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The film opens on a fragile period of stability in Gotham City. The vigilante Batman/Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale), operating outside the law, has managed to suppress much of the organized crime. He works in an uneasy alliance with the few incorruptible figures in law enforcement: Lieutenant Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) and the idealistic new District Attorney, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). Dent is the celebrated "White Knight" of Gotham, the legitimate hero who is successfully using legal means to imprison mob bosses. Bruce Wayne publicly backs Dent, hoping he can be the city's true savior, allowing Batman to retire and pursue a normal life with his childhood love, Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal), who is currently dating Dent.
Transcript
00:00The film opens on a fragile period of stability in Gotham City.
00:04The vigilante Batman, Bruce Wayne, Christian Bale, operating outside the law, has managed
00:09to suppress much of the organized crime.
00:12He works in an uneasy alliance with the few incorruptible figures in law enforcement,
00:17Lt. Jim Gordon, Gary Oldman, and the idealistic new district attorney, Harvey Dent, Aaron
00:23Eckhart.
00:24Dent is the celebrated White Knight of Gotham, the legitimate hero who is successfully using
00:29legal means to imprison mob bosses.
00:32Bruce Wayne publicly backs Dent, hoping he can be the city's true savior, allowing Batman
00:37to retire and pursue a normal life with his childhood love, Rachel Dawes, Maggie Gyllenhaal,
00:43who is currently dating Dent.
00:45This stability is violently interrupted by the Joker, Heath Ledger, a self-proclaimed agent
00:50of chaos who orchestrates a brilliantly intricate mob bank robbery, killing off his own crew
00:55to ensure he is the sole survivor with the mob's money.
00:58The Joker's goal is not money, but to prove that chaos and fear are the natural state
01:03of humanity, and that heroes are merely pretenders waiting to be broken.
01:08E. Joker's War on Order
01:10The mob bosses convene to discuss their crippling losses, from Batman, Gordon, and Dent's prosecutions,
01:16and now the Joker.
01:18The Joker crashes the meeting, offering to kill Batman for half of the mob's fortune, which
01:22has been hidden by their Chinese accountant, Lau.
01:25Batman, with the help of Lucius Fox, Morgan Freeman, manages a daring extraction of Lau from
01:31Hong Kong, bringing him back to Gotham to testify, which allows Dent to successfully seize
01:36all the mob's assets and arrest the bosses.
01:39The Joker responds by escalating his terrorism, threatening to kill a public figure every day
01:44until Batman unmasks.
01:46He executes a judge, the police commissioner, and then targets Mayor Garcia, though Gordon
01:51stages his own death to save the mayor.
01:54The fear and pressure become unbearable, forcing Batman to decide to reveal his identity to the
01:59public to save innocent lives.
02:02However, before Batman can confess, Harvey Dent preempts him, holding a press conference
02:07where he claims to be Batman.
02:09This is a strategic move, designed to lure the Joker out and protect the symbol of Batman.
02:14The Joker attacks the police convoy transporting Dent, leading to a massive street battle.
02:23Batman intervenes, saving Dent, and ultimately, the Joker is captured by Batman and the newly
02:29promoted Commissioner Gordon.
02:31Batman interrogates the Joker, who reveals his true, nihilistic philosophy to the Caped Crusader.
02:37This is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object.
02:40He then reveals his ultimate psychological trap.
02:44He has kidnapped both Rachel Dawes and Harvey Dent, placing them in two separate, abandoned
02:49buildings rigged with explosives.
02:51He gives Batman the addresses, but intentionally reverses them.
02:55Batman rushes to Rachel's location, only to find Dent.
02:59Gordon races to Dent's location, only to find Rachel.
03:02The bombs detonate, killing Rachel Dawes and leaving Dent alive but with half of his face
03:07brutally burned and disfigured.
03:08The Joker escapes custody after having successfully pushed the one man who represented Gotham's
03:14virtue into despair and madness.
03:17IV.
03:17The Fall of the White Knight.
03:19The emotionally shattered and physically scarred Dent is visited by the Joker in the hospital.
03:24The Joker persuades him that his loss was not part of a plan, but a result of a cruel, chaotic
03:29universe, and that the only true justice is random chance.
03:32Dent, now operating under the persona of Two-Face, uses his scarred coin, now an instrument of
03:39blind fate, to decide the life or death of those he holds responsible for Rachel's death,
03:44including Maroney and the corrupt police officers who sold them out.
03:48The White Knight has become a cold-blooded killer.
03:51Meanwhile, the Joker announces his final, grand social experiment designed to prove that civility
03:56is a thin veneer.
03:58He rigs two evacuation ferries with explosives, one filled with regular citizens, the other
04:03with prison inmates.
04:05He gives each ferry a detonator for the other and says that if one boat doesn't blow up the
04:09other by midnight, he will blow up both.
04:12Versus Sacrifice and the Dark Knight's Legacy.
04:15Batman, using a highly intrusive sonar surveillance system he commissioned Lucius Fox to build,
04:20against Fox's moral objection, locates the Joker.
04:24The climax is a tense standoff.
04:26Simultaneously, the ferry experiment reaches its deadline.
04:30The civilian ferry debates but ultimately refuses to condemn the other boat.
04:34On the prisoner ferry, a hardened inmate takes the detonator from the guard and dramatically
04:39throws it out the window, refusing to stoop to the Joker's level.
04:43The Joker's core belief about humanity is proven wrong.
04:46Batman confronts the Joker, subdues him, but honors his own rule by refusing to do it.
04:50As the police move in, the Joker laughs, stating that his victory lies not in the ferries, but
04:57in the corruption of Harvey Dent.
04:59The final confrontation takes place where Rachel died.
05:02Two-Face has kidnapped Commissioner Gordon's family, threatening to kill Gordon's son to
05:06demonstrate the fairness of chance.
05:09To save the boy, Batman tackles Two-Face off the ledge, resulting in Dent's death.
05:14Faced with the truth, that the White Knight had become a murderer, Batman and Gordon make
05:19a monumental, tragic decision.
05:22They realize that if the truth were revealed, all of the criminals Dent convicted would be
05:26set free, and Gotham would lose the symbol of hope it desperately needed.
05:31Batman chooses to take the blame for Two-Face's murders and Dent's death.
05:35He becomes the scapegoat, the necessary fall guy, ensuring Dent's image remains untarnished,
05:40the martyr who died fighting crime.
05:43Gordon smashes the Bat-signal, and Batman flees into the night, cementing his new identity as
05:48the Dark Knight, the silent guardian and watchful protector who operates not as a hero, but
05:53as a reviled outlaw for the greater good of Gotham.
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