Aaron Eckhart aka Harvey Dent ***SPOILERS***

[huedell]

Hue, I didn't mean to be condescending. I was only joking, or being satirical, when I said "you must have fallen asleep". We can agree to disagree here, as I've done with darklord and Raydeen over their criticisms of the film. I don't think you're less intelligent or deserving of ridicule for your opinion, but I do think you're missing something here, which I hope/think will become apparent next time you see the movie.

And I will CERTAINLY be viewing this movie again as there were alotta
things I DID like about it.

And, no, Vort, I didn't actually think you were saying I was literally asleep
in the theatre

I think that the whole "WHITE KNIGHT vs. DARK KNIGHT" thing that drove this
movie---while hurting me with what seemed like drawn out execution---was
a huge boon for critics who wanted something to grab hold of in the
"cerebral department"----do I think it's really worth all that celebration?
No way.

Do I think it stinks? No way either. It just tired me.

The "chaos" element and how Ledger's Joker played it was "just enough"
thank you.

[palitoy]

I really liked Harvey Dent in this movie but I just didn't get the impact out of Two Face I was hoping for. But Kudos the make up men for including that snear, that was a little all too important detail.

[Vortigern99]

Hue, I didn't mean to be condescending. I was only joking, or being satirical, when I said "you must have fallen asleep". We can agree to disagree here, as I've done with darklord and Raydeen over their criticisms of the film. I don't think you're less intelligent or deserving of ridicule for your opinion, but I do think you're missing something here, which I hope/think will become apparent next time you see the movie.

On a more hyperbolic note, here's my friend, horror writer Stephen Romano (www.shockfestival.net)'s take on the film, and specifically on Two-Face's character:

[EDITED FOR LANGUAGE]

Saturday, July 19, 2008

DARK KNIGHT: THE BELLY OF THE BEAST, BABY!


One of my friends said an hour after he'd seen The Dark Knight that he felt like he'd just gotten back from Vietnam. When I heard about this, which was only minutes before the curtains would open on my own personal war story, I did the obvious: I rolled my eyes and laughed. I mean, really now . . . could a BATMAN movie be THAT brutal? Hey, I saw the other one with Christian Bale a few years back, it was good, it had spunk, it was a real step in the absolute right direction for this type of film, with thoughtful and interesting characters, a cool origin story, neato plot . . . though it lacked focus in places and had absolutely no ending. The new film looked much better, as if the ambitious themes and reverent spirit of its predecessor were taking root in a darker, more complex way. Ledger looked as if he had aces up his sleeve.


But "I just got back from Vietnam?" That's steep man.


To go there, you'd have to rack this baby right up with the all-time great "disturbo movies that make you think." Is it true? Can you believe the hype? Has Bats truly gone over to the Dark Side?


Well . . . let me put it to you this way: Yes.


If I had seen this movie as a nine-year-old, when Batman was still my favorite Saturday morning cartoon hero (because who can trust Superman?), I would have simply been scarred for life. As a much older person with years of horror films, crime dramas and god knows how many twisted tomes of blood-drenched fiction etched permanently into my abused brain, I am patently exhausted, disturbed and utterly blown away. Yes, the film is flawed. Yes, there are clichés running wild. Yes, Batman feels like a supporting character in his own movie . . . but as I sit here, just a few hours after seeing this ******* thing and swimming in post-traumatic combat shock, I am reminded that clichés, flaws, and feeling like a supporting character in your own movie are what often define our real lives, and the world we live in. This might seem like some sort of bizarre bend-over-backwards apologia at first blush to some of you, but the fact that this film has me, a professional writer, re-examining those ideals in such a genuine way speaks to what may be the most lasting significant aspect and /or accomplishment of The Dark Knight: This is the first superhero movie to derive its power from not only shopworn mechanisms of popular mythos turned inside-out (Ang Lee's HULK did much the same with great results, though I often seem irritatingly in the minority on that score) . . . but a sense of complete mortal dread that puts us in a headlock from frame one and never lets loose. And it's not just a breakneck pace I'm talking about---in fact, the forward momentum of the movie sometimes seems a hindrance, as if there's too much going on at once or not enough time to smell the roses or whatever. But that's not it. No people, this whole thing has been deconstructed and turned into a horror film with a disturbing one-eighty that not many people will see coming. With slick Hollywood stylistic gimmickry abandoned---things like HELLBOY II's showy kung-fu action setpieces bathed in cascading slo-mo close-up which allow you to see a sword blade cutting a single CGI raindrop in half---in favor of rough-and-tumble dogpile action filmed in such a way that it may be difficult to even tell who is hitting who at times . . . what remains is a sort of grueling, gritty realism that brings one damn thing after another, surging towards Something Absolutely Horrible. And for me, that Something Absolutely Horrible does not come in the many amazing beats of Heath Ledger's much-ballyhooed swan song as The Joker---though there IS that, and it IS pretty ***damn breathtaking.


