Hysteria (2011)

Starring: Hugh Dancy, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Felicity Jones, Jonathan Pryce, Rupert Everett
Director: Tanya Wexler
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Rating: C+

I'm still a bit undecided about this movie. On the one hand, I love Hugh Dancy and Maggie Gyllenhaal and probably always will. On the other hand... I had high expectations for Hysteria and it failed to deliver.

Hysteria follows Doctor Mortimer Granville (Dancy), a modern thinking doctor living in Victorian London. His attempts to modernize his places of work has had highly negative results - mainly a high job turnover. Following his latest firing Mortimer gets a job at the practice of Dr. Robert Dalrymple (Pryce), who specializes in the women's disorder known as hysteria, which he treats through stimulation of the female sex organ. While working for Dr. Dalrymple Mortimer meets his two daughters; the intelligent and subdued Emily (Jones), who Mortimer strikes up a fancy for, and the passionate, hot-headed Charlotte (Gyllenhaal), who Mortimer (and her father) disapproves of. Then Mortimer begins to get a case of carpal tunnel syndrome, altering everything.

To start, I loved the cast, from the leads Dancy and Gyllenhaal, to the supporting actors. They each had a well defined role that they played rather perfectly. I even have to give props to Gyllenhaal for her accent - while it wasn't a perfect British accent it was far from being one of the worst fake accents in a movie. That being said though, I don't think Dancy or Gyllenhaal really stepped out of their comfort zones here. Both were playing roles that I felt like I've seen them do before and while that's acceptable in some actors, and even expected at times, I do have higher expectations for them. Both are great actors who should be challenging themselves. Hysteria doesn't do this.

The thing that I disliked most about this movie, however, was that it didn't seem to know if it wanted to be a period piece of a romantic comedy - and ended up being too much of the latter. I felt like this could have been a really smart movie, but it just wanted to go for the obvious jokes. Seriously, watching Hugh Dancy masturbate old women is only funny for so long.

The Dark Knight (2008)

Starring: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Heath Ledger, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Morgan Freeman

Director: Christopher Nolan
Genre: Action, Comic, Drama, Thriller
Rating: A+

"Why so serious?"

I’m not really sure if there are words to describe just how much I was blown away by The Dark Knight, the second in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy.  This movie has you sitting on the edge of your seat from start to finish and appears to complete Gotham’s descend into a really dark world.  My favourite part, though, is Ledger’s take on the Joker and the very sick and dark form of humour that he brings to the film.  While Batman movies have been funny before, they’ve never done so in a way even remotely similar to Heath Ledger’s Joker.

The Dark Knight escalates things from the way that they were left off in Batman Begins. While the mob still rules in Gotham it is clear that the duo of Batman (Bale) and Lieutenant Jim Gordon (Oldman) are making a very clear dent in the business. Mob bosses are now definitely scared of the Batman, and the new district attorney Harvey Dent (Eckhart) has a tough on crime approach that makes him a good ally to this dynamic duo. That is, until a new villain arrives on the scene. Calling himself the Joker he is a perpetrator of anarchy and desires to cause Batman to break his one unbreakable rule – he wants to drive Batman to kill. Alongside the struggles of Batman is the slow downfall of Dent, who at the start of the film is a stoic man unwilling to compromise his morals – an unmasked counterpart to Batman, and a good match for Rachel Dawes (Gyllenhaal), who acts as the damsel in distress to both Bruce Wayne/Batman and Dent. Just as it appears that they’ve caught the Joker, Dent and Rachel go missing – it’s up to Batman and the good men of Gotham’s police force to find them in time.

This movie takes the set up that Bale established in Batman Begins and runs with it. We know who the players are and the world in which they live; it’s been established that Bruce Wayne is a brooding, stoic man who carries a torch for Rachel – a torch that while being mutual is in competition with her feelings for Dent. Since we already know this – as well as Batman’s decision to not kill – Nolan doesn’t need to waste the viewers time re-establishing all of this. Instead he just plunges us straight into the action – even going so far as to introduce the movie’s villains before he reintroduces its heroes. And from that moment when he takes out the bus driver Ledger’s the Joker has us completely captivated, assuming that it even took that long.  The best part is that never once does he do anything to rip you out of the compelling narrative that he's weaving; as soon as you're sucked in, you're in it until the end.

The acting in The Dark Knight is stellar, but with this kind of cast it shouldn't come as a surprise.  I much preferred Maggie Gyllenhaal's Rachel Dawes to Katie Holmes', however I am still disappointed that they had to recast her.  I hate it when they recast characters, be it in the movies or on TV, as I find that it takes away from the narrative.  It's one thing when it's James Bond, which is special, and another thing when it's pretty much anything else.  I love, love, love Heath Ledger in this movie.  He was one of my favourite actors, and I think this movie just really shows his genius.  The Joker has always been one of the best Batman villains, and in this film Ledger proves to be one of the best Jokers.  That the film doesn't stop with the one villain makes things even better.  The problem with Batman Begins is that it was unremarkable and rather slow: it spent so much time setting up the premise that by the time everything was established half the movie was over and then they finally got around to dealing with the villains and plot twists.  Dark Knight doesn't waste any of this time and as a result it's plot twist after plot twist, action sequence after action sequence, and the whole thing just blows your mind.  Even when it isn't the big action sequences - even when it's just the Joker strolling down the street you're completely captivated.  If you haven't seen this movie yet, I highly recommend you do.