The Dark Knight

Let me begin by saying I really liked Nolan's Scarecrow. That statement plays an important part since he chose to being The Dark Knight by making Scarecrow a "grey" hat, as it were.

One of the opening scenes (about fifteen to twenty minutes into the 2 and a half hour picture) is of a group of mobsters being attacked by a group of Batman wannabes, led by Scarecrow. When the real Batman shows up and unmasks one of the bats-in-training and Dr. Krane, they both desperately profess that they were "only trying to help."

What? Scarecrow is ... trying to help Batman? I don't think I'm okay with that. And for purely female reasons, I'm also not okay with that being Cillian Murphy's only scene in the whole movie but his absence didn't take away from the rest of the movie.

The rest of the movie was... not as good as the first. When I heard Christian Bale, the American Psycho, was cast as Batman, I worried. Batman Begins put that worry to rest. The Dark Knight was not as good. If you are in it for explosions and the occasional one-liner (Lucius Fox asking Bruce Wayne's accountant if he really thought it was a good idea to blackmail a man who spends his nights beating bad guys to pulp), you are in for a hell of a ride. But if you are expecting a film to par with Nolan's previous outing, I fear you will be disappointed.

Morally, I have qualms critiquing Heath Ledger's performance, given the speculation that his inability to get out of character and leave The Joker's insanity behind was what led to the depression that eventually killed him. That is not to say I don't think he did a good job in the role, and if I didn't know it was him, I'd have never known it was him, but I have heard unofficial reviews that he made the show and I'm not sure I agree with that.

The truth is The Joker is supposed to be the scariest of all the Bat-villains because his only motivation is to, to quote Alfred (Michael Caine), "watch the world burn." Throughout the history of Batman, from the original Detective Comics to the 1960's TV show to the Dark Horse comics, The Joker has never been given a backstory to tell us why he is the way he is and he is (intentionally) the only villain without one. I don't think this version of The Joker was written to live up to that title. It comes down to a question of writing and considering Nolan's writing, Scarecrow is far more frightening than The Joker.

For the record, Nolan's treatment of Two-Face was a bigger disappointment but expounding on the whys of that would give away too much of the end of the film and I don't do that.

I guess the moral of the story here is to go see The Dark Knight but don't go because of the media hype (which is a bit over the top) or because the 14 screen theater in my humble hamlet has it playing on five screens to accommodate the anticipated audiences (which is also a bit over the top). Go because, in the dozen or so years I have been watching his performances, Christian Bale has never failed to impress and go because it's freaking Batman.