The Dark Knight, round 2.

"Even if the death of Heath Ledger hadn't already draped it in a funeral shroud, The Dark Knight would be a morbid affair," writes New York's David Edelstein: "It could only be darker if Batman died.... The Dark Knight is noisy, jumbled, and sadistic. Even its most wondrous vision - Batman's plunges from skyscrapers, bat-wings snapping open as he glides through the night like a human kite - can't keep the movie airborne. There's an anvil attached to that cape."

"Warner Bros has continued to drain the poetry, fantasy, and comedy out of Tim Burton's original conception for Batman (1989), completing the job of coarsening the material into hyperviolent summer action spectacle." David Denby in the New Yorker: "Yet The Dark Knight is hardly routine - it has a kicky sadism in scene after scene, which keeps you on edge and sends you out onto the street with post-movie stress disorder. And it has one startling and artful element: the sinister and frightening performance of the late Heath Ledger as the psychopathic murderer the Joker. That part of the movie is upsetting to watch, and, in retrospect, both painful and stirring to think about."

Updated through 7/20.

"[Director Christopher] Nolan wants to prove that a superhero movie needn't be disposable, effects-ridden junk food, and you have to admire his ambition," writes David Ansen. "But this is Batman, not Hamlet. Call me shallow, but I wish it were a little more fun." Also in Newsweek, Devin Gordon talks with Nolan.

Roger Clarke profiles Nolan for the Observer.

Sean Porter - not his real name - was an extra on Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and, in the Independent, tells a few amusing stories about his casual encounters with Heath Ledger. Then: "My image of Heath is of a man envisioning a life rather than a death; of an actor deeply committed to his art - perhaps to such a degree that it contributed to his undoing."

Earlier: Round 1.

Updates, 7/15: "Why return to Batman?" asks James Rocchi at Cinematical. "It turns out that for Christopher Nolan, the reason to come back is that there's something to say about, and with, the character even after decades of stories and multiple reinventions. I was hoping The Dark Knight would be good; I had no idea that director and co-writer Christopher Nolan was going to make a film that not only addressed the philosophical and political conflict between the rule of force and the rule of law but also takes on the timeless clash between order and chaos... and, along the way, evokes everything from Michael Mann's Heat to John Ford's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance."

Rob Gonsalves at Hollywood Bitchslap on the online avalanche that has befallen David Denby since his review appeared just yesterday: "This isn't genuine intellectual give-and-take discussing a critic's take on a film; this is bullying, and since these are fanboys, it's probably a case of the once-bullied turning into bullies."

Gwladys Fouché reports on last night's black carpet premiere. Also at the Guardian: Video of Christian Bale, Aaron Eckhart and Nolan... talking.

The BBC has pix.

Steven Zeitchik was there for the Hollywood Reporter: "First, the movie. It's very good. Not Citizen Kane-meets-Star Wars-meets-The Godfather very good, but still very good."

"It's said in the film that the Joker is the kind of man who simply wants to watch the world burn, and his presence opens up the kind of nihilistic abyss that rarely worms its way into the popular consciousness outside of Sex Pistols records," writes Victoria Large at Not Coming to a Theater Near You. "Pretty subversive stuff for a summer blockbuster."

"It is impossible to watch this film and not start spewing hyperbole upon exiting the theater," warns Quint at AICN.

From Bob Westal at Bullz-Eye: "The Caine File: 10 Hidden Highlights from Batman's Benevolent Butler."

"The Dark Knight is a diamond in a mound of cubic-zirconia gemstones, two and a half hours of blockbuster at it's finest, a movie worth the price of a concert ticket," writes Paul Moore at the SpoutBlog.

David Edelstein, too, is under attack: "Needless to say, 99 percent of these attacks have come from people who haven't seen the movie - which is not to say they won't love it, having so much emotional energy invested in its greatness."

