hapiores

After Spiderman's debut super heroes' movies have reached higher and higher, leaving the childish tone for which they were known throughout the 80's/mid 90's, to become complex productions, in a path similar to that followed by the comic books from the early 80's on, giving a depth to the stories and characters until then unknown. Batman the Beginning followed this trend and was already a well balanced picture, rooted in a sense of reality that made it distinct from it's contemporaries. The Dark Knight is one step beyond.

Continuing the saga of Gotham's most known hero, The Dark Knight begins where it's predecessor had left: by now both Batman and Bruce Wayne know exactly what role they must play and the movie opens in full speed, with an intricate fast tempo, showing all the characters and building the plot from the very first frame.

In the end it's simply impressive, the sheer sense of completion the movie has - something that puts it miles away from it's predecessor - which is partly explained because of the great script (the brothers have proved to be an excellent team in past movies: Memento, The Prestige) and the methodical shooting C. Nolan uses.The way the characters move in a perfectly real emotional landscape gives them an unexpected depth, from Batman to the Two Face, or - obviously - the Joker. Heath Ledger is perfect in the role of Joker and the character becomes simply daunting, the first time ever that the joker is not a silly sociopath, but a truly dangerous man, devious in everything he does and yet brilliant in his own game: the fact that he chose Harvey Dent to go after is the best example of his meticulousness; and he wins (remember that it was his intension to swap the addresses of Harvey and Rachel).

Epoch Movies sometimes fall into a pit, where the mechanics of moving back in time has more to do with showing characters dressed in the days of old and portraying social poses than conveying a genuine epoch feeling. This is of course arguable since the spirit of a time now dead is impossible to show; but maybe it can be emulated, suggested more than defined - and of course, the more vague it gets the more dependent it becomes of the viewer's own predisposition do see it, understand it or "connect" to it. For me "Jesse James..." works at this level portraying with accuracy something both palpable and vague that transcends the curiosities, the costumes, the surface of what we see – the spirit rather than the materiality; very intimate, passionate and yet strangely detached. These were the men of the days that are gone. The awkwardness of those days bursts in the beginning, as a strange locomotive fills the the dark woods with light, and this synthesizes the overall mood for the picture: the direction, the cutting, the photography, the actors - and their meager lines -, are in a perfect unison.

I remember "The Proposition" and the parallels that can be traced between (appart from Nick Cave): both movies use a similar visual technique, with long shots of the wilderness, small lines, subtle score and loose editing. The big difference is perhaps the voice over in "Jesse James...", a narrator that works almost like an historian and brings us closer to the characters and their inner feelings.

Brad Pitt has good leading role – the best in the last years – looking a matured actor, and Casey Affleck has the first big opportunity to show what he's got – and he delivers.