Finally.

That first word totally sums it up for me…finally. After all of the waiting and anticipation, I got to see The Dark Knight and it delivered, it truly delivered. After nearly 3 years since the first *NEW* Batman, I finally was able to see The Dark Knight. Choosing to wait out the massive crowds on opening night and weekend, I ventured out on a bright Sunday afternoon to experience this epic movie. With expectations as high as ever in tow, I watched The Dark Knight…

…and it was absolutely fantastic. I walked out of the theater mesmerized and a little short of breath, and in fact, I needed time to sit and recollect on what I just experienced. There was so much in the movie and it was such a BIG movie that there was no way I could even express what I felt or thought until I had a chance to sit down and actually verbalize what I thought. I was overwhelmed by the movie, by the shear mass of it I was taken for a loss. I had waited so long and had such high hopes and had talked about it to nearly everyone I knew, and wrote countless news pieces and insights into the movie that I nearly didn’t know how to even start this review.

I was afraid going into the movie that the hype would outlast the reality of the screen, though I wasn’t as freaked out about it as some other film bloggers, I was at least wary of the fact, but it seriously and utterly lived and surpassed the hype following it. So much goes into the marketing of a movie and many were calling TDK an “over-marketed” movie with all of its viral sites and teasers and trailers debuting here and there, and I am here to tell you, once again, that you will totally forget that fact once you see this movie. I thought that the movie held up great against its “image” that was created prior to its release, there’s never a point where you feel like you were cheated by the amount of information and games that the studios made you play in order to find out anything about the movie. It just adds to the overall phenomenon surrounding the movie.

I think I am going to devote an entire blog to Heath Ledger and why I think he is the best comic book villain to-date to ever appear on screen. His performance ALONE is worth seeing the movie multiple times in the theater. I have never, well, maybe not since Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs, forgotten about an actor and legitimately believed I was watching a real person like I did watching Ledger portray The Joker. In most cases, I see the ACTOR portraying a character, I see Christian Bale as Batman, I can see Michael Caine as Alfred, but with Ledger, I didn’t see him AS The Joker, I just saw THE JOKER!! I was totally frightened and amazed at The Joker. His evil was unexplainable, which made it all the better, and he seemed to really and truly embody what The Joker should be…someone who is pure evil, not made evil by some abusive childhood or turned by a tragic event, but someone who just IS evil for evil’s sake. Watching Ledger become Joker was true magic, and to be honest, a little disheartening to think how much he would have had to do to prepare for that role mentally, how depressed, low, insane, lonely he had to become to wholeheartedly become Joker. I read that he spent an entire month in a small run-down apartment in a dangerous and shabby part of New York to learn what that kind of loneliness felt like…hindsight in that situation makes you think a little.

Trust me, don’t believe the hype or the stories you read, Ledger makes this movie stand out on its own. Yes, he was SO GREAT that it did expose how just GOOD Christian Bale, Michael Cane, Gary Oldman, etc. were, in that he absolutely OUT SHINED his costars, but not so much as to ruin the movie. It just reminds you how GREAT Ledger was. You can tell that he put everything, literally everything, into this role and sadly enough, from what I have read, the added stress of preparing for a role as dark as this one may have been too much in the end.

One of the things that bothered me about this movie (I know, half of you just gasped, but hear me out) was the splotchy and fidgety editing. I was really bothered by how at times the scene would cut way too fast to the next scene that was already in progress, and it just really distracted me. At multiple times, there were action scenes that were cut too tight and seemed to end too quickly without any resolution at all. I felt like they had SO MUCH MOVIE to cut and edit that in the end, I think they spent too much time slimming the movie to 2 and a half hours and didn’t concentrate enough on how scenes flowed together. The transitions didn’t match at times and it just seemed a little robotic in its flow.

