Why 'The Dark Knight' is No Bat-Masterpiece

With The Dark Knight Rises due in theaters next July, what better time to revisit the middle sibling of Nolan's Bat-trilogy, The Dark Knight?

Make no mistake, the guy's still a master.

Now before I get started, I need to make a few things clear. Like all other Bat-fans across the world, I stood in line at midnight for the film that early buzz deemed the greatest comic book adaptation of all time. I giggled with glee – and even shed a tear or two – as Heath Ledger brought us the greatest live-action interpretation of The Joker to date. And after the credits rolled, I walked out of the theater wide-eyed and speechless, eager to tell the world that the definitive Batman film had finally become a reality.

But with more than a dozen viewings under my utility belt, I can confidently say that The Dark Knight, while a landmark achievement for on-screen superheroics, suffers from several issues that keep it just shy of landing the top spot.

 Instead of looking at these observations as stabs at the film often deemed a "masterpiece," let's consider them as missteps that Nolan and co. will hopefully catch the second time around as they assemble the final entry in the trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises.

Hockey Pads, Evil Puppies and Other Tomfoolery
When dealing with the Caped Crusader, these three truths typically follow the character everywhere he goes:

1) Ol' Bats always has some crazy-cool gadgets
2) He knows how to throw a beating
3) The guy sure knows how to make an entrance

The Dark Knight more than covers the first two, but completely botches #3. Even Joel Schumacher pulled this one off! I realize that we all know what Batman looks like at this point, but his first moments on screen should involve less fully-illuminated shuffling this way and that way, and more of the shadowy Dark Knight we know and love. I mean, slapping a few dogs around and oddly bending a gun? Not to mention the infamously awkward "I'm not wearin' hockey pads" line...

More like this, please.

Hopefully The Dark Knight Rises gives us a reintroduction to Batman worthy of his best entrances. I know it's been done a million times, but my vote goes for crashing through a skylight – there's no way that I'm alone here.

Gaps in Logic
Christopher Nolan and his editor, Lee Smith, certainly have a distinct method in the editing room; from The Prestige, to The Dark Knight, to Inception, the filmmakers have shown their love for frenetic and often dizzying transitions from shot to shot. While this style has served them well in their films arranged like cinematic puzzles, it tends to come off a little sloppy on the streets of Gotham.

Take the Bat-Pod sequence, for example. In a hurry to stomp his boot into Joker's face, Batman cuts through a shopping mall and causes a fair amount of property damage. We see him shoot a glass door, only to come flying down a hallway in the very next shot. Then we finally see him crash through the door in the third shot. He weaves through a few twisty hallways, then suddenly zooms down the street again.

(Clip at 1:40-1:55)

 

Jarring, no? I realize that Nolan wanted to get Batman back out of that mall ASAP,  but I would have accepted some long shots of Batman winding the Bat-Pod to and fro over this muddy edit job. The production team built the thing from scratch as a fully-functional vehicle, for god's sake, shouldn't they want to show us what it can do?

Here's another example of slip-ups in the editing room:

(Clip at 0:28-0:54)

 

The Joker detonates the stomach bomb, creating an explosion that clears the entire MCU building of officers. How does Joker evade the blast, you ask? He simply stands in place as the cops miraculously disappear around him. I realize that Nolan's Joker is more of a force of nature than a living, breathing character, but this sequence doesn't make a bit of sense.

I'm not even going to mention the tunnel chase sequence (that subject has been done to death). Here's hoping that Rises manages to guide us from point A to point B without mucking it up along the way.

Final Act Fiasco
There is no question that The Dark Knight is truly an ensemble piece, with every actor pulling their weight. But no matter how you look at it, Heath Ledger's Joker is the crutch upon which the entire film leans. His mysterious presence haunts the first act of the film, and his intricate plan drives the second act to its devastating conclusion – the scarring of Harvey Dent.

And then there's this guy's stereotypical and silly dialogue.

And then we have the third act, where things take a turn for the slightly ho-hum. The continuous thumping drums in Hans Zimmer's score keep things from ever taking a momentary pause, and Joker's schemes start to stretch their credibility a bit (the guy apparently spent ten years hiding bombs in everything before the movie started). And on Batman's end, we get a half-baked Patriot Act ripoff that only helps to create a few less-than-thrilling and convoluted fight scenes – not to mention the fact that Batman murders two or three dogs by sending them plummeting several stories down. Not cool, Bruce.

Thankfully the more personal, less "GOTHAM IS DOOMED!" climax involving Two-Face and Jim Gordon's family brings things to a satisfying conclusion, and our hero rides off into the sunset on a high note. But how close we were to having the on-the-nose final showdown between Batman and The Joker as the film's final moments.

Like I said before, The Dark Knight is nothing short of a fantastic Batman film, with breakneck pacing and brilliant performances. But with missed opportunities like these, it's not hard to imagine The Dark Knight Rises sweeping its predecessor off its feet.

Bane (Tom Hardy) in Rises

So who's excited?