The Dirty Dozen and The Dark Night (Movie Review Sample)

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Movie review: ‘The Dirty Dozen’ and ‘The Dark Night’
In the dirty dozen, a US major is given a top-secret assignment to train and prepare 12 life-sentence and death penalty prisoners for an assault mission on German High ranking military officers. The mission, which aimed to eliminate top German officers, was considered an effective incapacitating move to weaken the Germans ahead of a confrontation with the US army in the Second World War (Aldrich). On the other hand the mission was a near suicidal move for the assault team and the chances were so slim for any of them to come out of it alive.
This movie by Robert Aldrich, presents a very interesting theme which depicts mid 1900’s military life with a classical noir theme. Major Reisman (Lee Marvin) is depicted as a tough and experienced soldier who always has his way, but also is successful. His unit of ‘the dirty dozen’ are equally unorthodox, portraying filthiness, indiscipline, and typical ‘street’ behaviour common to convicts, but not expected of a military unit. The major was not concerned about this because to him this unit was not permanent anyway. Any surviving member of the unit after the mission would not be part of the US army, but would have his sentence reprieved.
‘The Dark Night’ portrays the life of a lone crusader who takes upon himself to be Gotham city’s defender against crime through night-time activities. Donned in batman gear, Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) takes on the city’s bad guys, but his night time activiteies puts him at crossroads with his girl friend Rachel (Maggie Gyllenhaal). His noble activities are quickly noticed in the city and other city dwellers also begin patrolling the streets donning their own batman costumes. They eventually work together trying to keep the real batman at bay (Nolan).
The batman’s main enemy was the joker whose main desire was to unmask batman and cause pain in the city. Donned in typical clown costumes, the joker proved to be an elusive and difficult to control criminal for both the batman and the city’s unofficial law keepers led by Lieutenant Gordon (Gary Oldman). The district attorney approved of the batman’s noble activities but failed to officially recognize him because of his own selfish interest in the batman’s former girlfriend Rachel.
Having read the dark night novel an also watched the movie version of the book, I find the book version more emotionally involving than the movie. The movie version offers more communication, particularly through imagery and theme presentation but fails to depict much about the main character whose adornment is a hindrance to key emotional communication. In day-to-day life, much of emotional communication is conveyed through facial expression. With a covered face, save for the lower part of the jaw, the batman was limited in conveying important emotional information to the viewer. Bale, however, did his best to use his voice and the visible part of his face to pass as much non-verbal communication as possible. The book offered an easier platfor...