Thursday, July 19, 2012

The Dark Knight (2008)

Rating: 90%
Alright to last night I saw this movie again to prepare for The Dark Knight Rises. So here's my review for The Dark Knight.

Plot: Since the events of Batman Begins, Lt. Gordon and Batman have been working on getting rid of the entire mob to completely rid Gotham of crime. After a mob-owned bank is robbed by the Joker, they decide to clue in the new District Attorney Harvey Dent in their plan to take down the mob. But when Batman captures the Chinese accountant who has all of the mob's funds, the mob decides to call the Joker for help. So the Joker sends a message where he declares an ultimatum stating that Batman has to unmask himself and people will die everyday for every day that he doesn't.

What can I saw that you likely do not know already? It's a wonderful film. The story itself is very creative and well thought out, the characters are awesome especially with how some of them introduce to us how Batman as a franchise makes it all psychological when it comes to its characters whether its the villains or even Batman himself. The action is very good, the special effects are awesome (especially when it comes to the Bat-Pod), the dialogue is very memorable, and one thing that I find especially nice about this film is how while it is very dark and every thing, they did gives us some comedy here and there that is very enjoyable. The first five minutes or so of the movie is very clever to the point where it almost seem like it shows itself as its own short film which is really cool.  But there's a couple of things that don't really make sense, such as *WARNING SPOILERS* how it isn't always clear that Lucius Fox known that Bruce Wayne is Batman. I mean I guess it's not a big deal because you can figure it out for yourself, but from my point of view from the first few times I watched the movie, I had trouble knowing for sure, so I guess for me, I would've liked them to just have said it straight out that he knows. But again, that's just my take from it. And then there's of coarse, the movie ending with Gordon saying that there's only five people dead when in fact there's at least nine people dead that Gordon should know about not counting the robbers that Joker killed earlier in the movie. Maybe the characters actually think it's just five and they somehow don't know or not considering the other deaths, or maybe that's a problem with the script that they didn't find before shooting that scene or something. I don't know, but that little error is confusing considering its inaccuracy. *END OF SPOILERS* That aside thought, it's an excellent film that did an excellent job at taking the idea of not just batman, but superheroes in general to an entirely new level.

Acting/Characters:
Christian Bale/Bruce Wayne a.k.a. Batman: Same thing as the last film, but the one major down that's part of why The Joker really stole the show in this film was how some of Batman's dialogue turned out to a little cheesy. But he still did a good job at the end of the day and you can at least enjoy how we get more into Batman having different kinds of gadgets like with the Batpod, the Night vision Bat goggles (or detective mode to people like me who play the Arkham games) and the Timed Grenade Launcher.
Heath Ledger/The Joker: I know we all say the same thing but that shouldn't stop me from saying it: Heath Ledger's Joker is a masterpiece of a performance. He was unpredictable, he was psychotic as heck, he. was. truly. The Joker. I mean Nicholson's Joker is just as memorable, but Ledger brings out the psychological aspect of who The Joker is, showing how he views the world, how he'll do things just because he can as Alfred points out, and most of also how they keep it a total, utter mystery as to where The Joker come from or where he came to be. Because for some people like my brother, they prefer to have The Joker without any past in him at all because that's what makes him even more dangerous because that can leave you just as defenseless as to how to stop him. It's a terrible tragedy that Ledger didn't live long enough to see how he turned out as The Joker in this film with how he has truly set up bigger standards for future actors to play the Joker in other film version of Batman possibly to come, and also that he didn't live to see himself win best supporting actor for his amazing performance. All let's left to say is that Ledger has our thanks for giving us a truly wonderful performance and that he should be well remembered for generations for his performance.   
Aaron Eckhart/Harvey Dent a.k.a. Two-Face: While Ledger stole the show when it comes to the super criminals in this film, Eckhart did do a brilliant job as Harvey Dent. He really showed Dent as a man who will stand up to crime and finish what Batman started and he'll do whatever it takes to get it done. Now how he was as Two-Face was an excellent result two. I mean the visual effect for making him Two-Face is cool and fun too look at, which is where I wish he was Two-Face much more often in this movie, and while they don't show the dual personality that Two-Face has in the comics, he still gave us at the very least, a really good introduction as to what his villain is like in the comics. Plus even if he's not a perfect Two-Face to some people, you can easily admit that he beats the living crap out of Tommy Lee Jones' version of the super criminal.

Music: The music is so much better in this movie. I mean they kind of upgraded the theme track for Batman which is awesome, and then they gave us the Joker's them track "Why so Serious?" which is a very interesting piece with all the different kind of instruments and notes that Hans Zimmer used in this piece which turned out to be very enjoyable to listen to.

And that's my review for The Dark Knight. It's a creative, well put together movie that really brings Batman and the idea of superheroes into a new level while giving us performances that we sure as heck are not going to EVER forget anytime soon.    

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