Christopher Nolan’s 2008 film “The Dark Knight” is based on DC superhero Batman and his fierce rivalry with DC supervillain Joker. Christopher Nolan uses a lot of exquisite and exceptional film techniques to set the film apart from other superhero films and really does this well. I will be investigating and writing about a scene known as “The Joker’s social experiment” and will talk about the film techniques used in this scene. Throughout the scene Christopher Nolan tries to build suspense by using the film techniques of lighting, dialogue, and costumes. These three points will be covered in my essay.

Dialogue is used in the scene to build suspense within the audience but also to drill fear into the characters. The scene starts with the joker speaking to both boats over the PA system. Before you focus on the words he says you immediately get the impression that he is greater than everyone else in the boats. This is a technique that builds a lot of suspense because of certain parts from the scene. In the part where the big scary prisoner goes up to the warden and asks for the detonator he says “give it here and I’ll do what your should have done 10 minutes ago”. This is telling the audience that he is gonna blow the other boat up because that is what everyone expects of him since he is a big scary prisoner. Instead the prisoner throws the detonator out the window. This really builds suspense because it catches the audience by surprise so they are on edge for the rest of the scene because they know they cannot guess what is gonna happen next. This is really good of Christopher Nlan because he has used the technique of dialogue to really captivate the audience and build suspense.

Lighting is a film technique that if used correctly can really help build suspense. This is something Christopher Nolan has done greatly in the Dark Night. In the scene where the joker is hanging upside down talking to Batman he is constantly swaying in between light and dark. Cristopher Nolan breaks the common convention of keeping bad guys in the dark and the good guys in the light but with the Joker he is swaying in between both. This shows that the Joker is unpredictable and not your average villain but instead a psychopath. This relates back to the directors purpose to create suspense within the scene because it is reinforcing that the Joker is not like anyone else and everything is all a big joker for him which puts the audience on edge because they don’t know what will happen next. During this scene the Joker says “I am an agent of chaos”, this again reinforces the idea that all he wants is anarchy and chaos and will stop at nothing to get them. In the scene with the two boats there is very basic lighting. At the start of the scene the light flickers on and off which is a basic way of warning the audience that something isn’t normal, this alone will build suspense because the audience will begin to question what is happening and will be on the edge of their seats waiting ot something to happen. For the rest of this scene the boats are very well lit up which symbolises that everyone on them are innocent of the jokers plans are simply just pawns in a wild scheme.

The Costumes in the film are something that have really helped director Nolan get the director’s purpose of ‘trying to build suspense’ across to the audience. He has done this through many different costumes. The Joker is a character build off of Anarchy and chaos so to go with his persoan Nolan had him wear a very crazy outfit. In the scene the joker is wearing a very well tailored green and purple suit with a very long trench coat. This builds suspense because usually the bad guys wear rough clothes but for the joker he is dressed very nicely so it shows he is different to your usual bad guy. Another thing that shows he is different is the colours of the suit. Green and purple don’t usually go together very well so buy pairing them together it shows us that the Joker is a very chaotic character. As well as this in the scene where the Joker fights with batman he is hanging upside down at the end. Whilst he is hanging upside down his trench coat falls with gravity and looks like a bats wings. This is a metaphor for the Batman and Jokers rivalry as it is almost saying that the Joker is like batman because he looks like bat. Other costumes from the scene is the prisoners, guards and civilians. On the prison boat all the prisoners are dressed in bright orange jumpsuits. This shows us that they are prisoners and are different from normal people as no normal person wears that. In the civilian boat everyone is wearing very dull and normal clothes with very little colour. This is to really show the audience that they are different from the prisoners. This also tells us that they are normal boring civilians with no personality because they just wear very dull colours. By doing all this with costumes Nolan has really put suspense within the scene.

In conclusion I believe that by using the techniques I have talked about above Christopher Nolan has really build suspense throughout the scene. This is a great use of the techniques available to him and it just shows that he is such a good director.

Marcus Hetherington