With the tenth anniversary of The Dark Knight a few weeks ago, I felt it appropriate to highlight it in our second ‘Trailer We Love.’ Though, honestly, that wasn’t the only reason. The first official trailer for the film, released in December 2007, is great. Really great, ranking with some of the best modern blockbuster trailers we’ve had.
There are two things the trailer sells incredibly well. The first is the film itself, and what Christopher Nolan has seemingly always wanted for his Batman Universe. Batman Begins is great, but it very much still feels like a comic book film, understandably. After the fiasco that was Batman & Robin and the reputation that it had built, Begins had to get in the good graces of everyone. It did, tenfold, but you got a feeling that it was obviously builder to something bigger, to something more. The opening words from the Joker indicate that The Dark Knight is going to be exploring certain things that we may not have seen in a superhero film.
‘You’ve changed things. Forever. There’s no going back. See, to them, you’re just a freak… like me!”
Christopher Nolan always said The Dark Knight was about escalation, and in so few words, you understand it. Begins Gotham, though still very true to the feel of the comics, was still rooted in the real world. So what would happen if The Batman were real? Something like a guy dressed as a 6-foot tall bat punching criminals in the face and swinging around the city isn’t something that people are going to shrug at and go about their day with, no matter how big or nuts your city may get. And, in just two and a half minutes, we get a good look at just exactly what may happen.
The trailer is a lot like the film. Tense and filled with seemingly bad things getting worse, we see the Crime-Thriller world that Nolan wanted for his universe all along, and just how events have been unfolding. Things are so bad that Bruce Wayne himself seems to be experiencing some sort of doubt as to how much he can do and how.
The second thing the trailer sells incredibly well is the most obvious: Heath Ledger’s Joker. It’s obvious the character would be such a focal point of the initial trailer; he is one of the most well-known foes in comics’ history after all. With there being doubt about his casting when it was announced, the trailer immediately squashed all of that with the Ledger showcased here, giving us our first real look at Joker as he exists in Nolan’s world.
The choice to have Joker’s initial full on reveal be a wide shot is great. You see all of him, finally, in full, but he’s still too distant to really feel personal. The voice-over afterwards, with the character’s seeming capture, lends perfectly to what he is, and should be.
“What have we got?” “Nothing. No name, no other alias. Clothing is custom. Nothing in his pockets but knives and lint.”
The knives and lint line is one I particularly always loved about the film. Of course that’s the only thing The Joker would have on him at any time. It’s a small, easy choice to have, but the fact that it was added made me so happy. Not to mention, it’s humorous in a very Joker kind of way. This of course leads to our first head first shot of him, ominously greeting the Commissioner before we are treated to more chaos within its runtime, including the tagline of the film of “Why so serious.” It is obvious The Joker is something that is unlike the city had seen before, or could have ever expected.
The trailer perfectly builds, to a perfectly tense finale that, surprisingly, uses one of the most awe-inspiring moment in the film; the flipping of an 18-wheeler truck. I’ve always loved the editing between Joker’s clap and the truck flipping. I can’t quite place why, but it’s always seemed like a perfect choice. All of this culminates in the great shot of Joker tempting Batman to run him down, followed by another great line; “Let’s put a smile on that face.”
The trailer is so well built and placed that it still makes you feel goosebumps ten years after having seen the actual film. The way it successfully showcased what kind of a world Nolan’s Gotham now is while also presenting the crème de le crème that is Ledger’s wonderful Joker performance. It gave us so much to look forward to, so many ways to discuss and speculate as to how the entire plotline would go. Why is Joker in jail? What’s with the truck flipping? What exactly leads to the conversation from the beginning? I vividly remember being on a film forum as people were discussing whether or not the “Evening, Commissioner” line was to be said before Joker inevitably kills Commissioner Loeb or a teasing shot at Gordon. The trailer, after the build-up of the fantastic viral marketing until this point, was nothing less than a homerun. The excitement seemed unbearable, and the wait over the next seven months felt like it was going to be torture. Like I mentioned, even ten years after seeing the film itself, the trailer still makes me incredibly giddy and excited, wanting to re-watch the film immediately.
