Let's Put a Smile on the Face

I'm sure it's been done to death, but I'd just like to take a minute to discuss the amazing cinematic experience that is the Dark Knight (the latest in the Batman saga, in case you've been living under a rock). Stephen Hunter of the Washington Post, a notoriously tough movie critic, praised Heath Ledger (as was only right) but found fault with Aaron Eckhart's Harvey Dent.

"He's got to show a love and an idealism so stout they can stand against the vilest villainy yet so fragile they can shatter into evil at a single catastrophic loss. It's not in him to show a range of contradictions like this, and the character -- as written by the Nolans -- is beyond demonstrating as much, either."

I disagree with Hunter on this point. I thought that Eckhart did a wonderful job depicting the fall of the White Knight of Gotham. And his change of heart is NOT completely out of the blue. The Nolan brothers give shadows, brief glimpses of the villain within. If the name was not enough, the ever-present two-headed coin was enough for any comic fanboy (or girl) to squeal and piss their pants at the sign of a new arch nemesis. And finally, that horrific make-up didn't detract from the pain visible on Dent's face as he reminisced about his life and the things he'd now lost. Dent, unlike Bruce Wayne and his nocturnal alter-ego, had followed the letter of the law. He'd worked hard with the system, and been rewarded for it. He'd won the girl, won the city, and was on top of the world until that was all taken away from him by complete chance. I'd go a little bonkers, too.

But nothing compares to the magnificent performance turned in by the late Heath Ledger. I remember how shocked I was when my sister called me to blurt out the news. The Joker is certainly his swan-song. The Joker is diabolical, nonsensical, and utterly anarchic; the perfect foil for Batman's code of honor. The movements, the sounds, the delivery of the lines are so precise, so perfectly in tune to his character; there is an understated homage to past precedence (Alex from A Clockwork Orange, Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols) but a twist that blows all other bizarros out of cinematic memory. It's terrible that Ledger isn't here to witness the success of this role. I think alot of people were worried that movie-goers would only see the film out of macabre fascination to witness the "role that killed Heath Ledger". But as I watched the film, I forgot that he was no longer alive. And I think that that's the wonderful thing about the film media; it is a record, a piece of immortality for everyone captured on screen. If actors were hesitant to attempt to out-do Jack Nicholson's Joker, Ledger now has the role clinched. He will never be outdone.