Saw it saw it a second time today and loved it even more.
I thought this was interesting
Here is what Grant Morrison had to say about the film:
I really don’t think I’m sticking my neck out too far if I hail ‘The Dark Knight’ as not only the best Batman movie so far and one of the best Batman stories ever told, but as the quintessential superhero story itself, laid bare, lasered down to its skeleton and reconstructed to suit the needs of our times with panache, wit and a monstrous sad darkness. It may even be the best popular meditation on a peculiarly postmodern version of Gnostic dualism that we’ve been given for a bracingly long time.
So comics scholars will understand me when I compare ‘The Dark Knight’ to WATCHMEN as a measure of its likely impact on the ’genre’ that spawned it. Like WATCHMEN, it forces all previous and future offerings of its kind into a higher-level dialogue and it will be intriguing to see what comes next. This looks set to redefine the limits of what a ‘superhero movie’ is capable of.
It shares with WATCHMEN a devious intricacy of structure, a hyper-machine-like sense of super-organized ideas whizzing around in perfect formation like the Red Arrows. As the whole immense engine clicks into place, and suddenly you understand WHY the title, the moment is accompanied by that peculiar sense of completion and accomplishment that, to me, is one hallmark of creative brilliance in the popular arts.
Christian Bale, best Batman ever, adds all kinds of new shadings to an already iconic take. His Batman is required to transform from man to myth as we watch and he never lets us down, capturing every nuance of Bruce Wayne’s loss, his determination and his own personal madness.
As advance reviews may have led an unsuspecting world to believe Heath Ledger does indeed dynamite the screen, dance through it and have murderous sex with your dad’s Chihuahua, in that way he would if I were a writer for a ’cult media’ magazine, drowning in the sound of my own ghastly hyperbole.
In his first appearance as the Joker, the IMAX wall seems to vibrate with Ledger’s presence and intent. He owns the room, as they say, and though you’ll weep bitter tears that he’s gone, you’ll surely stand in awe of this tour de force of sheer ******* act-yer-tits-off-son bravado. It’s the Joker incarnate.
Michael Caine does the definitive Alfred. Gary Oldman brings the movie’s beating human soul to a rumpled Jim Gordon. Maggie Gyllenhaal nails her role and adds the frazzled edge to Rachel Dawes that Katie Holmes left out. Morgan Freeman wears gravitas like a hat. It’s almost ridiculous how well every single moving part in this movie acquits itself to scrutiny.
Oh, and Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent will break your heart.
I’m quite hard to please, and a movie has to be really good to get me jumping but this Dark Knight honked my horn from here to hell and back and I feel a need to spread the love like margarine over these, me own internet pages. It’s a work of art to look at, and as Nolan’s clear attempt to craft his own perfect all-time best Batman story EVER, the ultimate Batman story, it never veers off course.
I can’t wait to see it again. This time at the Xscape in Braehead with the neds. Like I said, it doesn’t take much predicting power to know this is going to be a big, paradigm-shifting and immensely popular movie.
I went mental for this film. I still can’t stop thinking about it and how instantly it avoids the type of formulaic ’comic book movie’ clichés you may have begun to notice in other films, or how brilliantly Nolan and his team have taken Batman off the page, reprocessed everything that makes him work, and rebuilt him as the ultimate American hero for the new post-post-9/11 zeitgeist.
I loved IRON MAN: Robert Downey Jr. has been and probably will be my favourite actor for a long time…but IRON MAN, THE INCREDIBLE HULK, SUPERMAN RETURNS and all the others feel a little like Saturday morning cartoons next to the carbon black glory that is ‘The Dark Knight‘.
Trust me, this is the future of this sort of thing.
I happened to be sitting next to the Family Beckham during the screening and overheard young Brooklyn Beck’s excited yelp when Bruce Wayne drives through Gotham in his new 200 grand Lamborghini Murcielago LP640.
‘Dad! Dad! He’s got your car!’
You never get that down the Xscape.
I got a chance to talk to Christopher Nolan for quite a bit after the showing and when I say talk, I mean gush enthusiastically and incoherently about how impressed I was. There’s something immensely satisfying about being able to convey your excitement and respect directly to someone whose work has impressed and inspired you.
------------------------------------------
As Great as "The Dark Knight" was I still have to say that "Superman:The Movie" is my favorite superhero movie. Mainly because Superman is my favorite hero and other than the fly to reverse time thing I thought the movie captured Superman perfectly.
