The Dark Knight

The film that redefined what a superhero movie could be, The Dark Knight is thrilling widescreen cinema at its finest. The sequel to Christopher Nolan's excellent DC Comics franchise reboot, Batman Begins, the 2008 movie finds the accomplished writer/director reuniting with star Christian Bale and much of the earlier film's supporting cast. An upgrade in every sense of the word, The Dark Knight features Bale donning a sharp new Batman suit and utilizing all sorts of remarkable technology, but the real improvement is the emergence of a "better class of criminal" in the unsettling smeared-makeup visage of the Joker (Heath Ledger). Devoid of any empathy and utterly deranged, Ledger's reptilian Joker is a villain of the highest order, one bound by nothing except his pathological need to upend everything. Charging headlong into his explosive struggle with Batman, the Joker is a truly incendiary presence. However, Ledger, who deservedly won a posthumous Oscar for his role, doesn't steal the show enough to completely overshadow solid, and, in fact, underrated performances by Aaron Eckhart as rising district attorney Harvey Dent and Gary Oldman as Batman's stoic police ally, Jim Gordon. During the course of Nolan's sweeping film, these characters collide in fascinating ways, bringing ethical dilemmas and life-altering decisions with them as they careen down their chosen paths. Even greater than the sum of its exceptional parts, The Dark Knight far exceeds its comic-book origins to stand as one of the best crime thrillers ever made.