Product: Batman Begins (Two-Disc Deluxe Edition) (2005)
Rating: 5.0
Best Comic Book Movie Yet
Movies usually either meet, go below, or totally exceed your expectations. <em>Batman Begins</em> was more masterful than I could've hoped and as far as comic book movies go it blows <em>X2</em> and <em>Spider-man 2</em> totally out of the water. Not only that, but it's a great movie even without being in the comic book genre. This movie has nothing to do whatsoever with the first four Batman incarnations and is not really a prequel. It's a starting Batman movie the way it was meant to be done. The acting was completely and utterly spot-on. I can't imagine if Bruce Wayne would've been so perfect without Christian Bale and Michael Caine really puts Michael Gough to shame as Alfred. Hopefully, more people will show love for Gary Oldman after him aptly portraying a pre-Comissioner Gordon. Cillian Murphy is finally showing the mainstream public, who likely hadn't heard of him, how good he really is in his role as Scarecrow and it just felt right. Katie Holmes and Morgan Freeman did very well reinventing their characters and I just love how they both interacted with Bruce Wayne. I'm not going to talk about Liam Neeson and Ken Wantanabe to avoid spoilers, but just know that they were no different from the rest.I still have more to say though so indulge me for another paragraph. Acting is all well and good, but what is it that makes this movie so special? The careful attention poured onto every shot. When you can't tell what's cg and what's real, you know you have a winner. You may think that the bats aren't real, but you'd be surprised which scenes actually had live bats. Part of this grueling attention comes from the dialogue though, which I just fell in love with. Not a single line was actually corny or out of place, but rather it got to its point without having to dumb things down at all. It all seemed pretty intricate, and I liked how key lines (especially those relating to big themes) came back. <em>Batman Returns</em> came on last night and comparing this script to that one is like comparing night to day. David Goyer really outdid himself and so did Christopher Nolan. For the latter to top <em>Memento</em> is no small feat, and yet he managed to do it right here. Not only was his hand in the script good but also his sense of art direction and grabbing the essence of Batman. The whole movie seems designed for people my age and older because of how dark it is. Batman isn't scary when he goes around in a batsuit like in those old four movies, but he may strike fear in you a couple of times when he does what he does this time around! It's hard for me to scrape up anything I didn't like besides one thing I don't really want to spoil (very minor anyway) and how fast the hand-to-hand combat was. I think the latter was on purpose, but I just would've preferred to see them go a little slower. Of course, it makes sense that in real life the people fighting wouldn't slow down and what this movie did best was putting you in a world where everything happening seemed possible, not gimmicky. I loved the subtle explanations of things and the batmobile may not look as sleek as before but it's definitely more useful.The video and sound quality are pretty good, though I feel that the transfer could've been a little brighter though I was watching the movie on an older television model. The special features are accessed via a comic book, which is kind of neat, but I'd rather just have it all straightforward rather than hunt for them (though if you navigate to the last page of it you can do this also). The features I've watched so far are really good and none are too long so you can easily watch them all in short bursts. They range from his training to the history of the movie's development to the costume design and down to the creation of Gotham City. Plus, you learn a lot of nifty things like how much fighting Christian Bale actually had to learn and that the scenes in the mountains were filmed on location. If you enjoyed the movie I feel that this set is pretty worthwhile. Even if they were to release a super duper edition, this is really all you need to thoroughly enjoy the film. The only thing that's missing is a commentary track, but I've heard that Nolan's commentary on <em>Memento</em> sucks anyway so it's no big deal.