Directed by:
Christopher NolanCinematography:
Wally PfisterCast:
Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Liam Neeson, Katie Holmes, Gary Oldman, Cillian Murphy, Tom Wilkinson, Rutger Hauer, Ken Watanabe, Mark Boone Junior (more)VOD (5)
Plots(1)
How does one man change the world? It's a question that haunts Bruce Wayne like the specter of his parents, gunned down before his eyes in the streets of Gotham on a night that changed his life forever. Tormented by guilt and anger, battling the demons that feed his desire for revenge and his need to honor his parents' altruistic legacy, the disillusioned industrial heir vanished from Gotham and secretly travels the world, seeking the means to fight injustice and turn fear against those who prey on the fearful. In his quest to elucidate himself in the ways of the criminal mind, Bruce is mentored by a mysterious man called Ducard in the mastery of the physical and mental disciplines that will empower him to fight the evil he has vowed to destroy. He soon finds himself the target of recruiting efforts by the League of Shadows, a powerful, subversive vigilante group headed by enigmatic leader Ra's al Ghul. Bruce returns to Gotham to find the city devoured by rampant crime and corruption. Wayne Enterprises, his family's former bastion of philanthropic business ideals, now rests in the hands of CEO Richard Earle, a man more concerned with taking the company public than serving the public good. Meanwhile, Bruce's close childhood friend Rachel Dawes, now an Assistant District Attorney, can't secure a conviction of the city's most notorious criminals because the justice system has been so deeply polluted by scum like crime boss Carmine Falcone. It doesn't help that prominent Gotham psychiatrist Dr. Jonathan Crane bolsters insanity defenses for Falcone's thugs in exchange for nefarious favors that serve his own devious agenda. With the help of his trusted butler Alfred, detective Jim Gordon--one of the few good cops on the Gotham police force--and Lucius Fox, his ally at the Wayne Enterprises' Applied Sciences division, Bruce Wayne unleashes his awe-inspiring alter-ego: Batman, a masked crusader who uses strength, intellect and an array of high tech weaponry to fight the sinister forces that threaten to destroy the city. (official distributor synopsis)
(more)Reviews (14)
This is how it should have been. They finally found someone who could rectify Tim Burton's embarrassing blunders (not to mention Joel Schumacher's botched "closure" of the series). This is the true Batman, the Dark knight beneath the mask, with a cape hanging on his back and an uncontrollable resentment in his heart. Few could have been a better Bruce Wayne than Christian Bale. The hero of Equilibrium has managed to improve his acting even further, and whenever he hesitated or became furious, a shiver ran down my spine. But the main hero here is Christopher Nolan and the team of screenwriters who managed to create precisely the atmosphere that the first installment of a comic book series needs. An exhilarating 90% and a final wink with the promise of awaiting things never before seen...
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No gothic buildings, spinning shots of newspaper headlines, jokes, positive emotions, digital eye-candy effects or a catchy soundtrack. Batman Begins is no fairy-tale fantasy. It’s Insomnia with Batman – a bleak drama about a real person set against the backdrop of the real world. What makes the film unique is the gravitas of the lead and supporting characters and their incorporation into the dramatically dense, emotionally engaging and intelligently told story. Everything in the film is physically palpable, the psychology of the characters is well developed, and the characterization of Bruce Wayne is literally a dissection of the development of his personality, a clarification of the reasons for which he became who he is. As a true character actor, Christian Bale redefines the cult of his character’s name. His Batman is not an exemplary hero. Rather, he is extraordinarily angry and enjoys the superficial vices that his wealth affords him. The bombastic cast is not without purpose and elevates the film to the level of a spectacular celebration of the comic-book genre. The action is great, though not quite as great as in Spider-Man. But does that really matter? It’s pains me not to give it five stars, but as an eternal idealist, I would have liked more plot innovation in the second half, which is rather guided by comic-book rules. The first half, however, is worthy of six stars.
