Dark Knight on IMAX

Woo hoo! Plans to go to Charlotte Friday night to see it with my buddy, Kurt, and maybe my new pastor. No one else has answered my emails and they are all lame ;-)

Here's a glowing TDK review that says it's the best comic movie ever and 'one of the best movies ever to show up in a theater'.

Now I don't know that I'm ready to go that far, yet, but it's pretty awesome.

Also, I was mistaken about the whole thing being filmed in IMAX. Only some scenes were. From the same article:

Nothing is wasted, there’s not a minute in the film that doesn’t fit into a bigger, broader, deeper picture. That goes for everything, right down to the way Nolan filmed it. When you see it (and you will), settle for nothing less than IMAX. Portions of the film were shot in specifically in IMAX, but not as some gimmick. They play a key role in setting the tone of the story. Most interior scenes are shot using normal film, and when displayed in an IMAX theater, they use only a portion of the total, massive screen, thus conveying an intimate setting. Exterior shots, flyovers of the city and amazing, breathtaking chases are done using IMAX, stretching out to cover the entire, enormous IMAX canvas, conveying a tremendous sense of scope by rote of contrast. Gorgeous, dark, city flyovers are used to hammer home the size of the world Batman and Joker are operating in, and pummel the audience with the scale of this place and hopelessness of Batman’s task in guarding it. None of that will be quite so evident seen anywhere but in IMAX, and you owe it to yourself, perhaps more with this film than with any other in the history of the format, to see it in the best way possible.

Awesome. Can't wait.

It brings up an interesting point that I've been mulling, one possible imperfection in the direction. I have a minor quibble with so many (how I remember it) daytime shots of Gotham, Hong Kong and fully lit shots of Batman. I don't think that's quite as effective as something darker. Batman is the Dark Knight AND the Dark Night Detective. Shadows help our willing suspension of disbelief. Burton's Batman seemed to hit this tone right more (again, in my memory). I'll watch more for that this time.

And here I see '“The Dark Knight” has been out for 17 days, and it’s already No. 8 on the all-time North American box-office chart'.

Excellent. Shouldn't have a problem getting more excellent Nolan movies. And the next Batman movie ALL in IMAX if he wants.

Ooo. The picture in the second article makes my point for me:

Look at all the light. Why so bright?

Hypothesis: Nolan was lighting Ledger, who deserves every ray. Would that make him the star? Believe me, more light does not work well for Bale as Batman.

One more interesting item, and then to bed. My buddy, Bill M, told me that Jack Nicholson warned Ledger. I understood that to mean about getting too deep into the psychopathy of the Joker. This article makes it sound more like Nicholson warned Ledger about Ambien. But then it goes on to say:

Ledger had acknowledged that his brooding character drained him physically and mentally and caused him to have trouble sleeping, a condition for which he said he took prescription pills.

Very interesting connection between the two Jokers.