It's good? It's good!

Rating: 10/10 (18 June 2005)

This is a film. Not a movie, but a film.
I never cared about Batman, and, to be frank, after a decent first chapter, the movies all sucked. But, when you get the guy who wrote and directed Memento -- that artsy cult classic Memento -- to direct and co-write ANY movie, you can expect solid results.
The results here are staggering.
I can understand your skepticism. It is, after all, a Batman movie, but it almost seems designed to appeal more to movie fans than Batman fans. It never adopts that "superhero/comic book" movie feel. Instead, Christopher Nolan crafts a sincerely dark and disturbing movie. Batman himself is scary, guys. Just one encounter with him would scare me out of a life of crime. The portrayal of the villains' plot: downright chilling, I kid you not. If I saw this movie as a ten-year-old, I wouldn't be able to sleep that night. Heck, I may not as a 21-year-old. Using his trademark style of storytelling, Nolan weaves an ongoing flashback into the present timeline, at least in the movie's early stages, and turns a story about a comic book character into a deep, confounding, "question-stacking" thriller -- one where the mounting list of questions leaves your mind in a state of numb befuddlement until, in a beautiful climax, it all suddenly makes sense. The first five minutes of the movie will hand you your first such quandary: what the heck is Bruce Wayne doing in the Himalayas? Intrigued yet? And here's the thing: they make it all believable. They have a rational explanation for everything -- from what makes a billionaire such a good fighter to where Batman got all his "wonderful toys" -- and, believe me, they explain EVERYTHING. The ending satisfies all your demands, which is a breath of fresh air for a superhero movie.
Then again, you're not really watching a super hero movie. You're watching a story about a MAN named Bruce Wayne, and that all-too-frequently overlooked idea finally hits home here.
Near the closing stages of the movie, I began laughing to myself, stomping my feet in giddy amusement, and resisting urge to jump out of my seat, stretch my arms to the ceiling, and exclaim, "THEY GOT IT RIGHT! THEY FINALLY GOT IT RIGHT!" This one's an instant classic. People will still be talking about it thirty years from now.
Still skeptical? So was I. Go see it and prove me wrong.