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Comic book bummer, or how to bury Burton’s circus easy and fast. It’s a pity that the villains are so uncharismatic. 9/10
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Visual wizard Burton created a legend, master of the film narrative Christopher Nolan found motivation for it. That's how simple the prequel to Batman, the comic book legend that took deep roots on the film screen, works. Strange fools tried to build on the first two classic films, but the result is the fact that Nolan saves the extinguishing legend, and it must be said that he saves the faith in a big way. His sober, realistic, dark and psychological ride impacts the viewer especially in the first half of the director's well-known aces: superbly sorted narration, suggestiveness, carefully sculpted acting performances (e.g., the episodic scene in the opera is a masterpiece!). The second, much more action-packed half, in which the symbol is already created and it is time for battle, is not as dazzling, because where Burton pulled out heavy visual calibers, Nolan is a little clumsy after all (especially the action scenes suffer from too much confusion). But: Batman comes out victorious in the closing stages and his director with him. Simply because, beneath the mainstream of the remediated comic cliché of the struggle of good against evil, there is a well-regulated underflow that has depth. It's the psychology of a hero, an anatomy of fear and evil that wants to do dubious good. The tool of the lower stream is both the magnificent rhythmization of the shots and the gradation of inconspicuous tension, as well as the excellent acting performance. Christian Bale is truly the best man in the black mask, Michael Caine is truly irresistible with his dry cynicism, Liam Neeson is "just" persuasive and Gary Oldman is unrecognizable... The very awkward Katie Holmes is unfortunate, but she gets lost in the mix. I wouldn't open the question of whether Nolan had surpassed Burton at all. His Batman is different. It has a completely unique atmosphere and a completely unique style. He prefers to look in the face over wild gunfights. That's a good thing, but after all, it brings a certain and understandable inner contradiction to the film, the bearer of which is the somewhat torn direction. Among comic books, however, Batman confirms the position of a true nobleman, and Nolan confirms that "ex-independents" manage to do the impossible – to film intelligent and non-prefabricated spectacles for Hollywood. ___ after the second viewing, I am clearly itching to give it full stars. All of my objections apply, but not that much, and the film improves upon a second viewing...
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It’s not the best Nolan film, but it is the best Batman, and probably the best comic book film ever (I don’t consider Unbreakable as a film belonging to this genre) ♫ OST rating: 5/5
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Since I saw The Dark Knight first and fell deeply in love with it, I was afraid to even watch Batman Begins lest it ruin my taste. But after the first 15 minutes, I knew I was in for something special... Batman is simply a cinematic experience with all the trimmings.
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Overall, this was rather disappointing, especially considering the adoration from a significant portion of the film fans. It is primarily a very divided film, which on one hand wants to approach the theme and its hero unconventionally, but on the other hand, is burdened with genre clichés. I think the only person who has truly grasped Batman in such a polarizing theme is Tim Burton. His Batman films are stylish, properly exaggerated in a comic-book way, and above all, they don't take themselves too seriously. Nolan wants to be realistic, but at the same time his flesh-and-blood hero faces a monstrous conspiracy by an organization that destroyed ancient Rome, burned London, and for some reason feels that it will save the world by destroying a modern metropolis with all its inhabitants. This simply cannot work. Nolan's film take itself too seriously, so even though his directing skills are excellent, and he utilizes several top actors and has an adequate budget, the result is only average. Moreover, compared to The Dark Knight, this film is worse for several reasons. The Joker is a much more interesting villain than Batman's antagonist in the first installment, and Katie Holmes as an actress is hardly half as good as Maggie Gyllenhaal, lacking not only acting talent but also personal charisma. Above all, The Dark Knight works much better in its construction and logic of the characters in this fictional world. For example, a powerful underworld boss brilliantly played by Tom Wilkinson, who controls the entire city and easily buys its political and financial elites, would hardly be guarding a drug exchange with a shotgun in hand. Such logical gaps occur abundantly in Batman Begins. Although Liam Neeson is a quality A-list actor, he fails as the main villain in the cult comic book series, while Cillian Murphy is disproportionately better and represents what I would expect from a monstrous villain in a comic book film. Overall impression: 60%.
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Nolan's trilogy logically begins with Batman’s origin, which had been neglected to such an extent up until then. Today the situation is a bit different, but it was not a bad move then. Batman needed a revival and audiences needed to forget the last film of the last series, Batman & Robin. Nolan relied on good actors and a realistic style within reason. This was yet another contribution to the great family of DC films and helped bridge a decade when the style of the genre was changing fundamentally.
