This one is really worth your time and ticket money

Rating: 10/10 (16 June 2005)

I liked the world Tim Burton created for his Batman movies pretty well. Let's face it, for a real fan of the books, the TV series and one movie were a real disaster. Burton, at least, wasn't making a camp spoof. I was less impressed with the Joel Schumacher take on the Caped Crusader, however and really didn't think the franchise was going in the right direction. They really hadn't found the right combination of Bruce Wayne and Batman in a single actor, either.
I was eager to see Batman Begins, partly because I liked Momento and the remake of Insomnia, the two films I'd seen by the director, Christopher Nolan. I also had respect for Bale's work in previous films And I'm always up for a new take on Batman, my favorite of the classic-era superheroes. I liked him precisely because he wasn't super, just a man with an obsessive need to fight crime and the physical skill and money to do it in style.
This movie delivers. It has more the feel of the Dark Knight and Year One books rather than the classic ones, and it exists in the real world, or at least in a world that could easilly be real. I may see it again and it will be a keeper on DVD when it comes out.
I'd read some criticism of some of the casting and performances. I didn't see it. Some have quibbled that Katie Holmes looks too young to be a crusading ADA. Well, she's twenty-five, just like many of the bright young attorneys in a big DA's office. I believed her. And Tom Wilkinson holds his American accent well and I could see him as a big-city mob boss of the current era, polished but still brutal.
As for casting Christian Bale in the title role, he is Bruce Wayne and Batman and you can see the transition as he moves from one to the other. Not everyone can act in the Bat suit. Bale can and he carries it off very well. This Batman is the right mix and I hope he's signed on for more in this series. And there should be one.
The long and the short, if you love a gritty Batman, go see it. If you haven't liked the previous WB Bat movies, this will change your mind. It isn't a kid's movie -- some of it is pretty intense -- and if you think it bears any resemblance to the animated Batman stuff on TV, think again. There were a couple of kids in the theatre when we saw it and they looked scared.
Highly recommended. A Ten with extra credit.