I think movies should be watche din moderation, like many things.

its good to appreciate it as an art form, I just think the medium has been a bit exploited.

I am interested in seeing the movie though.

I haven't seen it, but I think it's very likely all the calls to give Ledger an Oscar are probably more to do with his death than his performance :-(

Maybe I'm wrong though, but he was playing a Batman villain, as Vampiero says there's a lot of scope to act however you like in such a case

oh thats right I forgot that guy died. hmmm thatll prolly be creepy knowing that and watching him play the joker

Amazing movie, and Kestas, Ledger was seriously terrifying in it. I had goosebumps throughout his performance. He deserves an Oscar over any other actor I've seen this year.

Also, Pandora, come on, this is a thread about the Dark Knight, nobody cares about your opinions regarding cinema.

I saw it Sunday - and it's no more creepy watching Ledger on screen than watching say.. John Wayne or any other (dead) silver screen actor. It's not showing Ledger *dead,* and that's the key point folks seem to be missing.

Ledger was terrific though, and that's coming from someone who never particularly cared for his acting style in other movies - it's easy to forget he's behind that war paint. He's not the only good part of the movie though, I thought the cumulative whole of it was fairly brilliant, with strong acting on all sides; it brought back the Epic part that was sorely missing from Batman Begins (as it had to be in an origination story).

I saw it in Imax on Saturday. Blown away by the movie, and the Imax only furthered that haha.

Terrific acting, great plot, great everything. One of the best movies I have seen in a long while.

i've seen it 4 times

so it's an all around goo flick then?

I just saw it again. I will likely see it at least one more time before the week is through. Ugh, amazing.

I am excited to see it as well. When the 1989 movie came out I was blown away by Nicholson. There's the 'camp' view of Batman, represented by the TV series and the original movie. Then there's the 'goth' view of Batman, represented by the comic books (pardon me, "graphic novels"), the 1989 movie and its first sequel (I'll ignore the other sequels) and the 2005 movie.

Could Heath Ledger's performance eclipse Jack Nicholson's without the tragedy of his suicide hanging over it? People may ask how much of his disturbing performance was rooted in the same demons that made him take his own life. Of course, the fact that his death was ruled an accidental overdose, not a suicide, will not stop people from speculating. Personally, I'll be hard to please because Jack's performance was sooooo awesome!

There's no question about it. Ledger did a better job than Nicholson. He is funnier, scarier, and truer to the Joker of the comic books and graphic novels (which are not the same thing -- I wouldn't call a 25 page comic issue a graphic novel any more than I would call a 10 page Asimov story a novel). I am not the sentimental nor the superstitious kind. Ledger's death has no effect on my views of the movie (except, of course, makes me wonder whether the Joker will return in a later movie in this series). It was quite simply one of the best preformances I have ever seen in a movie, and certainly the best I have seen in a movie based on a comic book series.

>>Croaker
As stated before, Comic books =/= graphic novels and Batman is in no way, shape, or form "goth". Noir, perhaps, but goth? Absolutely not.

> I am not the sentimental nor the superstitious kind. Ledger's death
> has no effect on my views of the movie
Yeah, that's what I've been wary of with the rave reviews freakflag, but it sounds like it is something worth seeing after all. Who would have thought an action hero sequel being a must-see, looking forward to it :-)

"goth" was a very poor word choice.

Ledger made an amazing performance: this movie would be nothing without it. The problem was that he really got into the character- he couldn't get it out of his head apparently.

The entire movie was voluptuously executed. Every actor was phenomenal, but Ledger as has been said had the most leverage and also the most interesting character. He played Satan, basically, which is, needless to say, daunting. He pulled it off without flinching however. I feel like he completely made himself into the joker. Not once did I think "that's Heath Ledger," rather it seemed to me throughout that he really was the Joker.

The other actors though deserve our applause, Christian Bale of course and underrated Aaron Eckhart, Michael Caine and Gary Oldman, any many others. Just very well-done. In short I'd have to call the movie horrifyingly captivating, or just strong. That's the best one-word way to describe this movie. It was strong.

O and don't forget Morgan Freeman!
I really liked what Christopher Nolan did with the sound in this movie. From the music, to the explosions, to the joker's chilling laugh I thought the sound effects were really what set the mood that made this film such a success.