To paraphrase Lemmy, “Do you like movies? Then you’re gonna love this”

I wasn’t a huge fan of the previous Batman movie – and The Core? My God, what a crock – and wasn’t at all excited about this one until the reviews started trickling in, but I believe it has to be one of the best movies of the last 20 years. It really is that good. Eckhart is inspiring, Bale is engaging and Heath Ledger is mind-blowing. Plus, Gary Oldman brings it home as Jim Gordon.

The story is both epic and tight, the drama is gripping and the action is exciting and believable.

Also, I waited a week for this one and it didn’t disappoint in the least. Ledger was better than advertised, and damned if Eckhart wasn’t able to keep pace despite getting “in the game” so late.

It’s early on, and Batman is completely confused as to how to go about things. He’s second-guessing himself, he’s taking advice from mobsters, he knocks himself out, pretty much on purpose, when he has the Joker cold (this also could be why it’s unclear if Batman broke his own rule at the end, there). Joker, on the other hand knows, knows exactly what he’s about, even though his little pop psychology assessment of Batman is way off. But Joker’s shtick is ultimately self-defeating, not because people are inherently good, but because his methods of terrorizing the city actually make people band together and care about each other. That’s a little bit of a stretch, because Nolan doesn’t overtly support that idea, but I came up with it, so I’m sticking to it. I loved that the movie doesn’t allow Batman to expose himself as Bruce Wayne to anybody new the way the Spiderman movies did every 15 minutes, which kind of cheapened the effect (or maybe I’m just thinking of Ultimate). But it did a total cop out in not showing us how Harvey becomes Two-Face and instead letting the comics do its work for it there.

But, man, that Joker.

Wow. Does there really need to be a sequel? Can we just speculate on that some other day? What could possibly top that film?

Aside from the pencil scene, the Joker in the nurse outfit getting mad at his remote and then jumping when it worked was the most morbidly funny scene in the movie for me. (I think that sentence was mostly spoiler-free.) I was crying laughing.

Oh, the bus driver line was pretty good, too.

If he were introduced in comics today, he wouldn’t rate above a 15% on the Rex-o-meter.

All due respect to those thinking of a way to bring a Joker or Harley into the next movie… why? I can’t think of a better, more complete treatment of the relationship between Joker and Bats. It was that good. And Ledger was THAT. GOOD. Just pitch-perfect.

For Number Three? Make mine Dr. Hugo Strange. He’s an oldie, he’s “realistic,” and he’s got a back-story tied into the mob history Nolan’s established in the first two films. I mean, heck, Rupert Thorne’s about the only Mobster Nolan’s not brought into the game at this point.

R

Ooh, we could really follow this through and bring in Fire Bird. Remember her? The girl who became a superhero to impress Robin? Make Riddler a crime boss who enjoys playing these deadly mind games not only with Batman, but his impersonators (in fact, especially with the impersonators — Riddler’s into cruel tricks played on the idiots of the world). People like Robin and Fire Bird treat the whole thing like a game, much to Batman’s horror, and Fire Bird gets herself killed. Robin goes all Jason Todd and Batman finds himself in the awkward position of helping this young boy as lost as he is find the light again.

The final confrontation can boil down to the Riddler treating the “lesser folk” like things and Batman realizing he’s been heading in the same direction and coming to accept that you have to think of people as people.

I noticed that as well. All I could think was that it was because they were setting up a Batgirl thing IE you don’t want to show someone and then have to replace her ala Katie Holmes again, but then you see her and she’s much too young even taking into account the whole year (or more) between movies sort of thing.