No . . . for me, it comes in Harvey Dent's transformation into Two Face.


This is one of the most affecting, heartbreaking, absolutely chilling falls from grace depicted in a mainstream Hollywood popcorn muncher. The moment when we see the monster for the first time is a moment in my own life I wish I could get back, preserve, and present to each and every one of you---just exactly as I felt it---for it depicts something that so many films back away from, and which I so often push towards in my own art. We see the ugly, evil face of madness, brought on by the simple, awful horror that is this: the loss of someone you love. When this happens to you, reason vanishes beneath a murky red haze of self-punishment and all the good that once existed is lost forever, replaced only by the insane desire to punish what is left in your world. This isn't Stephen being art-farty with words. I know this horror. I am describing it to you. In Aaron Eckhart's much underrated performance as Harvey Dent, and in the skillful setup and destruction of his character---which uses a low-blowing, sorrowful love triangle to tie together a series of plot threads so dense you could knit a sweater out of them---The Dark Knight describes it also. Not elegantly. Not with Hollywood gloss. But as raw and awful as it can get . . . which makes the cruel manipulations of The Joker all the more horrible. The Joker, by the way, is behind everything and wants to put us all to the ultimate test, as in Alan Moore's brilliant Killing Joke graphic novel, and the question is this: what breaks us . . . and why not just go with it? When you're down in the zero, even the good guys wear black hats.


The glimmering hope that the citizens of Gotham may yet be worth saving, or that, under cover of night, the Batman will somehow triumph against his demons and save tomorrow from our own worst fears, is addressed in the film . . . but it doesn't erase the pummeling, draining notion that you have just seen the face of the beast---in fact, you have been virtually raped by a beast--- that may be impossible to kill. These guys are not interested in "the usual way this **** is done." They want to scare the living **** out of you. They want you to know that even when Batman wins, he loses. This may make The Dark Knight one of the most important mainstream American films of the past ten years or so, but it will not protect you from it. At all.

Be very afraid.


STEPHEN

[huedell]

I thought he was awesome and felt really bad for the guy.I ended up rooting for the guy and telling myself,cap that b****!!
when he was going after everyone

I was looking at my watch.

[huedell]

That's the thing,he wasn't really a villain until the very end.So how can too many Villains ruin it?

You're splitting hairs here t2cool---how about "too many characters
that bore too much plot"?

Yeah---it didn't work for me.

[toys2cool]

That's the thing,he wasn't really a villain until the very end.So how can too many Villains ruin it? I thought he was awesome and felt really bad for the guy.I ended up rooting for the guy and telling myself,cap that b****!! when he was going after everyone

[huedell]

I appreciate your nice words Hector...but please give me one simple retort
to you and Vort....

I must have "Fell asleep watching the movie" ---huh?

I think you Vort and Hec must be falling asleep during my posts.

I GET the nice neat "white knight" plot thing---I just didn't like
how it was executed.

I felt it hurt the movie and drew out the ending.

What part of that don't you guys understand?

You can have the greatest reasoning for WHY it was good all you'd like.
I just don't agree.

Don't make me out to be stupid merely because I didn't like something you liked.
I feel like that's what you're doing every time you say I "missed the point"
(even though I explain that they drilled that friggin' point into your head
too much during the whole movie).

I wish I could enjoy TDK as much as you guys---well, I don't
----and the main reason for that is Harvey Dent's character's presence in the movie
----rational---plot-suporrting--- or not.

[Hector]

Good posts guys, I'm glad we are all on the same boat.

Heck, let's invite Hue to the boat too, we won't let him drown, he's our bud too.

[Hector]

Yeah, Hue, I'm sorry, but evidently you've missed the whole point of the movie. Two-Face was the second main character behind Bruce/Batman. His arc is essential to the drama that unfolds. The ending at 250 52nd St. is not a tacked-on subplot, but is in fact the psychological climax of the film. He is the good guy who "lived long enough to become the villain"; he is the victim of the Joker's attempts to drive someone close to Batman insane; he is the handsome White Knight with an ugly, angry soul. His performance as Two-Face chills and shocks. His dialogue is not clunky at all, but truthful and character-driven, not to mention utterly true to the comics persona.

