In the 14 years since its release, The Dark Knight has become a modern classic and frankly I don't get why.

Yes, it has an all-star cast, yes, it is well-shot, and yes, it does treat Batman with a lot of realism, but outside of that it's badly written and in the end it just feels empty.

That being said... there's no denying that Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker is one for the ages. It's incredible. If you had told me back in the day that the pretty boy from A Knight's Tale would give an Oscar-worthy performance as a comic book villain, I wouldn't have believed it. But I certainly believe it now. This movie is worth seeing once just to watch Heath Ledger work. It's a tour-de-force that you very rarely see.

So, yeah. For me, The Dark Knight is a mediocre movie built around one shining diamond of a performance. Make of that what you will.