The Batman - Movie Review

Critics Score - 7 of 10

General Audience Score - 8 of 10

Robert Pattinson has been one of the premier Hollywood heartthrobs since he sank his teeth into audiences everywhere back in the days of the Twilight saga. Since then he’s put out plenty of good to great performances, but now he’s donned the bat suit as our latest version of the Dark Knight. Some are taking issue with Pattinson’s portrayal but I was impressed and thought he embodied the character well, his anger and sullen demeanor shone through the mask. The Batman is ambitious and different from any anything we’ve seen before but Bruce Wayne and all his money couldn’t make this a perfect movie experience.

SYNOPSIS - Our costume dress up party begins on Halloween, we watch as someone is doing surveillance on a politician and we can smell it, there’s murder in the air. We then switch over to and follow Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) as he wanders the city streets looking for ne’er-do-wells and putting them back in line. Pattinson is younger, slimmer, sporting more guy-liner and it’s even mentioned he’s not nearly as financially well off as the other versions of the character we’ve come to love seeing on the big screen for more than the past three decades. He also looks great in the uniform, his dark and brooding mood helps him wear the outfit well in more ways than one. As we watch a thief rob a store, he runs out before looking down a dark street, we hear Batman say “fear . . is a tool” and see the thief start quaking unsteadily. Then we watch a street gang harass a gentleman at a train station until Batman politely requests they leave him alone, with his fists. Fascinatingly enough, the Batman that Pattinson plays is vulnerable, while fighting the gang the camera angles make us privy to hits that previous versions would’ve easily deflected. A couple times the camera takes us to the opposite side of the train tracks and we get a wide angle of the entire fight with all the characters in view and see they don’t all take turns attacking Batman, a common theme in group fights onscreen, and we see Batman struck multiple times in the back, once with a pipe. This character is human, at times he’s weak, there’s a point when he goes to jump off a building and stops short of the edge, briefly paralyzed, the normal human fear sweeping across his face. The same is true as we meet Catwoman (Zoe Kravitz), the Riddler (Paul Dano) and various others characters, they’re less like MCU superheroes and more in the vein of Kick-Ass, almost like if you or I were to order a Halloween costume and go fight some thugs, albeit they’re probably in a bit better shape. But these elements kept the film extremely grounded and realistic.

When Batman starts investigating the dead politician, we’re harkened back to the comic book days of old. Instead of looking cool, driving the batmobile around and fighting villains, the next sequence we watch as Batman walks through the crime scene, picking up on and putting together clues with the police to solve this murder mystery. Pattinson’s gritty and at times subdued performance matches well with the methodical direction from Matt Reeves (War For The Planet Of The Apes). But with so much character work to set up besides building us an updated version of Gotham City to explore, you can picture Matt Reeves saying to himself “it’ll take as long as it’ll take” while he’s filming these scenes. At an almost three hour run, it’s nice to have so much patience in a superhero film, but it’s almost a bit shocking that Reeves lets us stay with these characters in some of these scenes far longer than necessary. With most every other Marvel and superhero film in a race to get to the next fight sequence, The Batman let’s us sit in the scenes with these characters and ruminate with them. But with the film being so drawn out, I wouldn’t recommend going to see this film late in the evening, if you’re tired at all as I was for my screening, you’ll struggle to keep your eyes on the screen.

One of the key pieces to any superhero film is the antagonist. While the Riddler is a decent enough villain and sets up extremely convoluted puzzles and traps for Batman, his targets and Gotham as a whole, there’s definitely some things lacking from this character. He’s absent for almost an hour of the second act of the film. His presence is never hanging over Batman like an ever present shadow the way the Joker did in other Batman incantations. Catwoman is also a great character, as Pattinson watches her slide into her leather outfit and then exit through the window and swing down a fire escape, we again get the sense of a person based far more in reality than Pfeiffer or (coughing loudly) Berry. Kravitz has a nice chemistry with Pattinson, it reminds me of the way you see an emo couple walking around together that brings me joy that they found each other and I’ll be interested to see where the series takes their relationship.

The decent character development aside, the film suffers from serious pacing issues. The screenplay is so bloated and stuffed full of detail, which on one hand gives the viewer a better understanding of this version of Gotham City but also subverts The Batman’s attempts to gain any momentum and therefore build to any epic finale. The soundtrack from Michael Giacchino (Spider-Man No Way Home) is a absolute banger. The violin and bells tolling in the background of many tracks amplify the extremely dark tone the movie has on lockdown. The cinematography and camerawork are exceptional for any film, let alone a superhero one, with close-up shots, the use of shadows and red hues giving the film a distinctive look. The Batman is a very cinematic experience, fully worthy of the big screen.

SUMMARY - While the film certainly makes some errors, some bigger than others, on the whole this film is a win. It’s doing so much, there’s so much meat on the bone, despite my mediocre first experience, I’m actually excited to revisit The Batman and like a vampire bat, I’m ready to sink my teeth into this one again.