Directed by:
Matt ReevesCinematography:
Greig FraserComposer:
Michael GiacchinoCast:
Robert Pattinson, Zoë Kravitz, Jeffrey Wright, Colin Farrell, Paul Dano, John Turturro, Andy Serkis, Peter Sarsgaard, Barry Keoghan, Jayme Lawson (more)VOD (5)
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Two years of stalking the streets as the Batman (Robert Pattinson), striking fear into the hearts of criminals, has led Bruce Wayne deep into the shadows of Gotham City. With only a few trusted allies — Alfred Pennyworth (Andy Serkis), Lt. James Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) — amongst the city’s corrupt network of officials and high-profile figures, the lone vigilante has established himself as the sole embodiment of vengeance amongst his fellow citizens. When a killer targets Gotham’s elite with a series of sadistic machinations, a trail of cryptic clues sends the World’s Greatest Detective on an investigation into the underworld, where he encounters such characters as Selina Kyle/aka Catwoman (Zoë Kravitz), Oswald Cobblepot/aka the Penguin (Colin Farrell), Carmine Falcone (John Turturro), and Edward Nashton/aka the Riddler (Paul Dano). As the evidence begins to lead closer to home and the scale of the perpetrator’s plans becomes clear, Batman must forge new relationships, unmask the culprit, and bring justice to the abuse of power and corruption that has long plagued Gotham City. (Warner Bros. US)
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Reviews (17)
A truly dark take on Batman — though let’s be honest, anything else wouldn’t feel right for the character. This version, however, has a slightly different kind of darkness compared to Christopher Nolan’s. It leans more into the comic book vibe, which actually works in its favor. The runtime feels appropriate for the story, and I appreciated that the filmmakers didn’t blatantly reveal the villain from the start, which made the surprise much more effective for me. Even Robert Pattinson impressed me; though he played the role with his usual restraint in terms of emotion, I didn’t expect him to be such a force. The action, especially the car chases, were top-notch — almost reminiscent of Mad Max, which is a big plus. I think what kept me from giving it five stars was the lack of a standout moment in the script. The story was more straightforward and simpler than I anticipated. Still, as a dark detective tale set in an alternate New York, it works really well.
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It is not worth measuring how The Vengeance stands against Tim Burton's or Christopher Nolan's concepts; this was primarily about defending Matt Reeves' perspective on Batman's existence. And even though there are many things that don't sit well with me, the living Gotham still immediately gets under my skin and the main character with it. Robert Pattinson doesn't fail for a second, even though this fragile psychological approach could have crumbled in his hands. Bruce Wayne walks in the rain with strands of hair falling on his face and as Batman writes crushing cries like "I am the twilight" in his diary. And yet he never passes into absurdity, he never crosses that emo boundary in such a way that I couldn't take his painfully personal quest seriously in the next scene. Which is crucial because he's literally investigating throughout the entire movie. The crime aspect is so paramount in the film that I even wondered if the comic book stylization was just an obstacle to the creators, distracting them from their obvious desire to make a Fincher-esque movie of their own. Unfortunately, the references to Se7en are so overwhelming that they disturb me and with them the result loses its own uniqueness. The second incomprehensible aspect is the length, which is unnecessary; if they had shortened it, there would have been fewer scenes of watching the dirty and shady city in the background and monologues or dialogues about the dirty city infested with shady individuals. On the other hand, thanks to this, the scale of storytelling never diminishes, as it thoroughly builds a foundation for escalating key scenes (the funeral). In the end, my feelings are mixed, just as they are in the movie, but because they all work, I support the idea that this confident approach should continue and fear not to venture into Batman's enemies and directions. The complete absence of mysticism, or at least caution with supernatural and science fiction elements, could quickly lead to predictability in future sequels.
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This is an intimate, depressing, gothic noir emo that at times looks like a nightmare of a light-headed sociopath, on the one hand lonely, on the other thrown into a claustrophobic space where law and crime embrace each other so tightly that it is impossible to distinguish them. A cleverly adapted origin story and a tale of a man consumed by revenge are superimposed on an almost Fincher-esque thriller. It's slow, sometimes driven to maximum effect, backed by the famous Riddler... three hours doesn't seem like a problem to me, because Reeves does it with precision, heavy-handedly, and unlike Snyder, it's not a masquerade at the bottom of dead mannequins, but still a human drama - even if simplified compared to Nolan. Pattinson fits the role perfectly, but the main asset is Paul Dano as the king of the incels. Reeves has delivered his own similarly willful project like Villeneuve recently did. For me, it's a hundred times better than the comically depressing Joker charade and several levels above the DC duds of the last decade. Finally the darkness breathes, the scars don't heal and the rats gnaw at the flesh.
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A smoothie made of Se7en and Zodiac, filmed as a PG-13, with no blood and explicit dialog. To cap this, we have Batman playing the role of chief investigator of a series of unexpectedly personal murders. Comic-book poeticism vies with a realistic approach and, despite several small hiccups caused by the not completely perfect script, most of the time Reeves successfully manages to balance them both. From time to time, the slow and atmospheric story is interrupted by a skillfully sound-engineered, visually impressive and un-confusingly filmed action scene, the greatest treat of which is the car chase with Oz. Bob Pattinson does quite a good job of Batman, his aggressive style of keeping order is likeable, but had not enough time to be convincing as Bruce Wayne. Catwoman is a fox. Dano enjoys his part. The final confrontation with the Riddler is perfect. The Batman Oreos was a nice treat. Nobody!!!
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The Batman is a great way to take a new path and not disappoint viewers pampered by Nolan. Matt Reeves is the guy who can take a simple plot formula and make such an engrossing spectacle that intoxicates the audience with every scene over the course of three hours. The deliberate slowness of many of the scenes with their polished staging more thoroughly stylizes the characters and builds up the dark atmosphere of the hopelessness of a dirty, corrupt setting. Giacchino is unrecognizable and, especially in the suspenseful scenes, he transcends the shadow of his own creativity. The actors are well cast and directed (Farrell is again the most expressive of them), and the new Batmobile makes a grand entrance. What diminishes the film’s potential is its PG-13 rating – its very dark spirit in combination with the plot concept involving the hunt for a psychopathic killer, heavily inspired by Fincher’s Seven, needed a bit of graphic violence. In the films greatest display of rage, Batman pounds his fists into the bad guy’s face without even bloodying his nose. And the film contains a lot of such nonsense, sometimes purely logical, that stands in stark contrast to the otherwise fantastically well-crafted filmmaking details.
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