Updates, 7/17: Scott Foundas (Voice, LA Weekly) assures us that Nolan

delivers the kick-ass goods, from an opening bank heist à la Michael Mann to a climactic episode of vehicular mayhem à la The Searchers' Ethan Edwards and High Noon's Will Kane, he's left to ride off into the darkness, pondering the uncertain destiny of principled men in an unprincipled world - as are we.

For Nick Schager, writing in Slant, The Dark Knight is a "majestically bleak vision of our modern age as dissolute, fragile and teetering on the precipice of anarchy" and "something very close to a pop masterpiece, a noir-ish DC Comics action-adventure reconfigured as a discerning, ambiguous rumination on these terrorism-besieged times. Thrilling, heady and, as befitting its title, exceedingly dark, it's epic pulp, or perhaps more accurately, it's pulp transformed through auteurist artistry into a piercingly relevant morality play epic."

"Something fundamental seems to be happening in the upper realms of the comic-book movie," writes Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times. "Spider-Man II (2004) may have defined the high point of the traditional film based on comic-book heroes. A movie like the new Hellboy II allows its director free rein for his fantastical visions. But now Iron Man and even more so The Dark Knight move the genre into deeper waters. They realize, as some comic-book readers instinctively do, that these stories touch on deep fears, traumas, fantasies and hopes. And the Batman legend, with its origins in film noir, is the most fruitful one for exploration."

"The personality split between the operatic Dark Knight of the soul and the OMG set pieces is almost as pronounced as the maladies of our freak trio," writes David Fear in Time Out New York. "Yes, it's visually impressive, but any hack can do a halfway decent job with trailer-ready tangents. Not everyone can push the genre forward, and the fact that Nolan's padded popcorn flick isn't the streamlined masterpiece it could have been is a real buzzkill."

"A muscular, overwhelming, even sadistic blockbuster, The Dark Knight gives you your money's worth and burns it in front of you," writes Nicolas Rapold in the L Magazine. "Batman Begins, despite its long run-up to take-off, ultimately assumed a safely satisfying shape; The Dark Knight is almost exhausting, a movie and a half that pours forth flipped trucks, leveled buildings, Sophie's choices, a beaten-down Batman and even the launch of the next grotesque baddie, Two-Face.... [I]t's clear Nolan is taking the long view, and The Dark Knight plays like an action-heavy middle chapter."

"By the midpoint of the nearly two-and-a-half-hour proceedings, the characters have begun to assail one another with so much moralistic, and oddly artificial, speechifying about choice, heroes, and truth that the film begins to resemble an action-blockbuster version of Brecht's Mother Courage," writes Bruce Bennett in the New York Sun. "Everyone talks a good game about human maliciousness and moral rot at its most foul, but despite all the bangs, booms, swoops, and crashes, except when Ledger is on screen, it feels mostly like talk."

"The movie may fall shy of greatness, but that's not for lack of trying," writes Sean Burns in the Philadelphia Weekly. "Indeed, The Dark Knight might be our first-ever megabudget summer blockbuster dialectical exercise. The witty, literate screenplay (penned by Nolan and his brother Jonathan) is comprised mainly of philosophical debates among various agents of order and chaos. These chats are punctuated by the curious, often exhilarating spectacle of a depressed billionaire dressed up like a flying rodent, beating the shit out of a psychotic clown."

"What is most unprecedented about the narrative... is its largely unsympathetic treatment of the yapping and yowling citizens of Gotham City, a gloomy echo of ourselves, at the gas pumps and grocery stores, still looking for easy answers from the highest bidders for our votes," writes Andrew Sarris. "In this respect, Ledger's Joker brilliantly incarnates the devil in all our miserable souls as we contemplate a world seemingly without hope."

Also in the New York Observer: "[I]n the words of the Joker (and Warner Bros marketing campaign), why so serious? Moreover, when you can't pay people to sit through a documentary on Abu Ghraib, or entice even the most earnest viewers to watch even one of the countless Iraq films that's tanked at the box office, why are we downright enthralled with the grim realities of our present day when they're trussed up in a batsuit? What is it about Batman?" Sara Vilkomerson talks with exec producer Michael E Uslan and film critic David Thomson.

