The Dark Knight broke several
box-office records this weekend, is the
second-highest rated movie of the year so far by critics. And (in a fine testament to internet hyperbole, is currently ranked as the
#1 movie of all-time on the Internet Movie Database. So, what does a new Batman movie have to do with politics? More than you might think. Critics have correctly pointed out the film is the first critically and commercially successful film dealing with 9/11 and terrorism. The film has philosophical debates about negotiating with terrorists, whether torture is justified, and the civil liberties trade off of using warrantless wiretaps to track criminals. And unlike most recent films
explicitly about the Iraq War, it manages to fairly look at both sides of the debate with nuance. Oh, and Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy
has a cameo.
The Weekly Standard's Jonathan Last, who also blogs at Galley Slaves, has
strong praise for the film:
As such, The Dark Knight, like Batman himself, takes a dim
view of liberal (meaning "classical Western," not "lefty Democratic")
pieties. Nolan's argument is that the invisible ropes binding us
together are not as strong as we might like, or imagine. A snip here, a
cut there, and our rules begin to break down. Liberalism is well-suited
to managing the competitions and collisions of liberal peoples. But it
can be fatally ill-equipped for confrontations with those not grounded
in the same basic traditions.
Most of the political left are enjoying the movie as well, including
The New Republic's Christopher Orr.
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