I am excerpting this review by David Denby in case some readers may think spoilers may include the full piece. The link is provided here:
http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/cinema/2008/07/21/080721crci_cinema_denbySome may also think parts which follow may be disturbing, but I think it important to post, and I may post it in other threads as well. If any one feels I should remove this post from
this thread, I certainly will.
From
The New Yorker:The Current CinemaPast Shock
Heath Ledger and
Christian Bale in
Christopher Nolan’s new Batman movie.
by
David Denby July 21, 2008
(....)
Yet “
The Dark Knight” is hardly routine—it has a kicky sadism in scene after scene, which keeps you on edge and sends you out onto the street with post-movie stress disorder. And it has one startling and artful element: the sinister and frightening performance of the late
Heath Ledger as the psychopathic murderer the Joker. That part of the movie is upsetting to watch, and, in retrospect, both painful and stirring to think about.
“
The Dark Knight,” which was directed by
Christopher Nolan (who also made “
Batman Begins”) and written by Nolan and his brother
Jonathan, is devoted to perversity. Bruce Wayne, attempting to bring order to Gotham City, has instead provoked the thugs. The mob is running rampant, and they’ve infiltrated the police department. The Joker, who doesn’t care for money and wants only the power to sow chaos, intimidates everyone, including the gangsters. Wayne and the noble Lieutenant Jim Gordon (
Gary Oldman) decide to get behind the new D.A., Harvey Dent (
Aaron Eckhart), and set him up as Gotham’s crime-fighting hero. Batman even thinks of retiring. But the Joker won’t let him; he needs him, as someone to play with. An anarchist by philosophy, the Joker uses terrorist methods (bombs, bombs, bombs), and he has an enormous advantage over the principled Batman—he’s ruthless. So the Joker taunts and giggles, and Batman can only extend his wings.
It’s a workable dramatic conflict, but only half the team can act it.
Christian Bale has been effective in some films, but he’s a placid Bruce Wayne, a swank gent in Armani suits, with every hair in place. He’s more urgent as Batman, but he delivers all his lines in a hoarse voice, with an unvarying inflection.
It’s a dogged but uninteresting performance, upstaged by the great Ledger, who shambles and slides into a room, bending his knees and twisting his neck and suddenly surging into someone’s face like a deep-sea creature coming up for air. Ledger has a fright wig of ragged hair; thick, running gobs of white makeup; scarlet lips; and dark-shadowed eyes. He’s part freaky clown, part Alice Cooper the morning after, and all actor. He’s mesmerizing in every scene. His voice is not sludgy and slow, as it was in “Brokeback Mountain.” It’s a little higher and faster, but with odd, devastating pauses and saturnine shades of mockery. At times, I was reminded of Marlon Brando at his most feline and insinuating. When Ledger wields a knife, he is thoroughly terrifying (do not, despite the PG-13 rating, bring the children), and, as you’re watching him, you can’t help wondering—in a response that admittedly lies outside film criticism—how badly he messed himself up in order to play the role this way. His performance is a heroic, unsettling final act: this young actor looked into the abyss. 
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