Very Good, But Has Flaws

Rating: 7/10 (26 June 2005)

I'm shocked that none of the many reviewers here seemed to dislike anything about "Batman Begins." Yes, it had a lot of good qualities; Chrisitian Bale was wonderful (especially as Bruce Wayne), the legend was told well, Michael Caine and Gary Oldman turned in their usual solid performances, Wayne Manor looked great, and in fact all the scenes with Bruce Wayne rang true. However, there were also some negatives. First, Katie Holmes was ridiculous. No way could anyone believe she was a D.A. In fact, her character was unnecessary. Morgan Freeman played the same character he always plays, and was totally unconvincing as an outcast research scientist/inventor. The origin of the Batmobile here was very disappointing. A refurbished tank? Come on! The very, very long scene of this Batmobile on top of the roof, and then being chased on the highway, took up way too much time and left me bored. The fight scenes tried so hard to be intense (and the camera moved so fast) that the viewer couldn't even catch what was going on much of the time. I also thought the Scarecrow was a little lame. All in all, it was a pretty good film, but hardly the classic that most people seem to think it was.