I took my son to see “Dark Knight” yesterday. I have liked most of the Batman movies with the exception of the George Clooney era. Believe it or not, it has nothing to do with his politics.

The success of Batman has depended on the villain. “Dark Knight” does not disappoint. Heath Ledger did a great job as the Joker. He was completely crazy without the over-the-top wackiness of the Jack Nicholson depiction.

There were many post 9/11 themes in this movie. The main theme was obviously good versus evil. The not-so-obvious theme was that good often gets a bad rap. As Americans, we feel his pain. In a chaotic world, the United States uses wealth and power to protect the defenseless from tyrants and bullies. In return, the rest of the world resents us.

The Joker can not be reasoned with. He is impervious to moral arguments and is not driven by greed. He gets off on the power of destruction and fear. Appeasing him solves nothing. In the face of such evil, Batman is confronted with a scenario where he could have killed the Joker and opts not to. Hopefully, a US Soldier will need to make this decision with Bin Laden some day.

Batman uses illegal surveillance to search for the Joker. This raises question about both the power of technology to invade our privacy and the ethics of using that power for a good cause. I am guessing Bruce Wayne is not a big supporter of the ACLU.

It was a good movie, but it was long. The “medium” soda my son drank proved to much for his pre-teen bladder. He ran from his seat to the bathroom. It was the shortest bathroom trip of his life. That is an indicator of his review.

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