“The Dark Knight” is here, but watch out for that Joker
When I first heard that Heath Ledger was going to play the Joker in The Dark Knight, the upcoming sequel to the stellar Batman Begins, I was a little, shall we say, dismayed. I’ve always liked Ledger, but he always struck me as a little too much on the “pretty boy” side of things.
However, once the promotional materials started rolling out, I began questioning that conclusion. And now that the film’s first official trailer has (finally) hit the Web, I’ll gladly say that it looks like I was wrong. And I should’ve known better than to doubt Christopher Nolan.
I’ll hold off final judgment until I actually see the movie—which comes out July 18, 2008—but the trailer is pretty much awesome. There are lots of great shots of the Joker; Ledger looks to have captured the character’s insanity and menace perfectly. This ain’t no clownish Jack Nicholson Joker we’re talking about here, but a dirty, rough-and-tumble, truly unhinged freak of a Joker.
One listen to that laugh, and you’ll know what I mean.
Comments
Mike
December 17, 2007 10:51amYeah, Heath has come a long way since “10 Things I Hate About You.” “Unhinged freak of a Joker” sounds about right.
I really liked the direction this franchise went with Batman Begins in ‘05. I have always liked Christian Bale ever since Empire of the Sun (still one of my favorite movies of all time) and I think he makes a good Batman. So, it only follows that they would go with actors of his generation such as Ledger. An interesting question is who else is out there that would be a better fit? Ashton Kutcher?!? At the very least we can be thankful they didn’t go the Batman & Robin route and throw in actors the likes of Ah-nold and Uma for star-power alone. That pic looked more like a ride at Six Flags than a feature-length film.
My only beef with the current Batman offerings is that the Batmobile is an off-the shelf (albeit prototypical) U.S. military vehicle instead of something more “batty” like in the past. Still, it’s a pretty bad ass ride.
Jason
December 17, 2007 7:40pmI had a similar reaction when I first saw the new Batmobile. I wanted something sleek and sexy. But then someone pointed out that the movie(s) drew a lot of influence from such graphic novels as “The Dark Knight Returns”, and in those, the Batmobile is more militaristic and tank-like.
If nothing else, it’s a whole lot better than the lame Batmobiles in the 1990 films.