The Dark Knight
How do you top a perfectly delivered reboot of the Batman series? By adding the most notoriously sinister criminal Gotham City has ever faced, who plays by no rules: the Joker. The maniacal laugh and cracked face paint create the eerie creepiness and depict how the Joker was supposed to be played. Not only is The Dark Knight just a comic book movie, but it is an undeniable triumph at molding an epic crime drama with a comic hero.
The Dark Knight picks up in the midst of the Joker's (Heath Ledger) path of destruction upon Gotham City. This is a new terror, as he cannot be bought or reasoned with, for he "just wants to watch the world burn." Batman (Christian Bale) is our intimidating caped crusader whose taste for the theatrics is matched by the Joker, but is faced with trying to stop the Joker's tirade that always has a catch. And of course there's D.A. Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) who has whisked away Bruce Wayne's true love, Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal).
There's a lot that happens in this movie as the cast is a large ensemble and the things that happen are well balanced, playing off each other, often in the similar fashion of the Joker's anarchical chaos. It's a lot to absorb as so much is covered in the 150 minute running time. The Dark Knight is very dark and grim, yet very complex as there are twists and turns and there is the profound presence of choice (not just from Harvey's coin flipping).
Obviously, everyone wants to hear about Heath's Joker. Very similar to Alex in A Clockwork Orange, he is a demented psychopath whose laugh is contagious as he kills people without giving a second though and does it in a way which can be interpreted as a joke. Ledger's immersion into the sick Joker's mind shows his tremendous dedication and talent, as it most certainly could earn him a posthumous Oscar nomination.
A complaint of mine would be, I wanted to see more Joker, to be quite honest. He steals the show as his range extends from crazy, loony, mad to a sadistic and cold killing spree. The downside to a large cast is that it hops around and everyone has a certain limited onscreen time. Some characters you will like more than others obviously. But The Dark Knight does an excellent job of structuring everything together, unlike Spider-Man 3, which jumbled everything together. A lot happens and it's a bit overwhelming, such that after leaving the theater you need time to digest it and let it settle.
Through the brilliant writing and direction of the masterful Christopher Nolan, The Dark Knight lives up to all the hype and could be hailed as The Godfather Part II of comic book movies, making Batman Begins along the lines of The Godfather. The film works as a symphony and is magnificent in every facet, as Nolan continues to the story of the caped crusader without making it feel like a comic book.