Warner Bros.

Ledger's joker is no joke. He's a chaos-seeking human missle and the best bad guy in film history.

The Dark Knight is an intense, brilliant film but it's also one of the best films I have seen in 10 years, and easily the best of its kind.

Christian Bale returns as the serious-minded caped crusasder fighting a world class villian, an all-consuming super joker, played Oscar-caliber by the late Heath Ledger.

Ledger's joker is no joke. He's a chaos-seeking human missle and the best bad guy in film history.

At times, The Dark Knight enters the cinematic stratosphere as a thinking man's comic book hero trying to save the world and in the process, feeling bad about the mind set it takes to combat pure evil.

The Dark Knight is written and directed to perfection by Christopher Nolan. Look at this supporting cast - Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Gary Oldman - all serving a technically dazzling film that exists on a higher level.

Be careful, The Dark Knight is rated PG-13 but feels like an R, and runs two and a half hours.

Every frame is a gut-wrencher, a morality tale about a bad guy with no morals and a good guy that appears to be over his head. This is why I go to the movies.

E-mail gcogill@wfaa.com.