I was a little dazzled that the "disappearing pencil" trick got past
censors in a film that was guaranteed to attract kids (I saw
5-year-olds at my showing).
I think Batman has always been superhero noir. The character's roots
are a mish-mash of gothic novel tropes with a Dick Tracy rogue's
gallery. Then the works that redefined him in the 80s-90s (Dark Knight
Returns, Year One, Killing Joke, Arkham Asylum, The Animated Series)
were all heavily influenced by classic crime fiction and existentialism.
That's a pretty good noir pedigree if you ask me and Nolan has been
very smart at pulling all this together.
The exploration of the Joker's motives was definitely the most
compelling part of the film and Nolan made his world view dominant by
giving him that final up-is-down, right-is-wrong levitating soliloquy.
It's good that Ledger was such a force in the film because without him
the movie is basically a Sharper Image(™) Death Wish 3.
Hopefully (though I doubt it) Alan Moore got a paycheck because the
best Joker moments were all from Killing Joke.
--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Nathan Cain" <IndieCrime@...> wrote:
>
> Has anyone else seen The Dark Knight? Would anyone else say it's a
> superhero noir? This was a rather surprising movie, especially for a
> summer blockbuster because of the villain's utter lack of motive
> beyond a desire to cause chaos and because (Spoiler Ahead):
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