drwex | Dark Knight

On Friday I took a half-day off work so wifey and I could see The Dark Knight. I thought it was a very good movie.
All of the actors were really good, even down to the bit parts, and the script dealt with the themes and tropes that make this story great.

Ledger in particular does a spectacular job as the pivotal motivating force in the movie. His multiple renditions of the "how I got these scars" story and the fact that he delivers his last speech hanging upside down and it matters not at all stand out as high points for me. The initial hospital confrontation between Joker and Two-Face also was well-written.

I liked the fact that the story never talked down to the viewer and was willing to just run with the assumption that people knew things like what Arkaham Asylum was, and why Rachel Dawes knows so much about Bruce/Batman.

Growing up I always wanted to be Batman, never Superman. I remember first reading the Dark Knight comics as a young adolescent and being so upset I couldn't read Batman comics for some time afterward. That kid-in-me identified strongly with James Gordon Jr. as he refuses to accept his hero's transformation into anti-hero. Batman as the person who will do what is needed - what he feels is Right - and yet will not violate certain strictures... it's a hard thing for a young person to wrap his head around.

That said, there were several things in the movie that were like sand in my eyeballs and I can't resist griping about them. First off, stupid plot. The prisoner with a bomb in his belly? Come on, that was obvious a mile away. I'm supposed not only to accept that the police didn't even pat this guy down before they tossed him in lock-up but that they can't identify something that screams "BOMB" when you glance at it? Boo, hiss. Yes, I know it's a movie but part of what makes the Joker so good is that he only telegraphs his moves when you can't do anything about them.

Also stupid: the hostages-as-masked-villains bit. Pfft - been done, should've been obvious. And the escort-chase through the tunnel with Dent-as-Batman: they have time to identify the weaponry that the Joker is using but apparently they have no guns to shoot at him as he fires off rocket after rocket? :(

Second, the decision to do Two-Face as a digital effect totally failed for me. The demarcation line between the face halves kept moving when Eckhart turned his profile relative to the camera. It was obvious to me that the actor was working without make-up or prosthetic, etc. I get that it's supposed to be horrific but leaving bone exposed? I don't buy it. The 100% perfect hair also made me crazy - half his face catches fire and his hair doesn't burn? No, sorry.

Part of what makes this sand more aggravating is that most of it comes late in the film when I'm already bought in and going with the flow. I didn't want to keep getting pushed out of the story. In the end I felt like they rushed the last bit of the film, as though they were hurrying to meet some production deadline and didn't have time to go back and make it right.

Minor points all, but like small flaws in a big sheet of glass they stood out where I just wanted things to be smooth.