While Schumacher was originally slated to direct a third film, Batman Triumphant, which may have starred Nicolas Cage as the Scarecrow and Madonna as Harley Quinn (except retconned in to being the Joker's daughter), it never came to fruition. Appropriately for a film starring Mr. Freeze, Batman & Robin put the franchise on ice for several years. It wouldn't be until 2005 that we saw the caped crusader again, except this time it wouldn't just be another film in a franchise, but a film that reinvented the whole idea of the Batman franchise, creating something more psychological and character-driven that had been done in the live action films. This was Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins.. At this point in his career Nolan wasn't yet the blockbuster auteur he would become with The Dark Knight and Inception. He was still very much the indie filmmaker making his first blockbuster. The film feels modest compared to the second and third and film in the trilogy but it also feels the most like a stright forward Batman film.
Burton's approach to Batman was enigmatic and mysterious, while Nolan and Goyer's is internal and personal. Batman Forever tried to be a little more character driven, most of Val Kilmer's arc as Bruce was exorcised in that film. To be fair, those previous 4 films were more interested in the villains than Batman. And I get why- they're often more colorful and entertaining than him. But I appreciate Nolan and Goyer zeroing in on Bruce and Batman essentially giving us the full of arc of Bruce becoming Batman. To get us more in to Bruce's head, Goyer's script employs a flashback structure, beginning with this nightmare Bruce is having of the time when he was a child and fell in to a pit of bats. We then jump to Bruce waking up in prison. In the years since his parents were murdered during a mugging, Bruce has traveled the world learning the ways of criminals, but has completely lost himself in that life. But then a man named Henri Ducard (Liam Neeson) gives him a chance to train under Ra's Al Ghul (Ken Watanabe) and become part of the League of Shadows. As he trains with Ducard we get more flashbacks of Bruce's life before leaving Gotham, including the moment where he about to kill Joe Chill, his parents' murderer, before he is murdered for being a informer by one of mobster's Carmine Falcone's (Tom Wilkinson) cronies. After being given a stern lecture on justice vs. revenge by childhood friend, now lawyer, Rachel Dawes (Katie Holmes), he begins his journey in to the criminal underworld.
Nolan and Goyer don't just use the murder of Bruce's parents as a set up for a completely sepearate story but use is as the film's thematic crux. Joe Chill only existed because of the economic depression, leading to financial desperation in men like him. While the murder of the wealthy Waynes supposedly urged Gotham to pull itself out of this depression Rachel points out that things haven't really gotten better. Gotham is full of corruption and is run by Falcone. And essentially this corruption and decadence fuels Ghul's motivation to destroy Gotham.
Nolan and Goyer trust the audience to wait awhile for Bruce to don the cowl. They knew they had to make Bruce a compelling enough figure our of the suit that audiences wouldn't be impatient getting to Batman stuff. I think the reason why this approach ended up working for audiences is due to Nolan and Goyer approaching this material with a certain kind of seriousness and earnestness. From very beginning the film plays out as a straight drama rather than a comic-book movie, though I feel of the trilogy this one feels the most a straight-up Batman movie. Ultimately, the film encourages the audience to engage with the narrative on a character and thematic level rather than just pure entertainment. I do hate when people say Nolan was embarrassed to be doing a comic-book movie since I feel it's the opposite. Nolan obviously thought there was something more to this material then silly pulpiness. He saw something mythic and compelling this character. He of course had to strip down some of the fantasy in order to do the story he wanted, but I like when these films have a specific vision. And to be fair, this is still a pretty pulpy movie and it has a sense of humour about itself.
Maybe the film's wisest decisions, is forgoing the Joker as the antagonist. Structurally, it just ended up working better for the overarching story of the trilogy. In this one Batman brings hope back to Gotham City and by the beginning of The Dark Knight is very confident in his abilities, and even underestimates the Joker, as does the mob. only for the Joker to completely destroy his whole world. This film's ending is so satisfying, having Lieutenant Gordon (Gary Oldman) giving Batman the Joker's calling card. It's the best sequel set-up of any superhero film, largely because it wasn't designed to be a set-up, but a payoff of the whole story.
In typical Nolan fashion, he uses the concept of fear both as a plot device and as a larger thematic concept. Ducard (who is revealed to have been the actual Ghul in the third act) wants to use Dr. Jonathan Crane/Scarecrow's (Cillian Murphy) fear toxin against Gotham so it it will tear itself apart. Bruce uses fear (the symbol of the Batman) to invoke a positive change. And Bruce initially blames his fear of bats (he had to leave the opera due to the people in bat costumes) for his parents' death.
While I usually really like Neeson, I do find the character, and his performance, a little bit on smug side. It's a big part of why I have a love/hate relationship with this film. I do like that this movie focuses in more on Batman than any of the previous live action films and feels the most like a Batman of Nolan's trilogy, especially in the aesthetic of Gotham. I do wish Nolan was a stronger visual stylist and that his shooting style wasn't always so basic. There's also some janky editing going on in the fight scenes, and the third act just isn't as strong as the first two. Rachel also feels likes she's just there to tell Bruce what he needs to hear, rather than being a fully formed character, though Nolan has often been a stronger idea and conceptual guy and his characters can often feel like mouthpieces for exposition. However, his Dark Knight Trilogy does have some really good character stuff and oddly feels like his most character driven work.
He's not unlike George Lucas, who also struggles with dialogue and character. Lucas' strengths, like Nolan, are in the bigger picture stuff. But Lucas and Nolan's flaws as directors don't really matter to most people because their films, often seen by people when they're younger, have such a impact on viewers and define a young person's upbringing as a cinephile.
Superhero movies often get seen as right wing power fantasies, though someone like Stan Lee was always very progressive in his politics. Batman, in particular, gets reduced, maybe fairly or unfairly, to the rich guy who beats up poor people. Nolan also got blowback when The Dark Knight came out when Batman chose to spy on people via cell phone to find the Joker, viewing this as pro Bush and Patriot Act. And in the third film, Tom Hardy's Bane was seen as a criticism of Occupy Wall Street. The Dark Knight does prevent the surveillance stuff as pretty morally dubious and Bane doesn't really represent the ideals of Occupy Wall Street but rather uses the ideology to turn Gotham against itself. Still, Nolan does try to have it both ways with the surveillance technology, presenting it as necessary one time thing before it's destroyed. The ending of The Dark Knight also prevents lying about Harvey Dent's crimes as a necessary evil to keep order. And The Dark Knight Rises does present the ideology of Occupy Wall Street as useful weapon to turn classes against each other. Nolan's politics are thorny but I'd argue it makes the films more interesting, especially compared to the more overt thematic exposition that has probably hurts these films the most on rewatch.
The key to casting Batman and Bruce Wayne is you don't go for the traditional leading man like George Clooney. You go for someone like Michael Keaton or Val Kilmer. You need some who you can believe dresses up as bat and fights crime. Christian Bale may have gotten himself the role by playing another rich, crazy guy with Patrick Bateman in American Psycho. I think Bale often gets overshadowed in these movies by the more colorful performances but he's good in this initial go around. Bale can sometimes be too actorly and heavy as an actor, but here he doesn't overplay the seriousness but lets it come naturally. He finds the reality in essentially an outlandish character.
While I feel The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises are stronger films formally, I understand why Batman Begins is often seen as the best of the trilogy and many peoples' favourite. It's thematically the tightest and feels the most comfortable being a superhero film. I always wonder the series would've been like if Nolan had continued on with this aesthetic. So, what are your feelings about Batman Begins? Is this your favourite? Comment and let me know.
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