Right off the bat you should know that from the ages of 11 to about 15 I was a huge comic fan.
I generally shunned what I considered the more ‘kiddie’ brand of DC comics in favor of the imminently more mature Marvel universe of superheroes, but I always had a healthy respect for the Dark Knight. And when I read Frank Miller’s “Dark Knight Returns” and “Batman: Year One” I absolutely loved them.
Like most others, I lamented the direction that the last two Batman movies went in. A movie that is SO ridiculously far from reality simply loses the power to really draw you into the fiction. When I heard that the movie studios were resurrecting the Batman franchise after the successes of X-Men and Spider Man, I was more than a little wary.
But there were hopeful signs. Christopher Nolan (of Memento and Insomnia) was chosen as director. Christian Bale was chosen as Batman. But most importantly, the tone of the movies was identified early on as wanting to get back to the dark and disturbing feeling that really made the Batman character so interesting.
Batman was never supposed to be your traditional good-guy. First off, he didn’t have any powers per se. His power came from the fact that he was frighteningly obsessed with fighting bad guys. Another aspect that was largely lost in the movies was the detective angle to Batman’s character. Since he didn’t have any super powers, the writers of the original comic made up by giving Bruce Wayne a top notch investigative mind.
But the real reason Batman is so interesting is because he’s NOT the kind of guy you want to leave your kids with. He is really, really disturbed. He leads a dual life. And not just the Clark Kent journalist kind of life, but a carefully constructed facade that has to be maintained with lies and deception, and which is stressful and draining on him psychologically. This is not behavior that you would normally approve of. And Batman Begins did a decent job of capturing the cost that Bruce Wayne pays for his choice of lifestyle.
Also, Batman was always one step away from taking his crusade too far. He was originally fueled by a desire for revenge, an anger that he unleashed on bad guys but which you always felt was one punch away from being purely masochistic. And Batman Begins captured that feeling as well. It’s one of the more interesting themes of the movie actually, and the plot is carefully created so that you always believe that Batman is walking the edge of a cliff, and could very easily be pushed off.
All the classic elements of the Batman tale are included in Batman Begins. Bruce’s terrifying encounter with the bats. The murder of his parents. The obsession with punishing criminals. Alfred. Lieutenant Gordon. The Batmobile (given a pretty interesting update). The difficulties in becoming something worthy of being called a legend. All of that is in there, as well as the inclusion of many of the classic Batman foes (Ra’s Al Gul, Scarecrow, Carmine Falcone) and many of the elements of Batman: Year One.
Plus, the cast was amazing. Bale did a great job of capturing the single-mindedness but fundamentally afraid playboy who finally confronts his demons. Michael Caine made a great Alfred. Gary Oldman was on his game. As was Morgan Freeman. Tom Wilkinson does a fantastic mob boss and Cilian Murphy at least fit the role of Scarecrow physically. The weakest of the bunch, in both talent and in writing, was Katie Holmes.
There were a few rough patches with dialog that was simply too forced to be anything but a comic book bubble which someone has to blunder into syllables, and at times the action was simply too shaky or dark to be followed, but overall the themes of the movie, the visual style, and the pace of the story kept this film moving in interesting directions the whole way through. I generally don’t like superhero movies that have more than one villain, but this one had four and still managed to make each of them interesting and believable in their own way.
Before seeing it I read two reviews which gave it three or four out of five stars, but I think the movie was at least four stars. It’s not easy to fill an action movie with FOUR villains, and still have the time needed to tell the story of a man turning into a hero.
I heartily endorse this flick for all action and adventure lovers and hope that future installments will continue to capture the elements that made Batman Begins an interesting as well as exciting super-hero story.
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