I really liked "The Dark Knight", but I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a part of me that agreed with Robert Downey Jr.
The Things He Said.
If Mr. Downey Jr. was serious and he wasn't misquoted, or if this wasn't an off the cuff joke that, stripped of its tone, came off kind of assey and willfully ignorant, is being kind of harsh here. But joke or not, I can see the essence of what he's saying:
I mean, yeah on a intellectual level when it comes to Dark Knight I'm there: The adult re imagining of the character, the Batmocycle, a Heath Ledger performance that was so good you forgot he's dead, the realistic portrayals of what it would be really, really like to dress up in body armour and a cape and fight a clown...for real.
There's no questioning that this is the best Batman movie that ever wore pointy ears and punched theme-coordinated street thugs in the face, hands down, bar none. From the dense James Ellroy-esque screenplay to the sober, measured direction of Christopher Nolan: Who managed the seemingly impossible feat of making what might be the best movie of the year and a Batman movie at the same time, and then had them be the same freakin' movie. Dark Knight is a rare case where the major studio strategy of grafting the Best Talent Hollywood Has To Offer onto a Big Summer Movie Property worked. No doubt about it: The Dark Knight was a class act all the way.
Now I don't want you to think that I'm being spoiled here, I know we as moviegoers have got a good thing going with this new Batman movie. As a movie, it's as good as it can be. However, I am now going to go on public record and say:
As far as summery superhero entertainment goes, I liked Iron Man better than Dark Knight.
That is not to say that Iron Man is a better movie than Dark Knight. It's not. And I understand if you think that it doesn't make sense to say: "I think that Movie 1 is an A+ and Movie 2 is an A-, therefore I like movie 2 better."
I get it, I'm on your side here, I really am.
It's just that there's one thing that Iron Man had that Dark Knight, in all its film noiriliciousness, did not: Iron Man was fun to watch while Dark Knight was like going to a really, really entertaining funeral.
I think part of the reason for my preference is that in many ways Iron Man was a throwback to the action adventure movies that Amblin made in the 80's. Bright, noisy entertainments that breezed along as much on the charisma of their leads as their visual effects. It was subgenre that George Lucas and Steven Spielberg willed into existence with the original Raiders and subsequently strangled to death in its sleep with Howard the Duck. It's a distinctive kind of bubblegum storytelling where even the serious action beats, when they occur, take on a kind of airy insouciance.
And the thing was, it didn't make Iron Man feel dated in any way. On the contrary it felt like a perfect fit. The mildly jokey fluffypuff tone matched the material perfectly. It was clear that the filmmakers enjoyed and to a certain degree respected the subject matter, but they didn't respect it too much. It wouldn't be right to call it throwaway, but it also doesn't stick around long enough to wear out its welcome.
Dark Knight, on the other hand, resounds with an almost operatic self importance. It practically beats you to death with all the subtlety that's on display. The combinaton of a screenplay that's stuffed with dialogue drenched in meaning and smothered in rich subtext with performances that start out perfectly honed, and are subsequently put on a program of steroids, injected with rocket fuel, and shot out of a cannon threatens to overwhelm the fact that this is, after all, a Batman movie.
Guy in a cape. Fights crime. Committed by clowns and alligator men.
Nolan's film doesn't do any disservice to Batman, on the contrary it blows the Bat/Clown conflict up to biblical proportions. But it's so concerned with being a great movie that it forgets to be a fun one. Even the Frank Miller comic from which Dark Knight takes its name and noir overtones (and little else) occasionally stepped back from big speeches (that seem a little too poetic for police commissioners and butlers to be coming up with off the cuff) and give a bit of a nod to the profound silliness of it all. Hell, in the first Nolan Batman movie Liam Neeson made fun of his superhero outfit. Those were good times. But it seems as if Nolan has made a conscious effort to outgrow that now, as if he wanted, instead of Bat-Man, to deliver Oscar Bait-Man. And the results teeter dangerously on the brink of arthouse pretentiousness.
I'm aware that there is a certain amount of stoicism that goes along with the Batman franchise, but I think in the next installment The Dark Knight could afford to lighten up just a little bit.
Just to add one more time, I really liked The Dark Knight. I think it's a great movie. Hooray.
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