The Dark Knight

Since I suck at writing reviews and writing in general, I'm just going to touch on a few points that I loved about this movie and leave the writing up to those who are actually good at it:

# Harvey "Two-Face" Dent - Arron Eckhart played him to perfection. Everyone is talking "Heath Ledger" this and "Joker" that, but Dent is the real star of this movie. Above Batman/Bruce Wayne and above The Joker, The Dark Knight is really about Harvey Dent as the Gotham City DA who takes on the rampant crime and corruption in the city and follows him through his tragic fall from grace to the twisted killer "Two Face". Before he becomes Two Face, Harvey Dent is the true hero of Gotham, not Batman. Heath Ledger may be stealing the show with his also brilliant potrayl of The Joker, but Arron Eckhart deserves some major attention for his exemplary performance as well.
# The Joker - This is the one everone's talking about. Would Ledger have gotten as much attention for his take on The Joker if he had not sadly died shortly after finishing his role? Most definately, but it probably wouldn't be recieving quite so much attention. Still, Ledger absolutely disappears into The Joker. He plays him straight up fucking evil and terrifying. You never know what he's going to do next and it fills the whole movie with a constant sense of dread and unease that gets worse as it goes along. You never feel safe to let your guard down in Gotham City when The Joker is around. Every second he is on screen he commands your absolute attention and he'll get it. There's not much more I can say about this that hasn't been said by everyone else and probably said better by them so I'll just finish my thoughts on The Joker with these two words: Magic Trick.
# Christopher Nolan has created a superhero movie that is more than just a superhero movie. It is a deep and complex crime drama. The Dark Knight is more than just Man In Tights A beats up Bad Guys B, C and D, then blows up object E. The characters tha inhabit Christopher Nolan's vision of Gotham City are each deep and real in their own way. They jump off the screen, each with their own complex set of emotions and motivations that guide them through this world. Of course they wouldn't be as great without some awesome writing and superb performances from each and every actor here.
# I love how there is very little CGI in The Dark Knight and what is there is very subtle. Christopher Nolan's insistance on practical special effects (you know, stuff that's actually there as opposed to something crapped out of a computer) gives even more realism and believability to the world of Gotham City.

There's probably a few more awesome things about The Dark Knight that I've neglected to mention, but trust me, someone else probably did it better. In all, The Dark Knight is a magnificently crafted film that will stand the test of time as more than a superhero movie, but as an amazing piece of cinema history. Now I have to wait for the DVD.