Not perfect, but the best so far

Rating: 8/10 (25 June 2005)

Others have already touched upon its "dark, gritty" atmosphere, the wonderful performances by Bale, Oldman, Neeson, and Freeman, so I'll move on to the things that made this film far less than what it should have been... or, to put it more aptly, the sole item that made me want to vomit.
The character of Rachel Dawes (played by Katie Holmes) was perhaps the laziest attempt at including a female lead in any film in recent times. The character was a demanding, ball-busting harridan without an ounce of understanding or empathy. She was self-centered, shallow, and the very definition of a waste of screen time.
First she slaps Bruce Wayne for bringing a gun to Joe Chill's hearing, accusing him of cowardice... conveniently ignoring the fact that (a) he didn't have to show her the gun, (b) he didn't shoot Chill, and (c) this is the man who has spent the past decade-plus living in abject guilt and horror over his role in his parents' death and obviously has some issues.
Then, when she sees him in his playboy persona, he tries to tell her that this is not who he is. Her response? A very shallow "it's not who you are inside, it's what you do." She never even once considered the possibility that there was a method to his madness.
And THEN when he does act, she informs him that, in a nutshell, it isn't how SHE wanted him to act and therefore cannot be with him until he magically changes himself back into the boy he was before his parents were brutally gunned down before his very eyes.
Her "moment" at the end was straight out of "Spider-Man." A horribly-xeroxed instance of "I love you, but can't be with you" meant to make the viewing audience really FEEL Bruce Wayne's loss and isolation. Personally, I felt that Wayne should have broken out the champagne at her declaration that she wanted nothing to do with him. Lame, lame, lame.
Yes, the character of Rachel Dawes was that bad... bad enough to make an otherwise A-grade film a B-minus effort. Next time? Some advice for the writers here: Avoid imitating Spider-Man too much, okay? Mary Jane is an integral part of the Spider-Man mythos. I've never even heard of Rachel Dawes. Everything that she was in that film could have been accomplished by James Gordon or left out entirely.