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Batman The Dark Knight Textual Analysis

By Kamal Singh and George Allen

The Intro to this movie is the main villain in themovie robbing a bank. He has a team of heistmembers to complete this bank robbery.

Bank Robbery Scene

Here is a close up shot of one of thebank robbers. It is effective that a closeup is used in order for the audience tobe able to see that he has quite adangerous weapon in his hands. Alsoyou can see that they are wearing amask in order to hide their identity. Thisalso shows to the audience that theymight me working with the Joker, themain villain, because of the mask. Themask ultimately allows the audience tosee that he is mysterious and is trying tohide his face. They later find he is hidinghis face to save his identity from securitycameras, etc. The camera angle of a closeup allows all of this. The diegetic soundin this scene is the weapon firing andbreaking the window. This shows thefirst sense of danger as stereotypicallywindows smashing isn’t a normal thingand normally shows a sense of escape.The non diegetic sound in this is the fastpaced music starting and foreshadowingfast paced action to come.

This is a medium shot/establishingshot. The medium shot allows theaudience to view the fact that thereactually is two heist members and thefact they are loading the weapon witha zip wire. The establishing shotallows the audience to see the dangerthat the heist members are about toput themselves into because of thesheer fact there is a massive drop. Thisshows to the audience that whatthey’re about to do has extreme valuebecause there are at least two peoplerisking their lives in the opening threeseconds after the opening intro. Thenon diegetic fast paced musiccontinues into this scene also.

This medium/longshot shows anotherdifferent character. Later we find thatthis is the Joker, the main villain. Fromthe camera angle we can see that hehas a similar mask to the othercharacters in his hand and also hasquite a big bag which suggests that hewill also be a part of the heist to theaudience. This camera angle showsalso the background city environmentand it also shows that he is notshowing his face yet to the camera butis showing to the environment. Thisgives a ruthless streak to his nature asit shows to the audience almost as ifhe doesn’t even need the mask as heclearly doesn’t care. The fast pacedmusic also carries on to this scene.

After the shot prior, the camerazooms closely into the clownmask. This foreshadows to theaudience that the mask will bevastly significant in the comingscenes. Also it shows that he willneed to hide his identity, andbecause of the fact that theaudience at this point in the filmare currently unaware of the bankrobbery that is about to occur, itslightly hints that there could besomething similar.

This medium shot of the charactermeeting with the car is significant.The shot allows the audience tosee that a potential robbery is upand coming. This is shown fromthe car as it is very big and wellarmored. Also the windows areblacked out. These factors alongwith the fact he is wearing a maskand has a big bag suggests greatlyto the audience that there is aboutto be a heist of some sort. Alsobecause the car is quite big showsthat there is quite a big crew aswell.

This medium shot of the originalcharacters that the audience sees issignificant. It is significant becauseit shows to the audience that it willbe a big robbery because of theamount of bags they have. The fastpaced music is still on going.

This is a close up shot of thecharacters readying the zip line.This shot along with the originalshot further shows to the audiencethe danger the characters will bein, which implies there is a bigprice tag on the job they are aboutto try and complete.

This long shot of now threemembers of the heist shows to theaudience that the heist is about tobegin as they start zip lining. Thenon diegetic sound in thebackground is also quite quick atthis point which suggests to theaudience that there will be someaction soon.

This high angled birds eye viewshot shows the sheer danger therobbers have put themselves in byzip lining over this. There is adiegetic “whoosh” soundexpressed in a non diegetic wayfor the purpose of the audienceunderstanding the height at whichthey are because of the fact thatwinds are stronger higher up. Italso shows the pace they’retravelling at.

This high angle extreme long shotof the robbers further shows to theaudience that the robbers are inlots of danger because of theheight that they are at. The nondiegetic music also gets a lot moredramatic making the scene moretense to the audience.

This low angle shot shows that thecharacters are superior. This couldbe because of the hard task thatthey had to complete in order toget where they are in the scene. Italso shows that they are focusedon the job because straight fromlanding from the zip line the firstrobber is already rushing off towhere they need to be. This shotincluded with the last shot has amatch on action where it gives us abetter view of them landing.

