Should We Fear Imitation of the Joker?
I finally saw the movie which has grossed $400 million in its first 18 days - well on its way to overtaking Titanic as box-office champ. The movie was visually and viscerally stunning but deeply disturbing, even diabolic.
The story's focus is the Joker, played by the late Heath Ledger of Brokeback Mountain fame. The Joker is portrayed as a man engaging in a purity of evil rarely seen. An anti-Christ type figure, he engages in evil for evil's sake and not for any material motive, and is totally unconcerned about his own well-being.
So youth seeing the film will see the evil of the Joker, be repulsed by it and turn away from it, right? Wrong.
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There are two supermen in this film - Batman and the Joker.
One problem, however, is that while Batman is a somewhat distant figure - a multi-billionaire whose money is largely the source of his being a superhero - the common man can relate more to the Joker who is a man dealing, in his own intensely cruel way, with a rough past.
In one scene the Joker describes the way he got his 'smile' - the two obvious scars which run up from both corners of his mouth. He describes domestic violence in his home where his father attacked his mother and then turned on him as a child, saying, "Why so serious? Let's put a smile on that face," and carved one in. As sick and scary as that scenario is, it is nevertheless one with which a great many of today's youth - deeply scarred internally - will easily identify as they too have been subjected to domestic violence.
And if that's not enough, Joker changes the scenario half-way through the film. He explains that his 'smile' is the result of an incident stemming from a disagreement with his wife who would thereafter have nothing to do with him. Hence, Joker's psychosis is portrayed as being a response to the all-too-common experience of domestic turbulence, whether involving one's parents or one's spouse.
The Joker and Batman are both presented as virtually invincible; indeed, if anything, the Joker is presented as being more powerful in many respects. He is completely unrestricted in terms of his actions, while the film clearly portrays Batman as hampered by his conscience. Batman The Dark Knight could easily be seen to portray good as a weakness which is used and repeatedly exploited by evil - the Joker. The corruption of the good in people is one of his main aims - it is in fact the only purpose which can be discerned in the Joker's otherwise completely chaotic acts.
But for all the power of this anti-Christ portrayal, there is no portrayal of an equally pure Christ figure. An heroic man in public power, one of the main characters, is eventually corrupted by the Joker's devices, and the only two good guys left - Commissioner Gordon and Batman himself - are themselves corrupted in that they must foster and live with a lie to maintain the illusion that the one who thoroughly succumbed to evil was actually the hero of the day.
Batman, meant to be the hero of the film, is far less morally consistent in his pursuits than is the Joker. As Bruce Wayne the billionaire, he is portrayed as a jealous, spiteful ex-lover, insulting his rival and using other women (even three at a time) to inspire jealousy in his ex-lover. The portrayal of Batman is weak and conflicted compared to that of the Joker. The Joker's character dominates the screen and the brilliance of Ledger's performance in this role serves to highlight this difference.
Are there going to be imitators of the Joker portrayed in The Dark Knight? There already are. Just look on YouTube for the number of videos where teens are dressing up as and imitating the lines of the Joker. Even more seriously, however, there have been crimes committed since the film's release where the criminals have dressed in Joker makeup.
The film would likely not be dangerous for those well-grounded in morality; but for the many in today's world who have not received the moral training that would allow them to clearly distinguish between good and evil, Joker character and philosophy of "anything goes" presents an all-too-appealing alternative way of attaining power and recognition.
Seeing the film only a few days after the very disturbing and unexplainable beheading of a passenger on a Canadian bus, I could not help wonder if the perpetrator had seen the Batman film. The description of the killing and decapitation as having been carried out in a calm manner, entirely without emotion, and the killer taking the head of the man and glibly showing it to horrified witnesses, seemed to fit with the Joker's character. Media screen shots of the film showing the Joker holding up his "calling card" (a Joker playing card with a decapitated head dripping blood) added powerfully to the association.
Superheroes in films normally generate imitation. Joker is every bit a superhero in The Dark Knight - but a super-evil one.
