the joker: president of the anarchy club

ok, so i finally just watched the dark knight. i was into it for about the first hour, suspending my disbelief and all. i had read the reviews and heard the hype about how it is a transcendent crime drama and blah blah blah and wanted to see if that was really true and if, unlike with the last batman movie, chris nolan had actually made a smart, engaging film.

i think it does alright in the beginning. while i've read some negative reviews about the scarecrow's early appearance (and i certainly do not begrudge cillian murphy any time on the screen) and how it was disjointed, i think it was meant to be a foreshadowing that the past villians were nothing compared to what batman would face this time in the joker. batman leaves the scarecrow and his buddies who were playing batman dress-up like little kids spanked and giggling. but the laughter we are to see later in the film comes out of a much more evil and unrestrained place.

so far, so good.

however, as i got further into the movie, i noticed a pattern. yes, yes, yes, the joker is an agent of chaos and isn't he so scary because he represents the id in all of us, violence for violence's sake alone? yes, i get that, we are told about it repeatedly through the movie by every major character, none so much as the joker himself. "do i look like a guy with a plan?" he yells out desperately to any character, major or minor, that will listen. well, um, hate to break it to you, but actually, yes, you do. beginning with the first scene, all of the joker's destructive "rampages" are meticulously planned and impeccably timed. down to the second. and not only that, but other characters realize this as well. gary oldman (looking a little old and pallid, but i guess it's been a long time since his dracula days) even yells out later in the movie, "it was all his plan! the joker wanted us to arrest him!" dude, that anarchist guy is really on the ball!

until the end. the ferry scene. oh, the ferry scene. i found it incredibly interesting as a sociologist, and this is going to sound crass and like i'm a big pessimist and i don't have faith in the human race, but give me a goddamn break. so, the premise is that the joker has made threats on tv about "wreaking havoc" (lord help us, what will he so wildly and unpredictably plan next?) on the city, everyone is freaking out and trying to leave. gary oldman (again, bless his old heart, why did he do this movie? i love him so, but why?) trying to out-PLAN the joker (who's crazy and chaotic, right? right, you guys? he is so wild! what will he do next?!?) thinks that those lousy criminals should be the first to get off the island because i'm sure they're just dying (get it? dying? ha!) to work for the joker. so, they get one ferry all to themselves and some regular folk get the other one. unbeknownst to the passengers of both, that crazy joker who just makes things up as he goes along has pre-rigged both ferries with bombs, even taking the time to gift wrap the controllers of each and present them as gifts to the opposite ferries. his distinctive voice magically appears on the intercom, announces that the members of each boat get to use the controller to blow up the other or both of them get it at midnight. (no rules, guys! chaos!) so what happens? neither boat blows the other up. they just can't do it! people are good and the superego really can triumph over that nasty id. sorry everyone, but i call bullshit.

i've seen other blogs allude to the milgram experiment as a reason for why this scene is so unbelievable. the trouble is that in the milgram experiment, people were listening to authority figures telling them to shock others, but they were free to go at any time during the experiment. the worst consequence they would receive if they refused to shock would have been the supposed disapproval of the researcher, who were study confederates anyway. alright, so compare that to this where the immediate choice is you live or that other boat over there full of people you don't know and even (gasp!) dirty criminals gets blowed up. what do you think would happen? it's nice to know that hollywood thinks so kindly of us.

while the joker is the mad one without a plan (no plan, really, none at all!), batman, who we're told repeatedly throughout the film is into rules and morality and all that, seems to be the one who really doesn't have a plan. he's responding to the chaos the joker just completely indiscriminately throws his way. he's the one on the fly, the true unpredictable actor. He shows up everywhere and then he's gone, poof, magic! Completely unpredictable. It left me wondering, is Chris Nolan trying to make a larger point here? That those who claim to be ruled by the id, who claim to be truly mad and unpredictable and out of control are really the ones who are more organized? That those who claim to enforce order in our world are really hanging on by a mere thread, not sure what the hell is really going on and just trying to keep everything as much in line as possible, including their own morally reprehensible urges? maybe. but i think that what is more likely is that the movie was trying to make a statement about the battle of the id vs. the superego, both on the individual and the societal level and got way too heavy-handed about making sure we knew who was who. in the process, shit got fucked up and the joker ended up looking like he should really be working for martha stewart (what with his skills, i'd hire him to organize my desk and write a dissertation timeline for me) and it was his adherence to order and planning, albeit "scary, chaotic" plans, that really took the bite out of the dark knight's bark.