This post is sponsored by the Movie Madness carnival hosted by Jen at Daily Mish Mash.

Well.

Where do I start?

The Dark Knight stars Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Heath Ledger, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Morgan Freeman.  Famously, and tragically, this is Heath Ledger’s final complete movie performance, as he died of an apparent accidental overdose of some prescription medications earlier this year.  Rumors flew that playing the Joker drove him crazy, made it unable for him to sleep (hence all the sleep aids that had been prescribed), but that is all these are.  Rumors.

His co-workers on the set of The Dark Knight described Heath’s work as inspired, and said he was a work horse… not disturbed in the least.  I was all ready to quote them, but I threw out my Entertainment Weekly with the article in it and so… you’ll just have to take my word for it.  REGARDLESS, lets just set all the Heath Ledger/Joker/untimely death bits aside and just look at the movie.

Wow!

The Dark Knight introduces Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent, the enterprising young district attorney who is doing an amazing job of cleaning up Gotham’s very realistic city of its mob problem.  Dent is so good, in fact, that when the mob bosses find themselves caught between the law and the Batman, they turn to a mysterious and dangerous man who promises to rid them of all their problems.

The only problem is that the criminal mastermind they hire to help them is known as the Joker, and he seems to be more interested in anarchy and chaos than in helping a few mob bosses stay out of jail.

The plot is thick and juicy, full of heart-stopping action and great moments that you will never forget.  The Dark Knight is rated PG-13, but I would not recommend it for ANYONE under the age of 13, regardless of what their parents think.  And you should be careful about showing it or seeing it with anyone younger than 15 I think.  Up to you as a parent, of course, but please screen it first so you know what you’re getting your kid into.  YES I know its Batman, but this is not your ordinary comic book movie.

The movie is named appropriately.  This is such a dark movie that at times I felt like I was drowning in it.  The Joker is frightening, and played so realistically by Heath Ledger that he has earned (rightfully so) rave reviews for his performance of Batman’s arch-nemesis.

In contrast to the much compared performance of Jack Nicholson as the Joker in Tim Burton’s Batman, who seems more like a clown among weirdos in Burton’s take of Gotham City, Heath’s Joker is a certified nut-job who is so dangerous and scary that it seems like he could actually exist.  Anarchy for the sake of anarchy is a terrifying concept, and the movie takes all its comic book elements and plays them completely straight, so that Gotham City seems like a place that could be right next door to us.  Unlike Tim Burton’s Batman, director Christopher Nolan has crafted a movie that seems more like a crime drama than a comic book movie, full of regular people just trying to get by.  Did you ever see The Departed?  The Dark Knight is right up that same alley, except darker.

Aaron Eckhart has a great role in the movie as Gotham’s so-called ‘white knight’ who is cleaning up the streets and putting the bad guys in jail.  He is contrasted with Batman, who is of course the titular Dark Knight who does the same work, just on the other side of the law.  Two sides of the same coin, as it were.  Heh heh.  Harvey Dent’s story arc is full and complete, and just a little heart breaking.  I really enjoyed his part of the movie (though it is not for the faint of heart near the end as… well I don’t want to spoil anything).

I could go on and on and on about this movie.  There are glimmers of light amidst the darkness portrayed, and you aren’t left at the bottom of the well when the movie draws to a close.  Go see it, and see it in theatres.  It is completely worth it.  I’ll try not to spoil the movie for you, but the ferry scene left my heart in my throat and I was so happy with the outcome.  One of the glimmers of light that I talked about.

I better stop writing, or I’ll just keep going and it’s starting to get redundant. Haha!  See it!