold statement.
Has anyone ever seen a movie in an IMAX theater? I’m curious what it’s like.
Oh yeah, and I don’t care how good it is, Christian Bale ain’t got a goddamn thing on Robert Downey Jr.
other than better roles and more money, and a shit load of franchise films to come.
Fuck that, this is maaaaaaaad overrated. It was good, great even… I would have gave it four beers. But “What could be said about Heath Ledger’s performance short of awesome” or “Heath breathed new life into the Joker”? Please. It was a good performance and nothing more. Nicholson’s Joker was way better and everyone is getting caught up in Heath-Hype. I thought Aaron Eckhart stole the show, and they fucked up and messed up the potential of Two-Face.
This was disappointing because the unfounded hype killed it. Not “Blair Witch Project” disappointing, but enough to piss me off despite how good it was. “Iron Man” was way better.
Nah, Jack’s performance wasn’t even close his joker was too goofy and this is from someone who doesn’t even like Ledger
The Joker is a goofy bastard though. Jack had the perfect mix of goofy and homicidal.
I agree Winston. This was a good movie. Over hyped like transformers.
I liked Batman begins better. Batman forever is still the best in the franchise.
good god you guys have horrible taste in films.
Nah dude, I’m being objective. “Iron Man” was better in every way.
I think that there are so many Batman fans in this world that really wanted this movie to be great that none of them could admit that the movie was only worth four beers. Heath’s performance was awesome as the joker, I agree that he stole the role from Nicholson, but I’m not going to base my opinion of the film on just his performance.
Christian Bales Bat voice was alot like Corey Feldman’s in lost boys the tribe.
This movie was awesome though but it wasn’t as entertaining as Iron Man. I’m glad some one in this world agrees with me thanks Winston.
stop smoking chiba
stop smoking iron mans rod
Iron man was better than batman forever as well. Quit sucking off Val, huckelberry
Tombstone > Iron Man > The Dark Knight
Superdave > everyone
Best superhero ever, when we making the movie?
It’s been done:
Sorry guys, but three beers MAX. It was borderline tedious and highly overrated. Batman Begins #1, followed by the older movies in whatever order, and lastly the Dark Knight. Nicholson portrayed the joker much much better than Ledger. Its probably a conspiracy that he died….they realized they needed a publicity boost to make people idolize Heaths performance.
hahaha nice.
I’m glad I’m not the only person that liked Jack Nicholson’s Joker better.
Now that’s a movie we all could sit around and enjoy!!!!
Shane and I just wagered on “The Dark Knight” taking down “Titanic”’s $600,788,188 domestic mark.
This is money in the bank. DK is losing close to 50% on it’s takes every weekend. No way it pulls another 200 million.
Though “The Dark Knight” has been a bona fide cultural event, boasting rave reviews and boffo box office, it hasn’t been immune to criticism. Some have quibbled with its political undercurrents, and others have criticized a muddled theme.
But here’s the critique most widely held: Why does Batman talk like the offspring of Clint Eastwood and a grizzly bear?
Donning the costume for the second time, Christian Bale has delved deeper into the lower registers. As Bruce Wayne, his voice is as smooth as his finely pressed suits. But once he puts the cape on, the transformation of his vocal chords is just as dramatic as his costume change.
Particularly when his rage boils over, Bale’s Batman growls in an almost beastly fashion, reflecting how close he teeters between do-gooder and vengeance-crazed crusader.
read msn much??
That’s not where I got it, I just think it’s funny that so many people are complaining that is making mainpage entertainment news over the fact that Morgan Freeman was in a serious car crash at that.