This over the shoulder shot of therobbers is back in the car. This scene ismore significant about the audio andthe diegetic sound which is thespeech. They try working out howmany guys there are on the job andare trying to work out the cut for eachperson. The next shot is a close up ofthe passenger with the driver andback seat passenger in thebackground. Here they discuss howthey think that the Joker shouldn’t getany money because he’s not doinganything, little do they know that he issitting behind them. This conforms thestereotype of a typicalvillain/henchman as they are beingquite dumb by not knowing what ishappening. It also conflicts thestereotype as normally henchmen arequite loyal to their leading villain.

This scene along with the lastscene of the robbers in the car linksin because in the car, one says “Iknow why they call him the Joker”and then this scene starts with onesaying “so why do they call himthe Joker?” This shows to theaudience that some people wouldbe close to the heist leader, theJoker, and some would have justbeen hired for the job as they haveno idea about him.

This medium shot of the two thugsshows that the heist team have beendone a lot of planning. This is becausethey have landed from the zip line andhave came prepared with a hammer tobust off the lock and also a device inorder to hack into the system. Theaudio in this scene is diegetic speech.One says “I heard he wears make up”almost making fun of the Joker. Theother replies “make-up?” questioningwhether he’s being serious and alsojoking about it. The first then says“Yeah to scare people, you know, warpaint.” This is to show the audiencethat he is quite scary. He isstereotypical because it is thought thatnormally when people are not goodlooking they wear make up a lot inorder to make themselves look better,which conforms the stereotype of anugly looking villain.

This low angled shot of themembers exiting the car showsthey have superiority. This isbecause they possess weapons andhave a clear intent to use them asthey are covering their identities.These are all characteristics ofvillainous characters.

This medium shot of the bankmanager shows to the audiencethe reaction of him when thehenchmen enter the bank and startshooting to start the heist andscare the people in the bank. Inreal time the bank manager islooking around and is a bitshocked that it’s happening andthere is also a security guard in theleft third of the screen to show thatthe bank is moderately protected.

This lower angled shot of the heistersshows that the henchmen are easilyable to deal with the security guardand disarm him with ease. As thecamera follows the three members ofthe team, it shows that each one playsa different role, one disarms theguard, one runs forward to control thecivilians and one is carrying a bag,more than likely used to hold themoney they expect to steal. Thisshows they are professional at whatthey do, not just an amateur team ofbank robbers, making them seem likemore of a threat to the audience. Thereverse shot shows the membersholding their weapons and pointingthem towards civilians. This is meantto build up the action in the film andis supposed to make the audience feelthat Batman is going to stereotypically‘come to the rescue’.

This medium-long shot shows tothe audience the amount of fear inthe civilians as even though thatthe three heisters are occupied,they are very scared to try andapprehend the robbers eventhough the civilians massivelyoutnumber the robbers. The shotalso shows the bank teller gettingdragged over the desk in order toinvoke fear into the civilians. Thenon diegetic music allegros andcrescendos. This makes the scene abit more tense and builds upaction to come.

In the first close-up shot it showsthat the henchmen have planned afair bit because they have broughta device in order to cancel the“silent alarm”. The next shotshows the guy behind himreaching for his pocket almost likehe’s going to kill the first manbecause the job he needed to do isdone. This shows to the audiencethat the henchmen aren’t very wellacquainted because they can killeach other with ease.

This close up of the bag shows thatone of the henchmen has a bag fullof grenades. This shows to theaudience that the villains areplanning for a heist that couldhave more bloodshed than needed(preparing for the worst casescenario).

Both of these shots show to theaudience that the villains arecreating havoc and apprehendingthe civilians in a quite a violentway. This is done by some of themgetting beaten by the henchmenand some of them being forced tohold a smoke grenade that will gooff if they let go.

This medium shot of both of thevillains, is significant as this shotshows one of them shooting theother in order to kill off deadweight, earning more of a cut. Theperson that dies says that someoneis “trying to call 911” and the otherreplies “will it be a problem” andthe first then responds “no” andthen gets shot. This shows to theaudience that the shooter is quiteruthless and was using the otherman.