Its not Tim Burton...But it's still Good

Rating: 8/10 (15 June 2005)

*SPOILERS AHEAD* Right just got back from a midnight screening of Batman Begins here in NY So quick info.
BB is the restart of the Batman series, it covers the beginning of Batman and leads in to his first battle involving the scarecrow and Raj Ha gul. (sp) The Review: Batman Begins had a lot to fix, after the dreadful batman and robin it looked as if the batman series was dead. When this film was announced there was first dismay as it could have gone worse, but then there came a shining light of hope. Christopher Nolan was signed up to direct. People everywhere sighed in relief, as after the powerful Momento and Insomnia, It was believed Nolan could do Batman...Sadly....He can and he cant.
The Good: David S Goyer should get a lot of credit for the story, and then him and Christopher Nolan should get kicked in the balls for the screenplay (more later) the plot develops at a brilliant pace, there is no beginning, middle and end, instead the film gallops along in a frantic pace building and building up to the climax we all know to come. Batman does make a physical appearance in the film until well into the plot and the focus on Bruce Wayne is refreshing from the previous films as they focused more on the villains. Christian Bale and his fellow cast carry the film very well and all play their parts well, Gary Oldman and Morgan Freeman are both excellent.
BUT Liam Neeson spoiler: when revealed to be Raj A Ghul steals the show completely from his fellow cast members as he plays his role brilliantly combining element of the role he knows so well (mentoras in episode 1 and kingdom of heaven) with a more demanding air then his previous films.
Visually the suit, Gotham and the rest of the sets are brilliantly put together and do create an excellent atmosphere.
THE BAD I said the story was great, developing almost every character in the film, but whichever one it was Nolan or Goyer, should be punched for overstating. THe film has some great visual moments creating the message the film wishes to portray visually...but then it is ruined when one of the character's has to state the obvious and explain the message. Only Liam Neeson doesn't suffer from this as he is able to pass this overstatement with a mixed sense of arrogance and wisdom. But the rest of the cast, esp Katie Holmes, the actor playing the father and Bale all suffer from these very flat and very fake lines that are there to ensure everyone 'gets the message' Nolan is a great director, and it must be understood completely that this has no link whatsoever to the original batman films. BUT FOR THE LOVE OF GOD MAN! AT LEAST NOTE WHAT WAS GOOD IN THOSE FILMS, Nolan wanted to present BAtman as both an image and a object of fear.
Fear: Fear works well with the unknown, with building tension etc. It does not work well when the shots and editing move so fast that no one see's what's happening. The fight scenes (except for 2) are all a big blurry mess, you cant make anything out and you don't get excited just confused.
IMAGE: Yes the thundering pace towards the revelation of batman is great...BUT ONCE YOU REACH THERE PULL THE F*CKING BREAKS! seriously, the film continues at a rapid pace and images like the revealing of scarecrow or Batman's first victory are almost blink and you miss them. the plot is so focused on fear as a image that the film itself forgets to focus on a image and instead swamps you in blink and you miss it shots that fail to stick to the viewer.Tim Burton had the right idea with the slow still shots of key characters, its like reading a bio of a character with just one image and has worked so well with the joker and the penguin.
I'll let this out quickly...katie holmes sucked, but we knew that already so we'll consider this a nonplus.
Tim Burton films really developed their villains, sadly spoiler: scarecrow is very much a underused side attraction who doesn't fit the fear obsessed madman of the comics..more of a Petty thug and simply drops out of the film they don't get as much attention here, but the plot allows the viewer to see rah ja gul's development in Bruce Wayne.
So your guessing i hated the film? Nope...i really enjoyed it, i'm just a harsh critic. Understand clearly that this is a new Batman, enjoy the plot because it is quite good for a comic book film, the duologue will annoy at times spoiler: father's death cringe but its not as bad as episode 3 and if your not expecting matrix style fight scenes then you should be happy with the end result.
I was 8/10 - 1: Annoying overstating of film's message - 1: Really poor fight scenes, and no lasting imagery.