Title: The Dark Knight

Film style: action/adventure

Rating: 4 out of 5

PLOT:

One year after Batman Begins, Lieutenant Gordon, Harvey Dent (the new DA) and Batman start to clean up the criminals of Gotham City. A sadistic, psychopathic unknown criminal called the Joker shows up in Gotham City and robs a mob-owned bank. He then tricks the mobsters into killing each other. It's chaos in Gotham City. Batman begins a personal crusade against the Joker to catch him at all costs. In the process, Batman is forced to examine everything he believes in ...

ACTING:

The characters are somewhat realistic, but they are based on comic-book characters so they are intended to be fantasy-like and exaggerated to emphasize the good and evil aspects of their characters.

Batman is a typical, uncorruptable hero. Harvey, at first, is the perfect DA, but later becomes hardened and vengeful after an explosion disfigures him and drives him insane and leads him to kill Rachel, his girlfriend. The Joker is a typical villain but much darker and more evil.

The acting overall is excellent and although it is based on comicbook characters, they make you believe in them. Heath Ledger does an incredible job as the psychopathic, sadistic Joker. His mannerisms and facial expressions make him seem truly deranged.

SPECIAL EFFECTS, CINEMATOGRAPHY, MUSICAL SCORE, CAMERA SHOTS:

Some of the film was shot in a format, especially some of the calmer scenes, that gives it that larger-than-life feel. The Joker is dressed more scruffy and grungy and this made him look eerier when he moved. By making him look so grubby the audience might even be able to "smell him." Batman's costume is tighter and looks more up to date technologically. The white lenses over Batman's eyes make him look more like a comicbook hero. Gotham City looks cleaner in this movie than in the last one. The characters look less repulsive and more realistic. Music in the movie sounds like it only uses a few notes. The music doesn't seem to interfere with how dark and evil the characters are.

What stood out for me was how technologically cool Batman's vehicles were. I liked this version of Batman much more because the characters were less cartoon-like and much more edgy. I liked the fact that Batman was conveyed as being both good and bad, he wasn't the typical goody, goody hero.

FINAL COMMENTS:

This is a "go see" film. It is Heath Ledger's last film before he died of an overdose and his portrayal of the Joker is incredible. Although the plot is predictable, it is entertaining and exciting to watch.

This film is definitely not for children as it is very dark and fairly violent. Anyone who loves heroes and villains and wants great escapism should go see this film. The down-side to this film is that it's somewhat typical; you have seen this plot before. The strength of this film is the acting and the cool technological Batman gadgets.