"Some may find it too hefty - besides a few zingers from Michael Caine's Alfred, its only moments of levity are supplied by a psycho in face paint," writes Cheryl Eddy in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. "Personally, I'm glad to see The Dark Knight presented like a drama (with, uh, capes and explosions) instead of a toy commercial."

"The Dark Knight may be the most hopeless, despairing comic-book movie in memory," writes Kenneth Turan in the Los Angeles Times. "It creates a world where being a superhero is at best a double-edged sword and no triumph is likely to be anything but short-lived."

Bill Gibron looks back over Nolan's oeuvre for PopMatters: "[H]e's the bellwether for a new kind of filmmaker, one that successfully merges Hollywood classicism with the best of the post-modern revision."

"Pitched at the divide between art and industry, poetry and entertainment, it goes darker and deeper than any Hollywood movie of its comic-book kind - including Batman Begins, Mr Nolan's 2005 pleasurably moody resurrection of the series - largely by embracing an ambivalence that at first glance might be mistaken for pessimism," writes Manohla Dargis in the New York Times. "But no work filled with such thrilling moments of pure cinema can be rightly branded pessimistic, even a postheroic superhero movie like The Dark Knight.... Like any number of small- and big-screen thrillers, the film's engagement with 9/11 is diffuse, more a matter of inference and ideas (chaos, fear, death) than of direct assertion. Still, that a spectacle like this even glances in that direction confirms that American movies have entered a new era of ambivalence when it comes to their heroes - or maybe just superness."

Nolan is "using the superhero movie as a pretext to create the most elaborate, sweeping, post-noir urban crime drama ever," writes Glenn Kenny in the Auteurs' Notebook. "And why not, given the fertile if under-the-radar cross-pollination between the print work by Bob Kane and his inheritors and post-Expressionist film stylists. Still, the prerequisites of the superhero genre (as they're defined in film, mind you, not in comics or graphic novels) keep Nolan from fully achieving his dream. There's nothing of the erotic element one expects of a true noir."

"Nolan turns the Manichean morality of comic books - pure good vs pure evil - into a bleak post-9/11 allegory about how terror (and, make no mistake, Heath Ledger's Joker is a terrorist) breaks down those reassuring moral categories," writes Slate's Dana Stevens. "The long, intricately braided story... include[s] vast wiretapping networks, suicide-bomb threats, and moral clashes over torture and prisoners' rights. In short, Chris Nolan does more nuanced thinking about the war on terror than we've seen from the Bush administration in seven years. And despite a falsely heroic closing speech from Gary Oldman's character, police Lt Jim Gordon, the movie seems to arrive at much the same conclusion about Batman as Americans have about Bush: Thanks to this guy, we're well and thoroughly screwed."

"As much as I disliked Batman Begins, finding myself not just unmoved but bored by its alleged darkness and moral complexity, I concede that it was at least a real movie, with a thought-out structure, a reasonable degree of character development and, most significant, an adherence to visual logic that was at least workmanlike," writes Salon's Stephanie Zacharek. "The Dark Knight offers the same degree of murkiness, both visually and thematically, and maybe even a little more. (The cinematographer is, once again, Nolan's frequent collaborator Wally Pfister, working largely in a dank, muted palette of grays and greens.) And Nolan... gives us enough multilayered subplots to at least fool us into thinking this is a work of intellectual and moral complexity. But as a piece of visual storytelling, from shot to shot, The Dark Knight is a mess."

But for Sean Axmaker, this is "the new gold standard for superhero noir."

"As strong as The Dark Knight's setpieces are - and they're all pulsing showstoppers of a kind not seen in Batman Begins - the real tension comes from Nolan's willingness to let that battle's ultimate outcome remain in doubt even as the credits roll," writes Keith Phipps at the AV Club. "The film's capes and cowls suggest one genre, but it's a metropolis-sized tragedy at heart."

