Why So Serious?

If by now, you still haven't watched The Dark Knight, go hit your Shutdown button and run to the theaters. Like right now. Go!

It's nothing like you've ever seen before. Trust me. But then again, this coming from someone who actually sang along a la karaoke night with the entire cast of Mamma Mia!, you would probably snigger in my face saying, "moron". So don't take my word for it. From an online source, apparently, The Dark Knight took in a record $155.34 million in its first weekend. And that's not just because of the apparent Harry Potterish hype, but because of its totally staggering impact on the viewers--it leaves you staggering from the theater, stunned by its scope and complexity.

One would recall Batman Begins as a relatively just OK prequel-installment to the Batman series...so having watched The Dark Knight, it made me think that it unquestionably provided redemption to its progenitor. It had a haunting quality in it that would make even non-comic book junkies hooked on it lock-stock-and-barrel: sitting through more than 150 minutes of the movie takes you flipping through the pages of the comic-book-turned-movie...from The Joker's heist to The Cape Crusader's going forth into the pitch black that is Gotham City.

The set and design were completely apt. Location for Gotham City--shot almost entirely in Chicago--gave the feel of being surreal: like a tween between (ahehehe...sorry, redundant) a fictional city and real people's premises. Everything was in place: the whimsical buildings, breathtaking aerial shots from hundreds of feet above the ground in Hong Kong's Kowloon District, the almost bare but light-flooded workshop, the immaculate bachelor's pad bedroom with all glass windows, and the sonar-spying videowall. The costumes were of different species--dapper, chic, ergonomic, ingenious, sinister and even sexy. The vehicles used were just over-the-top: from the luxury sports car to the heavily armored and wired Batmobile, every man in the cinema would simultaneously pee and cum in his pants--it's every little big boy's toy.

And the acting. Oh my God. The acting. You can most definitely feel the intensity of every single character's emotions--from the anxiety to the anguish to the glee to the fear to the despair...no amount of emotion was wasted. Outstanding emotionally-packed sequences were: Harvey Denton's anguish over the death of Rachel Dawes; James Gordon's wife's discovery of his faked death; Lucius Fox's nonchalance over an employee's blackmail attempt to whistleblow Batman's identity; and of course the entire cast of passengers in both boats in deciding which boat to blow up to save themselves.

Christian Bale looked more, uhm, confident this time--that is, compared to Batman Begins. I wonder if that has got to do with his more sophisticated, more improved Batsuit...but you can really tell, he's literally slid into the role more comfortably this time around.

Aaron Eckart, in my opinion was just underutilized. He was a betwixt and between good portrayer of the Morally Upright Man role. In the movie, he only scintillated right when he snapped and crossed the line between good and evil--in the persona of Two-Face. I just wish his good-gone-wrong role was stretched longer than what actually was in the movie.

Michael Caine still excelled as the faggish, unequivocal butler. Although his lines were written by a bunch of quick-witted scriptwriters, he claimed ownership for every one, especially the innuendos, candid remarks, and the occasional sarcasms.

But the movie's focal point character, in my mind--as well as a league of others, I would suppose--was Heath Ledger. I found myself comparing his performance with Jack Nicholson's in the 1989 Batman...but realized that it'll be like comparing apples to lemons. The way he reinvented The Joker was quite unexpected. His mannerisms and gesticulations seemed legit, i.e. worked seamlessly into the psychopathic persona of the character. The way he'd peer at you from his maniacal eyes, his throaty sinister voice, and his mercurial shift from being somber to excessively gleeful, were surprises you wouldn't expect from a very young, supposedly novice actor. Heath was such a waste of tremendous talent. His untimely death was such a sad, sad joke of life...even less funny than his spoof of Jerry Maguire's "You complete me".

The Dark Knight isn't probably something I would watch more than twice like I did the others. Or at least not immediately after the first or second...for it was heavy and dark as (k)night. But it was really worth the ride in the back seat of the Batcycle looking at Gotham's story in a little under three hours. True enough, Batman's the hero that Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now ... and so Gotham will hunt him ... because he can take it ... because he's not a hero... he's a silent guardian, a watchful protector... a Dark Knight.