Nobody Move, This Is A Review: The Dark Knight

It’s always darkest before the dawn, and even though The Dark Knight offers a few slivers of hope by the end, this is a very bleak movie indeed. In a nutshell, Bruce Wayne / Batman (Christian Bale) is fighting to rid Gotham City of the Mob by targeting money launderers, and is so successful that The Joker (Heath Ledger) takes it upon himself to kill the Caped Crusader. Behind the cartoonish superhero posturing, however, is a very serious meditation on America’s approach to the so-called ‘War on Terror’ – Batman engages in the ‘extraordinary rendition’ of a suspect from Hong Kong, and isn’t averse to torturing a prisoner when the occasion demands. There’s also a fascinating double-act between Batman and Gotham’s new District Attorney, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), aka ‘the White Knight’, who distrusts Batman’s vigilante approach and wants to fight crime in a clear and transparent fashion. The director, Christopher Nolan, has crafted a thoughtful and often philosophical movie, but he hasn’t neglected to include a number of powerful action sequences, most of which – the lumbering and unconvincing Bat-bike apart – are expertly executed via Steadicam. Bale’s bass growl when voicing Batman is still an unnecessary irritation, but The Dark Knight is much more concerned with exploring the psychology behind Bruce Wayne than his alter ego, and here Bale is in superb form. Surrounded by an excellent cast – Morgan Freeman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Gary Oldman and Michael Caine all shine, particularly Caine – he is magnificently intense and introspective, offering an unusually realistic portrayal of a superhero beset by self-doubt. The star of the piece, however, is Heath Ledger as The Joker. Combining the expected range of tics and quirks of the clownish psychotic with a pathos-laden performance that offers real depth to the character, Ledger burns where Bale smoulders, leaving a scorching reminder of what his talent might have achieved. – Declan Burke

This review was first published in TV Now magazine

A GONZO NOIR: An Internet Novel # 12

A Grand Vizier writes: “Pootled along to see the new Batman flick The Dark Knight yesterday morning, and terrific stuff it is too, an unusually bleak and philosophical movie for mainstream viewing, especially given the cartoonish quality of most superhero movies. It’s chock-a-block with story, so it’s probably not too much of a spoiler to tell you that, among his many outrageous acts (the ‘disappearing pencil’ gag is hilarious), The Joker gets to blow up a hospital. Which is quite the bummer, as A GONZO NOIR is rapidly approaching its conclusion (the penultimate section comes below) with hospital porter Billy / Karlsson poised to – oh yes! – blow up his place of work. Oh well, it can’t be Mills & Boon every day, right? Anyhoo, on with the show …

The story so far: Failed author Declan Burke (right), embittered but still passably handsome, wakes up one morning to find a stranger in his back garden. The stranger introduces himself as Karlsson, a hospital porter who assists old people who want to die and the hero of a first draft of a novel Burke wrote some five years previously. Now calling himself Billy, he suggests a redraft of the story that includes blowing up the hospital where he works. Intrigued, Burke agrees to a collaboration, but things do not go swimmingly …
  For the reasons we’re publishing a novel to the interweb, go here.
  If you want to skip all that malarkey, the novel starts here.
  If you’re one of the 34,014 readers who have been following the story, the latest update can be found here.
  Oh, and as a special treat for Ms Witch, this is the view Billy / Karlsson has from the decking where he and the Grand Viz have their little ‘hospital incineration’ chats …

  Now read on …