The Dark Knight

[daddytodd]

Saw it om IMAX this afternoon. It was good, but IMHO not great. It was well plotted, and paced at a breakneck speed that defies boredom, but the pieces don't really hold together as a... what's the word? Oh yeah, STORY.

But as I seem to be the last guy on the planet who judges movies on their narrative, you should probably ignore me.

Comments

[stokeydoke.livejournal.com]

the high point was when he went to hong kong-- batman flying around hong kong
kidnapping bad guys-- how cool was that?

turf all the joker, two face, gotham city stuff, and send batman around the globe like
james bond in bat-body armor!

[deafguy.livejournal.com]

I'm interested enough to ask--what was wrong with the story?

What was wrong with the Story

[daddytodd.livejournal.com]

Well, there wasn't one, as far as I could tell -- "A lot of stuff happens" isn't the same thing as "A story."

A narrative needs a beginning, a middle and an end, and needs to tell us something about life.

This movie was just chaos. It was like 2 1/2 hours carved out of someone's gaming session. Oh sure, the "player" (Bruce/Batman) won a lot of battles, didn't get greased, and moved up several levels... but it wasn't a story.

Go watch "Memento" and see if that's any more satisfying than "The Dark Knight." Same writer/director, but "Memento" was a better film (IMHO) because, once you take its pieces apart and reassemble the story, there WAS a story. You understand WHY people do stuff, not just watch them do random stuff for no discernible reason.

Re: What was wrong with the Story

[deafguy.livejournal.com]

Oops... I meant to reply to your comment directly, but I accidentally wrote a new comment. I apologize.

[deafguy.livejournal.com]

I've already seen "Memento" last year. The way it was told was impressive and interesting, but I preferred Chris/Jonathan Nolan's other films more.

My friend and I had a discussion about the "Dark Knight" the other day. It did have a story, it simply wasn't centered around Batman. The main arc was the rise and the fall of Harvey Dent.

In the beginning, there was some implication about three main "pillars" standing against the Gotham underworld: Harvey Dent, Jim Gordon, and Batman. Out of them all, only Harvey is "perfect" (in the sense of lawful behavior and order). Jim Gordon is forced to work with corrupted cops and Batman defies the law.

Think about how much Harvey Dent despises corruption--he constantly criticizes Gordon for working with corrupted cops. He is willing to go any length to fight the mob, even risking his own life in the process. But as the movie proceeds, through Joker's actions, he is stripped of everything and pushed to the breaking point: Rachel, his face (nobody wants to vote for a scarred politician :P), the corrupted cops' betrayal, etc etc. He is driven to become the very thing he was trying to fight against. Maybe not every action was reasonably explained, but there was an main/significant arc that could be used as a character study of how chaos and corruption destroys an individual.

At least... that's my two bits. *shrugs* I don't mean to criticize your views--I just thought it posed an interesting discussion question.

[daddytodd.livejournal.com]

No offense meant or taken. We're not criticizing each other, just having a discussion!

I have to confess that Dent was far, FAR more interesting to me than Joker. His was the most complete character arc in the film, and I would've loved to see more of him.

I wasn't sure if Gordon's cops were really crooked, or if Dent was overzealous. Yours is certainly the more interesting interpretation by a long shot! It is, however very dark and pessimistic -- the only "clean" one was destroyed by the forces of chaos and killed. Not much hope there.

I guess I felt like all the Bat Angst is getting a little shopworn by now, going all the way back to the Tim Burton Batfilms. Bruce/Batman needs to get over himself! And I find his Bat Voice annoying.

Ledger's Joker was just a collection of facial and vocal tics (and Hannibal Lecter-like psychopathology). Not much new or fresh there.

I also find it distressing that the movie was given a PG-13 rating. That movie is NOT for kids; it should've been R.

[deafguy.livejournal.com]

I thought there was some hints of the corrupted cops in this and the first movie. Gordon keeps mentioning corrupted cops in his unit, and how somebody keeps leaking information to the mob. I'd have to rewatch both films to be sure. So maybe Dent was overestimating the amount of corruption, but there was certainly corrupted cops.

I'll have to be honest--I haven't seen the Tim Burton's Batman films yet. Somehow I never got around to seeing them... I did see the last two horrid batman films ("Batman Forever" and "Batman and Robin") so it was very easy for me to be blown away by Nolan's Batman. I wasn't aware Bale used two different voices, one for Bruce and one for Batman. Interesting.

I definitely agree about the rating of the film! I was appalled when I saw several parents bring their children (some as young as six!) to the movie both time I saw it.

[sh3rm4n04ks.livejournal.com]

I couldn't disagree with you more - see below.

And I think that Ledger did a fine job - disappearing himself inside a psycopathic frightful Joker; with none of the gentility, subtlety or cerebral qualities of Lecter. I found it nuanced and fresh.

I also think the "Bat Voice" was entirely plausible as a vocal disguise, which he dropped when he was alone with characters that knew his identity.

Applause.

[sh3rm4n04ks.livejournal.com]

Thank you for succinctly describing the narrative which cleverly illustrates some of this (action movie's) themes: Chaos vs Order, Nihilism vs Existentialism, Ends Justifying Means, and Pessimism vs Optimism. The scene with the people on the boats with the bombs may be a bit pedantic, but it encapsulates the crux of the Joker's hypothesis: Chaos reigns, and when pushed, people are cruel, predictable, cowardly, and above all: self-serving. Who will defy him?

Many people have thoughtfully elaborated their analysis of the themes and storylines woven within The Dark Knight, so I won't re-hash them here (Google yields many). Suffice it to say, that I found the story full enough to carry the entire film and scripted superbly well. I cared about the characters, and I felt they were three-dimensional; for a movie based on a comic book it felt remarkably realistic.

It humanizes Batman (and all his supporters) in heretofore unprecedented ways (akin to the Frank Miller work it was based on - and as you described above). What would organized crime's reaction be? If Batman represents the biggest "No" in Gotham, drawing the line in the sand - who most represents his opposite: the biggest "Yes" out there? And indeed, did not Batman himself "create" the Joker by pushing him out into the open, by challenging him to push back, by mere virtue of his own war on crime?

It's an action story which poses our deepest philosophical, sociological questions, and explores them in very poignant, if depressing, shades; it's the sign of our times. It not only expresses an author's view, but it does so whilst being relevant to our current cultural climates; our overwrought Age of Terror and Corruption.

Whereas Batman Begins dealt with Ra's al Ghul's (and the League of Shadow's) assertion that humanity needs to be culled and pruned through fear and destruction, in order to survive, flourish and ascend -- The Dark Knight confronts Nihilism and sociopathic crime. The Joker is frighteningly insane - and he'll prove to you that the whole world is, too. Rather than let the symbol of hope (Dent) become extinguished, Batman himself takes the rap - takes the blame, and continues his thankless, bloody fight - in the shadows as a "vigilante." He's precisely that: a REAL hero because he's not a ornamental, branded "SUPERhero." What could be more Batman than that?