Batman Begins [M]

Left disillusioned, fearful, and angered by the brutal murder of his parents, billionaire heir Bruce Wayne travels the world seeking the means to fight injustice and turn fear against those who prey on the fearful. After being trained by a mysterious force called the League of Shadows, Bruce returns to his home city of Gotham, dismayed to find it a cesspool of corruption, crime, greed, and desperation. With the help of his butler Alfred and his ally Lucius Fox, Bruce unleashes his newly-found alter ego Batman: a caped crusader who uses his strength, intellect, and array of highly sophisticated weapons to fight the crime and injustice that threatens Gotham. 

Batman, like Indiana Jones or even the Muppets, is a phenomenon that knows no boundaries and has no expiration date. After the Tim Burton productions of the caped crusader in the 80s, director Christopher Nolan reintroduces possibly the most famous and celebrated hero to a new generation in this great film that is packed with plenty of action, a great plot, romance, and memorable moments of light-hearted comedy. 

Left disillusioned, fearful, and angered by the brutal murder of his parents, billionaire heir Bruce Wayne travels the world seeking the means to fight injustice and turn fear against those who prey on the fearful. After being trained by a mysterious force called the League of Shadows, Bruce returns to his home city of Gotham, dismayed to discover that is has become a cesspool of corruption, greed, fear, crime, and desperation. With the help of his faithful butler Alfred and his newly found ally Lucius Fox, Bruce unleashes his newly-discovered alter ego, Batman: a caped crusader who uses his strength, intellect, and sophisticated weapons to fight the crime and injustice that threatens Gotham. 

I firmly believe that modern adaptations of classic stories and characters have lost that great characterisation and acting talent and place too much emphasis on special effects, explosions and the like. And, even though I love this movie and find is as rollicking and awesome as any Inception or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, there is something wanting. 

The basic plot is fantastic, one of the few in which the climax is explained to the audience before the first half is over (and then, in the midst of all the action and numerous bad guys that we have to keep track of, we forget it, thus getting surprised and reminded at the end), but (and this is my real only beef with this movie) they could have worked a little more on the performances and script, and less on the explosions and action. Don’t, get me wrong though; they were pretty effing awesome! And Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman did turn in memorable performance with many of the best lines of the film. 

Starring Christian Bale, Liam Neeson, Michael Caine, Katie Holmes, Cillian Murphy (who was born to be a bad guy), Tom Wilkinson, Rutger Hauer, Ken Watanabe, and Gary Oldman, Batman Begins is a fantastically action-packed and rollicking movie filled with romance, fighting, ninjas, cool gadgets, humour, and plenty of action. It’s not the best representation of Batman to be sure, but it’s damned entertaining and rather mind-blowing to boot. I am happy to own it, I must say.