DARK KNIGHT: BELIEVE THE HYPE

I don't, as I have stated before, I don't do hype, but this morning I am suffering a mild case of movie build up excitement.
I have just seen THE DARK KNIGHT and believe me it really does live up to the speculation. The film opened with a $66 million dollar opening day, which was a record, the film then went on to take $155.3 million dollars in its opening 3 days, the biggest opening weekend in cinema history, beating the previous best set by Spiderman 3 with $151.1 million.

I think the film is brilliant, it's an epic piece of film making and lifts the whole genre of comic book inspired movies to a whole new level. If you take the whole issue and all the elements of the film's comic book origins out of the equation, This is still an excellent and multi layered thriller.
The build up to the release of the film has been over shadowed by the tragic death of Heath Ledger, who redefines the role of The Joker.
Forget all that have gone before, this is something new and disturbing, dark and menacing, the persona reaches out of the screen and pulls you in, it quite simply is The Joker.
The performance is a fitting tribute to the undoubted talent possessed by the films late co-star. Heath Ledger who contrasts the brooding stillness of his performance in the Oscar winning Brokeback Mountain with one full of dark energy.

All the performances are all very good, with Aaron Eckhart also stands out as Harvey Dent / Two Face.
I am not writing a review of the film so I will stay away from waxing lyrical about why I thought the film was good, that is down to you to go and see, you have to make up your own minds.
The film without a doubt is going to do well as the American box office has already proved, the publicity surrounding the release of the film has been going on for months and though the end of promotional campaign is in sight, the excitement surrounding The Dark Knight is set to continue for a while at least and the mysterious circumstances linked with the death of Heath Ledger will add to the momentum which will ultimately add to the box office generated by the film, and as dark and cynical as it seems, the death of Heath Ledger will probably add $30 million dollars to the films opening weekend and globally it will add somewhere in the region of 20% to the overall box office take.
In an industry dominated by profits, the legacy left behind by Heath Ledger has proved to worth its weight in gold.