"The Dark Knight rides on Ledger's performance as the Joker," writes the San Francisco Chronicle's Mick LaSalle. "So does a lot of audience hope, and that's another element at work here. There has never been a situation quite like this: Audiences for the biggest blockbuster of the summer are flooding in, not just hoping an actor will be good but also expecting and needing him to be absolutely amazing. They want something profound, to put alongside Ledger's Ennis in Brokeback Mountain. They want the fabled gift that arrives six months after the loved one's death."

"This sociological bloodsport shouldn't be acceptable to any thinking generation," declares Armond White in the New York Press.

Updates, 7/18: "The Dark Knight is, to a surprising degree, a film about politics by other means: Its antagonists wrestle over the public mood like Victorian novelists over the soul of a virgin," writes the New Republic's Christopher Orr. "Batman cultivates himself as a symbol of hope and justice, but also inspires mob retaliation and the appearance (shades of Magnum Force) of lookalike vigilantes more bloodthirsty than himself. Little wonder that he aspires to abandon his mantle to the less-compromised Dent ('Gotham,' he explains, 'needs a hero with a face'). The Joker, meanwhile, tries to suck the people of Gotham into criminal complicity, with a series of mortal ultimata: Reveal Batman or bear my wrath; destroy a whistleblower or watch a hospital burn; kill others or be killed yourselves. This is rich, resonant material, and Nolan wades in deeply."

"The Dark Knight may be a state-of-the-art popcorn movie, but its Gotham City is a fun-house-mirror image of America, its democratic institutions crumbling and its people perched between anarchy and totalitarianism," agrees JR Jones in the Chicago Reader. "This infusion of 21st century politics makes Batman a more complicated screen hero than he's ever been before."

Dominic Wells traces Batman's history in the London Times.

"Kane's Batman comic art got much of its look and feel from movies like German émigré Paul Leni's The Cat and the Canary and The Joker himself was modeled on Conrad Veidt's carved smiley-face disfigured hero in Leni's film of Victor Hugo's The Man Who Laughs," writes Michael Wilmington at Movie City News. "Ledger makes a very different laugher than Veidt, the tall, slender movie fiend who played the deadly somnambulist in The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, and the evil and lordly Major Strasser in Casablanca. Ledger is hip and feline and bitterly funny, and, in some ways, like Jack Nicholson's Joker for Tim Burton, he's the real hero of this movie."

"Nolan's strength lies not in action but in emotion; he always manages to coax excellent performances from his cast," writes Paul Constant in the Stranger. "Aaron Eckhart is as good as he's ever been as incorruptible Gotham district attorney Harvey Dent. But Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne, the beating heart of the first film, gets crushed under the weight of all the flashy villainy. He lisps and roars as Batman, like a child trying to sound scary, but it's hard to hear him with all the eye-boggling nine-figure property damage going on around him."

"The film's mistake is Eckhart as Dent," argues Stephen Hunter in the Washington Post. "This is a role that calls for more gift than Eckhart, in other circumstances an honest journeyman, possesses.... So the whole subplot about Dent is mostly just fury and sound, signifying nothing except someone's idea that a summer blockbuster has to be 2½ hours long and therefore must be chock-full of not very compelling subplots to swell it up to epic length if not quality."

"There is almost no humor in The Dark Knight, even less than in its predecessor," notes the LA CityBeat's Andy Klein. "This is not merely serious; it's downright somber, even grim."

"Like a symphony where every note is exactly where it needs to be, or a painting without a brushstroke wasted, The Dark Knight is an unabashed, unashamedly great film," argues Bill Gibron at PopMatters. "It's a flawless amalgamation of moviemaker and material, Christopher Nolan's calling card for future cinematic superstardom."

"Issues of who gives the 'best' performance as the Batman and Joker, or which director best understands Batman all pale in importance compared to what has always been Batman's true subject matter: the modern city," writes Michael Joshua Rowin in a longish piece for Stop Smiling. "Since Roman Empire comparisons have become routine since 9/11 in describing America's current role on the global stage, Nolan's link is hardly daring or inspired, but what would otherwise remain bullet points slapped on to Batman's vigilantism for cheap, one-dimensional political relevance expand with his blockbuster's delineation of urban space."

