Saturday, February 28, 2009

The Dark Knight

It took a long time for me to get around to seeing Batman, but thanks to the second-run theater near me, I was finally able to see it. It was worth the wait.

This movie has been reviewed enough to make going over the plot pointless, so instead I'll focus this review on The Dark Knight's symbolism. In chess, the Dark Knight (Batman, played by Christian Bale) is opposed by the White Knight (Harvey Dent, played by Aaron Eckhart). They are powerful pieces in chess, capable of skipping over other pieces, striking from behind Pawns to attack opponents and then jumping away. In that sense, Knights are somewhat more chaotic than the other pieces; every other piece moves in a linear fashion, but the Knight moves forward and to the side. Although it may seem to be one of the weaker pieces of chess, when combined with any other piece it is one of the most powerful.

In a similar fashion, Harvey Dent and Batman are more powerful because of their pawns. Dent's pawns include the media, Gordon, and a mostly corrupt police force. For Batman, it's the corporate boards, Gordon, and yes even the police force. Which is the first hint that the simple dichotomy between Batman and Dent isn't quite accurate. Dent isn't the flipside of Batman, he's the same version with different characteristics illuminated. Dent is Batman as a civil servant, minus the angst.

Batman's true nemesis, the real White Knight, is of course the Joker (Heath Ledger). And now we truly see the opposite of what Batman stands for. Where Batman is cold, measured, and consistent the Joker is brutal, offensive, and chaotic. And yet they are two sides of the same coin: "You crossed the line first, sir," says Alfred, referring to the criminal organizations Batman hunts. "You squeezed them, you hammered them to the point of desperation. And in their desperation they turned to a man they didn't fully understand." Just like the police turned to Batman. Joker is a criminal form of vigilante justice.

If there's an overriding message in The Dark Knight, it's that in a war of escalation, everyone loses. The ultimate response to the Joker is a massive show of force, a sacrifice of values, and then ultimately a withdrawal from the public. Superheroes and villains taken to an extreme are basically just terrorists blowing up a neighborhood. The human cost is too steep for anyone to operate like that out in the open, a lesson the Joker teaches Batman the hard way.

Caught in the middle are the victims: Rachel Dawes, Lucius Fox, and Dent's sanity. When Two-Face arrives, it is the cracked mirror of Batman, a hero-turned vigilante who, instead of the Knight that strikes from the shadows, moves in a straight line from one victim to another as judge, jury, and executioner. Two-Face is finally done right in this movie (better than even the cartoon, and that's saying something), and his horrific appearance is so disturbing that my wife felt it pushed the film to an R-rating.

The Joker is so unnerving, so malevolent in action, and so utterly amoral in his goal of protecting the Batman-ideal, that Ledger and Nolan have made their indelible mark on the character. This is the Joker comic book fans always knew from "The Long Halloween" and "The Killing Joke." And he's nothing to laugh about.

Yes, it's long. Yes, it's violent. But ultimately, Nolan's masterpiece is both a meditation on the comic book genre and modern day society. To stop a terrorist, are we willing to bend every civil liberty, burn down every forest, no matter what the cost? It's a bold, uncompromising vision that will haunt you long after the movie ends.

No comments:

Post a Comment