Why So Enthusiastic?

It still seems a little strange to me that the general public latched onto The Dark Knight in such a big way. Yes, it's arguably the best of the Batman movies and, for that matter, one of the better superhero movies ever to grace the big screen. But how did an extremely dark and brooding film about a guy who dresses up as a bat and fights a guy in clown makeup become such a big box office success? Was it buoyed purely by a posthumous performance, or is it just a finely crafted piece of mainstream film? The answer lies in how accessible director Chris Nolan made his source material.

In my opinion, The Dark Knight was a compelling crime movie that just happened to have a superhero in it. It has all the suspense and thrills of a movie like The Departed or Inside Man, providing a compelling villain and a plot full of surprises. What makes The Dark Knight so accessible is that it doesn't hit you in the face with the fact that its based on a comic book character. The characters of Batman and the Joker are merely recognizable figures that draw you into the film, they're treated as part of the story, not as the main reason for the film to exist in the first place. All too often, superhero films are built around showcasing superpowers and special effects, not the stories that these characters should be taking part it. The Dark Knight struck a chord with the masses because of its deft narrative as well as its intelligent use of a cast of easily identifiable characters.