Page - 94 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 03/01

94 | Simon Philipp Born www.jrfm.eu 2017, 3/1, 75–104 to Mikhail Bakhtin, “were not actors playing parts on stage … but remained fools and clowns always and wherever they made their appearance”.43 With his disconcerting speech patterns, gestures and way of walking, the Joker does not seem to be of this world, but rather has stepped out of the liminal world of carnival. he repeatedly calls attention to his mouth, highlighting his scars with red lipstick, smacking his lips, grinning and holding it directly into the camera (see fig. 20). In the subversive theatricality of the carnival, the concept of the grotesque body concentrates in the gaping mouth, for Bakhtin the symbol of a “wide-open bodily abyss”.44 the Joker’s mouth gapes like a large wound in his face; by conjuring a smile onto his victim’s face with a knife, he lets that victim share his own limitless blackness. The face is the leitmotif of the film. Recalling Béla Balázs’ early film theory of the visualization of man through his physiognomy on screen,45 the faces in The Dark Knight (2008) become an important carrier of meaning (see fig. 21, r.). Looking into the painted visage of the Joker, one gets caught up in the mael- strom of his infinite malignity. In contrast, Batman’s masked face becomes a symbol of resistance and hope, an immortal ideal that inspires people to follow his lead in the fight against crime. Unfortunately, his freely interpretable face also allows people to misconceive his ideal, as militant copycats take up arms and act against his intentions. finally, there is the face of district attorney harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), whose all-American look becomes a surface for projected hopes and optimism: “Look at this face. this is the face of Gotham’s bright fu- 43 Bakhtin 1984, 8. 44 Bakhtin 1984, 317. 45 See Balázs 2011. Fig. 20: Unlike for the protagonist of the silent classic The Man Who Laughs (Paul Leni, US 1928), the reasons for the Joker’s permanent smile remain mysterious. Film still, The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan, US 2008), 00:05:28.