Batman Begins... ...to rule!!!!

The stars have re-aligned. The balance of nature has been restored. Chris and I are once again (after the Star Wars Episode III fluke) back to agreeing on films.

Batman Begins is quite simply the best Batman ever put to film. Better than campy 60's Batman--which I grew up on and have a soft spot for. Better than Joel "Codpiece" Schumacher's Batman. Better than Burton's. Heck, it's better than any Batman film I've dreamt of. It rules exactly that much! And here's the reason: Batman is the main character. Wow, sounds like a novel concept, eh? Let the main character be the main character. Don't let the Joker be the main character. Don't let the Riddler and Two Face be the main character. Don't let the nipples be the main character. Let it be Batman.

You've read it before, and you will again, but this film's biggest triumph is the character development of Batman/Bruce Wayne. We see his training that allows him to be quick, quiet, and ferocious. We see his reasoning for getting said training, and his reasoning for deciding to fight crime in Gotham. We see surprisingly smooth and logical reasons for each of his gadgets (including the suit, the car, the belt, the grapling hook, etc.). And it all works. It all makes sense.

Why has no one ever tried to give us this textured, layered Batman before? Why have we never seen the explanation for his gadgets before? Was it so easy to simply say, "He's a millionaire, and that's how he gets his cave and his toys." Heck, Burton even put in a throwaway joke for the Joker about the origin of the tools Batman uses.

But this is what such a backstory and reasoning does: it humanizes the character. It connects him to the audience. In short, it makes him more real.

Now, I'll let the review Chris wrote stand as the objective, intelligent one (as we've come to expect from him) and allow mine to de-evolve rapidly into yet another bulleted list of things I liked (frothed at the mouth over) and things I didn't. Here it is, relatively spoiler-free (which means nothing a trailer or two wouldn't have shown you):

LIKED, LOVED, & ADORED:

- The car. Man, oh man, the car. Again, I'm far from the first to say this, but....why did we ever think a super-fast sports car was what Batman needed? This monster is what he needs. It drives on and jumps to the roofs of buildings for Pete's sake!! (one of my favorite lines is a police officer trying, over the radio, to convince his superior that the Batmobile is not on any road.)

-The backstory. Batman doesn't show up in costume for about an hour or so, and that first hour was some of my favorite stuff. Explanation is not bad, people...it's good. Batman's cool and all, but knowing why he does what he does and how....well, it takes cool and turns it into jaw-droppingly awesome!!

-Gary Oldman. As Chris said, the most normal he's ever been. And I really enjoyed it.

-Freaking Michael Caine. Jeez. I thought I loved the Alfred from the last four films--and, indeed, that guy was good--but he's no Michael Caine. Caine adds layers of wit and compassion and fatherly love that I never saw in Alfred.

-The Scarecrow's toxin. Again, not to sound like a broken-repeating-Chris record here...but the scenes of people hallucinating on the toxin are scarier than any horror movie I've seen in years. Way scarier, for instance, than a faceless girl with black hair crawling out of a TV. Great effect when we get shots from what I call The Toxin Cam. It will wig you out a little.

-The way Batman moves around his cave, particularly in the scene with the hurried injection of an antidote to a toxin-laced victim. He doesn't fly, really. Nor jump. He sort of glides around. Just awesome.

-Gordon's reactions while driving a special car. Nothing terribly original, but still funny.

-The Bat signal, and the first time we see it. Good stuff.

-The flying bats, and the way they're used as a transition to a new scene.

-Villians as secondary characters. I think the villians are even smaller players here than they are in the Spiderman series, and that works. Future movies can give some more screen time to the villians. This movie is about Batman. And it never loses that focus by going off on villian-monologue rants.

-There is a shot, after Batman finally dons the costume and busts up a drug delivery at the docks, where we swoop through the cityscape and finally circle around Batman standing at the top of a skyscraper....and that shot nearly made me vomit with love. It was maybe the coolest thing about the movie for me...they just nailed that shot.

-The cape is made of a military experimental fabric that....well, I don't want to ruin it...but the cape is my favorite gadget. Loved the explanation they gave it and how it ties in to the tricks we've seen Batman doing for generations.

- Did I mention the car? Yeah, I did. But no harm mentioning it again. It rules.

- The big finale was cool. I love the monorail train that Gotham has, and how it ties into the action.

- The humor. Like Spiderman, there are several moments of good humor in this film, laugh-moments, that aren't jokey lines. The humor comes from character.

- "Come on Bruce, we have more hotels for you to buy!" I love the playboy image Bruce conjurs up for his public life. I like how this movie presents Batman as his true identity and Bruce Wayne as the act. That's a nice twist, and probably much more realistic. I think, having the backstory as we do in this film, that he would feel much more comfortable as Batman than as Bruce.

-I know he only has limited screen time, but Linus Roache as Bruce's dad was freaking great.

DIDN'T LIKE:

-So some of the fighting is too close up to tell what's going on. And while I'm tired of that trend....at least this movie has an excuse. I mean, this is under the list of things I didn't like, but I actually didn't mind it nearly as much as I thought I would. It sort of works in a way where I can see Nolan saying, "I wanted the viewer to feel the fury and panic and confusion of the thugs Batman is taking down." And I get that. Batman is a ninja basically, and his foes never know where he is or where he'll strike next, and the camera work in the fights (while a tired trend) actually contributes to that. Ultimately Batman's coolness in this film doesn't come from specific punch or kick moves in battle, but from his stealth and the way he strikes fear into the hearts of the bad guys.

-Katie Holmes. She wasn't awful...heck, she wasn't even bad. But she wasn't good either, and nearly everyone else in this movie is good. I get the character and how she fits into the story, but a host of other actresses could have given us more with it than she does. She's just sort of average. She looks good, sure. But her acting is just okay. Wish they'd have cast someone else.

-Music. Again, it's not bad music...it works. But where's the theme, guys? The Batman theme! Not the one from Burton's movies, or any previous one for that matter. I'm glad they wrote entirely new music....but I want to remember it. There has to be some theme that we can immediately identify with Batman (like the Burton film, or like the Spiderman films have). I missed that. Didn't make me dislike the movie, and the music does a fine job underscoring the highs and lows of the film. But I was hoping for something instantly classic. Maybe I'll pick up on something in a second or third viewing, but this first viewing didn't give me that.

- That's about it. Seriously. No major complaints. It's a pretty good sign when the worst things you can list about a movie are things that were average or "just okay."

So there you have it. I'd say this movie puts the franchise on track to keep up with the Spiderman and X-men franchises as far as "indie directors telling good stories and making superhero movies good again." I loved it. My roommate loved it. We both grew up on Batman. But my girlfriend and her sister loved it too, and they definitely did not grow up on Batman. Nor are they huge Superhero fans. They went because of some of the actors involved that they liked from other films. An hour in, my girl turns to me and says, "I'm absolutely loving this movie." And I thought to myself...."Yeah, me too." This movie should be huge. You honestly don't have to love Batman--or even superheroes--to love this film. It's that grounded in character and story. I was beyond impressed. Bottom line is this....this movie kicks ass...period. Man, Hollywood, can we say now that we've finally learned that treating the characters with respect is the best way to do these films? I love the Burton Batman, don't get me wrong....it was the first cool filmed Batman I ever saw....but after seeing this new film, it's hard for me to say that Burton took his characters seriously. Oh wait, Hollywood, you just hired Brett Ratner for X-Men 3. I guess we have a ways to go before this lesson is learned completely. At least Batman Begins helps us take another giant leap in that direction.

I'm sure I'll think of things later I'll wish I'd have remembered to put in the review...but this is it for now. Go see it. You won't regret it.