The Nolan brothers’ script I thought was very well put together and flowed nicely. The story really moved quite well in my opinion and never left you guessing. One of the elements of the story that I didn’t quite like and noticed right away was the “over-villain-izing” that was going on. Like the debacle that was Spider-Man 3 with all 3 of their MAJOR villains trying to split time in a 2 hour movie, I thought the inclusion of Two-Face (Dent), The Joker, Gamble, The Mob, AND the Scarecrow (though his was a small part) was a little much to try and cram into the movie, even though it was 2 and a half hours long. I know that Joker was the MAIN villain and most of the movie revolved around him, but I felt like they tried too hard to show all of the villains on one screen and in one movie.

This was a fantastic movie that I will see again this week. It lived up to its hype and it kept me thinking about it and discussing it days after, which is what a truly great film should aspire to do. This movie will make $300 million in 3 weeks, mark my words!

Content Warning: Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and some menace. The Joker is an evil guy and the kind of darkness portrayed in this film is not for the younger kids. Adults, don’t miss it, but find a sitter.

The Dark Knight grossed a behemoth $158.3 million from Friday through Sunday, according to early estimates, to score the biggest three-day opening in box-office history, while leading the way on a weekend for the record books. It scored the biggest three-day opening weekend of all time (beating Spider-Man 3’s $151.1 mil bow). It achieved the best opening day and single day in history ($66.4 mil, shattering Spider-Man 3’s mark of $59.8 mil).

It brought in the most money from Friday midnight shows of any release ever ($18.5 mil, passing Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith’s $16.9 mil). It banked a record $6.2 mil from 94 IMAX venues over the weekend (Spider-Man 3 had the old record, $4.7 mil). And it did it all with the biggest theater count, 4,366 locations, of all time, pulling in $35,579 per theater on average.

Worldwide, it has already made $196.6 million, compare that to its predecessor, Batman Begins, which made $205.3 million in its entire domestic run….all in just 4 days!

So, does anyone else want to chime in on how great it was for them? What do you think about these figures? Do you agree with my prediction that it will hit $300 million domestically in 3 weeks?

I must be honest and admit that when I first heard that RDJ (Robert Downey Jr.) was going to play Iron Man, I was curious about the choice. That’s not to say that I didn’t or do not like RDJ, it’s just that he’s been off the radar for a while, and I didn’t know whether this movie would be the best “comeback movie” for him or not. And before you guys say anything, I know, I was definitely proven wrong. I literally, after seeing the movie, can’t think of a better actor I would want to play Tony Stark than RDJ. He had the perfect mix of abrasiveness, charm, sarcasm, wit, and arrogance to play someone as notable as Tony Stark. I’m sure you obsessed comic book fans will agree.

One of the best parts of Iron Man was the show-stopping sequences of special effects. The gadgetry and creative weaponry on display were amazing. I know there are a lot of special effects in blockbuster movies and it’s normally not worth mentioning, but in this movie, the effects weren’t overdone or out of sync with the rest of the action going on in the scene. I thought it flowed very smoothly with the rest of the film.

There is definitely a subtle under current running throughout the movie that deals with war and technology and America’s view and stance in the “War on Terrorism.” I didn’t think it was overly anti-war or anything, but it was very apparent by numerous scenes where and how the director and/or actors felt about our current situation in the Middle East. It was a little disheartening to see the “stereotypical” Middle Eastern terrorists hiding out in the caves; it seemed a little too cliche. It wasn’t a detractor from the movie for me, it was just another “Americanized” view of terrorists that we’ve all seen.

Overall, it was an absolute joy of a movie. I don’t think I’ve seen such a complete movie, in that every aspect seemed to hit the nail on the head in regards to excellence, in a long time. From the sound, to the score, to the story, to the actors, to the direction, to the effects, to the emotion, to the comic book excitement…the whole movie just blew me away!

Oh, and by the way, if you haven’t seen it yet, stick around after the credits, you won’t be sorry.

Content Warning: Rated PG-13 for some intense sequences of sci-fi action and violence, and brief suggestive content. There were a few scenes that showed Tony Stark’s “way with women” that were a bit surprising in their sexuality, but nothing too over the top. It reminded me of Transformers in that it had scenes that intentionally were sexual, just so that they could satisfy that component of a summer PG-13 comic book movie…