July 19, 2008
Critic At Large: The Dark Knight
Jack Nicholson gave a fine performance as the Joker in the 1989 Batman film, but it's a performance accompanied by a wink and a smile. Nicholson's Joker has a cartoonish quality that detracts from his menace. In The Dark Knight, Heath Ledger's Joker is one of the most nihilistic villains I've seen on screen. Ledger imbues the character with a twitchy, sharp-edged psychosis that is both terrifying and enthralling. It's truly a shame that such a gifted actor is no longer with us.
This movie could easily have become a one-man show, but the rest of the cast is strong enough to hold their own. The complex story elevates the movie above traditional comic book fare and the action scenes are operatic in staging and execution. Director Christopher Nolan brings the same dark, brooding sensibility that he first exhibited in Memento (which you should really should check out if you haven't seen it). He gives us a brave vision of a hero's place in amoral, vicious world.
Posted by wintermute2_0 at July 19, 2008 01:48 PM