What sets Batman Begins apart is Christopher Nolan's unilateral disposal of the expected cartoonishness in favor of elemental grit. When Batman takes a hit, he hurts. When he wakes up after a night of Batmanning, he's bruised and exhausted. When he leaps from rooftop to rooftop, he crashes down on his chest; you hear the crunch, you hear him groan. This is Batman in the real dirt of the earth, Batman in the real flames of the fire, Batman in the real chaos of the air, Batman in the real peril of the water. Nolan ingeniously reinforces his concept of Bruce Wayne's journey from something merely human into something elemental with incredibly palpable visuals. Where the earlier movies mostly aimed to look like the comic books and/or the TV show, tossing off joke after joke until the promising idea of "The Dark Knight" was once again reduced to out-and-out parody, Batman Begins has the audacity to look real. For the first time, it's a Batman movie you come away from feeling about as physically beat-up as Batman himself. And who doesn't enjoy the morning-after glow of a great bruise every now and again? Christian Bale couldn't be better as Bruce Wayne/Batman—he's got the right body for it, certainly, but also the depth of skill to actually make the character's transition seem plausible and concrete. You literally see him become Batman, and the persona of Bruce Wayne become the artifice. It helps that the storyline takes one of the best Batman tales (that is, the origin story) and plays it out to perfection, managing the feat (heretofore NEVER performed) of staying true to the comics while also hitting all the needed notes for a summer blockbuster. I can think of few big summer movies that come across so much like art. Begins wisely utilizes a pair of lesser-known but actually more significant (in the comics, anyway) villains than the usual gang of suspects: Ra's Al Ghul (Liam Neeson, successfully sword-fighting without evoking Qui-Gon) and the Scarecrow (Cillian Murphy, looking remarkably shorter than in 28 Days Later). I was particularly impressed with the treatment of the Scarecrow, who, in the comics, more often than not comes off as just silly. Nolan managed to create a Scarecrow that fully represents the character in all of its possible menace and ultimate failure. The casting all around is a real triumph. Michael Caine as Alfred? Hell yeah! Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox? (Slaps head.) Of fucking course! The one that really tripped my trigger was Gary Oldman as Jim Gordon—he's so completely spot-on that I didn't even know it was Gary Oldman until after the movie, when my ladyfriend (well, she hasn't had the operation yet, technically) pointed it out. Tom Wilkinson is amazing as a mob boss, once again proving that British actors are the best American actors. And I didn't even mention Rutger Hauer! Well, now I have. You can't go wrong with Rutger Hauer! At least according to Hauer's campaign song for his failed Dutch presidential run back in '90. Where the film really succeeds is in the development of the Batman mythology—this is the first superhero movie that really evinces the potential for comic-book characters to reflect the same universality, gravity, and real human meaning as the characters in classical mythology. This is something comic readers have been wanting to believe for decades, only to be shrugged off by anyone with a prejudice toward "real literature." Finally, Batman can be considered as culturally and philosophically significant as, um, Sisyphus? Well, at any rate, I expect to feel less embarrassed about making Batman analogies at parties in hopes of "getting some." The film's only significant flaws are the inclusion of the obligatory love interest, which the story absolutely does not need, and the casting of Katie Holmes in the role. Now, I don't care what Katie Holmes does in the privacy of her bedroom (contractually located five floors below, and two wings down, from Tom Cruise's), but the issue is that she's saddled with some dialogue that an actor of her non-caliber just can't pull off. The heavy-handed overdramatics might have been appropriate for bitching out Pacey, but not for bitching out Batman. Personally, I think she needs another smackdown from Mrs. Tingle. It's not typical for me to crave a sequel, but in this case, I want ten sequels. I want a whole new franchise of Batman movies I love, instead of ones that mostly piss me off. The opportunity is ripe for a Batman series that is as serious and tangible as the earlier films were smarmy and unreal. Over time, the previous Batman blockbusters will recede to the camp stature of the old Batman: The Movie (or in the case of Batman & Robin, the stature of the Filipino Batman movie); they'll be disowned and molested as the bastard stepchildren they are. Now, Mr. Nolan—bring on the Joker, motherfucker, and quick-like!
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