"It's a cliché to say that Dark Knight is a teenage boy's idea of a serious film, but of course that's the source of its immense appeal," writes Salon's Andrew O'Hehir. "I'd go a step or two further: It's either a teenage boy's poorly executed idea, or the teenage boy in question has a Memento-scale case of ADD, and maybe all the fogeyish, clueless protestations about how video games are ruining the youth of today are actually true."

"What amazed me most about The Dark Knight, among several things, is that the flick's got more layers than an onion farm - and yet it never loses touch with the idea of fun," writes Scott Weinberg at Cinematical. "True that we're talking about a comic book fun that's decidedly more melancholy than the cinematic exploits of The Marvel Gang, but dang if TDK isn't supremely satisfying for about a dozen different reasons."

Also, a list from Eric Kohn, a "Dark Knight Companion."

"The Dark Knight is, in many ways, stupendous," acknowledges the Oregonian's Shawn Levy. "And it contains the indelible souvenir of Ledger's gifts and presence. But it simply (or, rather, complexly) tries too hard to out-think and out-reason itself."

"[I]t runs a marathon when a 10K would have sufficed," argues Scott Von Doviak at Screengrab.

"Tim Burton knew how to have fun with Batman rather than turning it into plodding, puffed-up kitsch mistaking itself for profound psycho noir that the source material won't support," writes Jürgen Fauth. "As Hellboy 2 amply illustrates, there's nothing wrong with fun - but there's none to be had here."

"The Dark Knight is Dirty Harry stripped of Don Siegel's ambivalence and ambiguity," argues Dave Kehr.

"The Dark Knight is the most disappointing movie of the year," declares Bob Cashill at Popdose.

Speaking of The Man Who Laughs (up there, a few items back): Michael Guillén.

"This is the first film-with-terrorism-metaphor that our age of terrorism deserves," writes JJ at As Little as Possible. "And it will stop your heart."

"[T]he last half hour of the film dawdles and sidetracks when it should be gunning for the climax," writes Alonso Duralde at MSNBC. "It's a flaw shared by Tim Burton's 1989 Batman, and it's the one misstep of The Dark Knight. Other than that, it's a soaring, brooding, haunting piece of work that sets a very high new standard for any future film forays for the Caped Crusader."

Updates, 7/19: Ryan Nakashima reports on a record opening night for the AP. And Peter Knegt lists the "Biggest Opening Days of All-Time."

At Movie City News, Larry Gross spots connections between Nolan's film and Fritz Lang's Spies and The Testament of Dr Mabuse.

"In the nearly 70 years since artist Bob Kane created Batman with writer Bill Finger, there have been thousands of comics about the character, and innumerable wildly different takes on him," writes Douglas Wolk in Salon, where he argues that "Nolan has dropped the ball on one of the most compelling ideas comic books have established about Gotham City's most famous resident: that his heroism doesn't come from his batarangs and right hook, but from his magnificent, brooding mind."

The Playlist is listing again: "10 Things About The Dark Knight That Aren't So Great."

Updates, 7/20: "My favourite Batman movie is the one with Adam West," writes Roderick Heath. "Perhaps it's the retro-camp fan in me.... For dumbed-down Lichtenstein, the 60s Batman was still a truly pop-art creation. It was stylish, funny, mocking, and zippy.... The Dark Knight is not a bad film at all, but it's also light years away from the instant, legitimate noir classic it's being hailed as. It may take a new, revved-up Catwoman to drag a reaction from this Batman that doesn't sound like he merely needs a cough lolly."

"Every time Ledger comes onscreen, you can't wait to see what he's going to do next, and of course the tragedy is that now we'll never know what he might have had in store for us in future films," writes Paul Matwychuk. "Indeed, one of the disappointments in The Dark Knight is that once Ledger's final scene is over, we still have to spend 20 minutes with a bunch of much less interesting characters."

Posted by dwhudson at July 14, 2008 4:06 AM