Friday, July 18, 2008
"Wow!" is the first word that comes to mind when wanting to describe The Dark Knight. Christopher Nolan has once again found a way to keep a sense of believability to this series while still being amazingly true to the fantastical characters of it's comic book counterpart. Half-way through I actually forgot that I was watching a comic book movie and felt like I was enthralled in a noir crime drama. I became less concerned with the characters and more concerned with the consequences. Plenty of action, of course, but the drama, the comedy, the pain, the suspense -it was all there. Just a good solid movie.
How can I say anything about The Dark Knight and not mention the late Heath Ledger. To go in with as much anticipation and expectations as I did and come out blown away is no easy task. More than likely you're setting yourself up for a huge disappointment. Ladies and Gentleman -Mr. Ledger does not disappoint. When it was first announced that he would be playing the part of The Joker in the Batman sequel I was more than mildly skeptical. As images and clips began to emerge the feeling was slightly quelled -but, c'mon! He barely seems anything like The Joker that we all know and love. EXACTLY. For years creators have been focusing on the clown side of The Joker: the gadgets, the themes, his odd sense of style. Nolan's Joker has none of that. His only agenda? Chaos, pure and simple...and sharing it with as many people as he can. Once the actual trailers came out for the movie, you could see what they were going for. "This might be pretty good." Fast forward to this Thursday night watching the first scene of the movie and I thought, "Well this Joker's pretty cool", but after the 'Disappearing Pencil Trick' I was gone. This wasn't your father's Clowned Prince of Crime anymore. Oh, no. This guy was a lunatic in every sense of the word and, honestly, I spent the rest of the movie with tingling anticipation and uncertainty as to what he may do next. Bravo, Mr. Ledger, bravo. You've re-defined the archetype. My only disappointment now is that I want more and that just ain't gonna happen. But like another great Joker once said, "If you're gonna go...go with a smile!" All that's left to see now is if his performance was Oscar-worthy enough for that little gold statue that sects of the Hollywood community are pushing for his performance to get. Well, I guess we'll have to wait and see, unlike The Dark Knight, which you can go and see right now. Go! I'll wait...
***An interesting footnote: Though we'll all still be able to enjoy Heath Ledger in Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (the unfinished scenes for his character will be played by Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farell -I am not making that up), his final completed performance will stand as his genius portrayal of The Joker in The Dark Knight. Ironically enough, the first role of his career was in Clowning Around, which is about -you guessed it...clowns.***
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