I have been asked to write a study pack for Individuals or Congregations on the Chris Nolan movie The Dark Knight. I have added this to my previous review, which can be found on this blog archive for August 2011.
There are similar articles on The Life of Pi and Apocalypse Now! Redux dated October 2013, and Zhang Yimou's film Hero also dated Aug 2011. This last has not yet been recast as group questions, but I will do so when I get time. Terrence Malik's Tree of Life seems to be a very deep well of meaning and interpretation. The last time I showed it (the 14th showing, I think) was to local friends who included a psychologist and another theologian, and yet more aspects were revealed. Maybe I will pull together my three (or is it four?) articles on this film.
The Dark Knight is at one level simply a piece of entertainment. It is the kind of film that costs more than a hundred million dollars to make - and must therefore attract a huge audience to recoup its costs. These are sometimes called ‘tent pole movies’. But the British Director, Chris Nolan, who studied English Literature at University College London, has never been content simply to entertain.
I hope this little study opens a few windows on its serious intent; its concern with private morality and public ethics; individual and corporate responsibility; the ambiguity of heroism and violence, good and evil, power and vulnerability, the temptations posed by ends that justify means; the human and moral cost of ‘collateral damage’; the role of the scapegoat in society and our own psychology; the personification of evil; the nature of ‘Christ-likeness’ and the possibility of human redemption.
It also illustrates my conviction that ‘tent pole’ movies can have serious artistic, philosophical and even theological intent and content, and that films have a central part in 20th and 21st century literature.