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This is not just any comic book adaptation, but a philosophically perfect hit with an overlay of ideas that surpasses anything we've seen in the genre so far. An intellectually visionary, formally balanced and overall captivating film about how a person can find themselves.
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A first-class comic book movie without a single deaf spot, a well-thought-out script full of interesting characters, action, suspense, humour, some insight, Michael Caine... It has basically everything.
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The thing that has always fascinated me most about the character of Batman is how controversial his film adaptations can be, or rather, how perfectly they can be screwed up. I've never been very interested in Burton's versions, I felt they were too colourful farces with many bizarre characters that looked borrowed from his other films, and I preferred to avoid Schumacher's infamous vision for good due to the horrible and mocking reviews, But Nolan? He showed here his exceptional skills and level... Some individuals, too spoiled by repeated viewings of the other two episodes (myself included), which possess a far greater dose of narrative innovation, a more noticeable aura of physical menace, and a more atmospheric Zimmer soundtrack, rightly consider Batman Begins to be the director's weakest effort, but that doesn't change the fact that as a grand opening to the most epic comic book saga since the turn of the millennium, these 140 minutes, and every second of them, work absolutely brilliantly. The first half, marked by flashbacks and time jumps, is masterfully orchestrated so that the viewer never loses track and is drawn into the plot – still built on a series of clichés uncharacteristic of Nolan – while the second half is a comic-book action romp, the epitome of Batman, with everything we imagine when we say his name. The fight scenes are a bit muddled at times, but they have an orgiastic visual charge, Zimmer is very much felt and the actors, led by the charismatic Bale, play their parts with a gusto and precision unprecedented for a blockbuster. As part of the series, 4*, but as a standalone film, it’s clear... 90%
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Eight years after the ultimate flop, Batman & Robin, comes an episode that rivals the early Burton films. Great atmosphere, cinematography and visual effects. I'm not a big fan of Christian Bale, but he's lost next to Gary Oldman and Michael Caine. You can see that the hiatus has been beneficial and the bar has been set pretty high again.
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Batman Begins is a terribly clever piece of work. For movie lovers, or people who are more into film, it muddies the waters with awesome acting aces (Tom Wilkinson is a god, Michael Caine is a god, Cillian Murphy is a god, Liam Neeson is a god, Gary Oldman is less of a god here than usual, and Rutger Hauer's godliness didn't get a chance to shine through), topped off with some great cinematography, a terrific score, and Nolan's deft hand. I mean, I have my complaints about the direction, of course, because to shoot 150 million hand-to-hand battles in a comic book movie like in a Steven Seagal movie (meaning a short montage of close-ups) is kind of yuck. But still ok. The problem is that all of the positive factors listed above are just tinsel on top of a supremely idiotic script about a battle between (absolute) good and (absolute) evil. Really all the positive characters here are dehumanized by perfection, and the negative ones (except one) have no other side whatsoever. It's not fair, and it blows the proclaimed darkness completely out of the water. That's like writing that LoTR is a noir film. It's classic American blockbuster hypocrisy, meaning there’s no lack of monorails falling on a town of people whose lives no one cares all while Batman’s coming up on police cars even though he has plenty of space next to him to see if they’ll move. And move they shall, but Batman Begins can’t dodge a mediocre rating from me. Sorry.
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The raw atmosphere of Gotham is portrayed perfectly and better than ever in Nolan's first Batman film. Thank goodness it was Christopher Nolan who took on the new Bat-saga, and he really did it in his own excellent way, showing us that Batman can be taken seriously and his fate and mission can be identified with. Though Batman Begins is mass-market entertainment, as it should be, it doesn't lack rather well-developed characters (in the old Batman you would have a hard time looking for some more complex psychological connections), the overall atmosphere is more than decent, and in the end really a bit apocalyptic :)), which is only to the benefit of the whole thing. I was a skeptic at the time, thinking that Chris Nolan couldn't top his first Batman. Everyone probably knows all too well how horribly wrong I was. P.S.: The cast is fanatically fantastic. :)
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