I can't help but think you must have fallen asleep during part of the movie, and missed the part where Two-Face was a tortured, heartbreaking villain with a meaty character arc and a horrifying visage. Or maybe you accidentally watched Batman Forever again, and confused Tommy Lee Jones' capering, magenta-faced clown with this moving portrayal of evil....

[Hector]

Yeah I agree, Hue...you don't get it.

[Vortigern99]

Yeah, Hue, I'm sorry, but evidently you've missed the whole point of the movie. Two-Face was the second main character behind Bruce/Batman. His arc is essential to the drama that unfolds. The ending at 250 52nd St. is not a tacked-on subplot, but is in fact the psychological climax of the film. He is the good guy who "lived long enough to become the villain"; he is the victim of the Joker's attempts to drive someone close to Batman insane; he is the handsome White Knight with an ugly, angry soul. His performance as Two-Face chills and shocks. His dialogue is not clunky at all, but truthful and character-driven, not to mention utterly true to the comics persona.

I can't help but think you must have fallen asleep during part of the movie, and missed the part where Two-Face was a tortured, heartbreaking villain with a meaty character arc and a horrifying visage. Or maybe you accidentally watched Batman Forever again, and confused Tommy Lee Jones' capering, magenta-faced clown with this moving portrayal of evil....

[Cosmicman]

I remember back in the day when Billy Dee Williams played Harvey Dent in the first Batman movie. Some of the fanboys were being rude and snotty making comments about, "I don't want to see a black Two-Face..."
I knew Burton wasn't going to stay on as director. I didn't expect Joel Schumacher to step in and nearly kill the franchise with Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face.

This reboot is what the Batman movie franchise needed. Now, hopefully they can keep up appearances and carry on and do justice to these characters on the silver screen.

I would love to see Two-Face again in another movie but that probably won't happen. They have a lot of territory to cover in the Batman world.

[huedell]

If you want to see movies that are overpacked with villains, see Those last couple Schumacher batmovies or Spiderman 3. Nolan and company handled multiple characters very well, even moreso this time out. I see it more as a continuity from one film to the next, early on the Screcrow loose end was dealt with, then on to the Joker that was teased at the end of Begins. Two Face was intro-ed toward the end of DK, and his story will continue thru the next film.

Well, I must state the often overlooked point that there are
DIFFERENT ways movies can suffer from being "overpacked with villains"---

I'd rather a movie suffer in lack of plot depth and rationale ala Spidey 3
than suffer by HAVING that depth and lose my interest
(the death knell for a movie goer!!!) with what came off to me
as a drawn out ending in TDK.

BATMAN BEGINS, btw, was far from suffering in that way---and one of the
kudos I give to that film.

[huedell]

I totally agree with You Hector...Eckhart did a FANTASTIC Job, and it's a shame He will be over shadowed by Heath...but this IS Heath's last chance...so I hope I does win an Oscar.
I also agree with You about the whole handling of His Character....They totally nailed it! I guess My only only complaint would be that Twoface didn't look EXACTLY like the Comic...His Face should have been half GREEN...just like in the Comics!


Nah....I'm just kidding! I'm just playing the "Nitpicky Fanboy".

and you almost had me...you KNOW I woulda "thought" that was a
wonky perspective if not actually saying something about it.

As far as you and the others saying Dent worked real well---maybe my
patience just wasn't there to see a whole other villain's sequence played
out after being exhausted mentally with the Joker (a much better character
and performance)---and that (again) MAY be because I simply don't gel
with Nolan's style all the way....because many others were HAPPY to ride
out the ending the way it was rendered...its not like I'm in denial about that.

[Earth 2 Chris]

Eckhart was fantastic as Two-Face. And Nolan and company's emphasis on Two-Face's obsession with fairness was great. It fit the Two-Face we all know, but they explained it in a more psychologically sound way. The way Joker gave him and Maggie a 50/50 shot of survival, making his own luck with the two-head coin...great set up for Two-Face.

I heard gasps of disbelief on the makeup too. I think the actual Two-Face design is even worse than what you posted up top Hec. I think that was an early test that leaked out.

I saw an interview with Eckhart over the weekend, and the reporter asked them how exactly did they do his makeup. He said he'd take those secrets to his grave. I think they actually had to use some CGI on him. In most cases like this, you can see the makeup built up, but it looked as if Eckhart's skin had been removed! And his bad eye moving around...MAN!!! I know Nolan uses CGI sparingly, but if he did use it here, they did one helluva job!

Chris