Movie Review: The Batman
2 and 1/2 Stars
The American public can’t get enough of The Bat. Our favorite masked vigilante who patrols the streets of a fictionalized New York City or Chicago (this rendition sways more New York City). Moral dilemmas are abound, villains are plentiful, and Batman is rooted at the epicenter of a struggle between Gotham PD and the criminal underworld.
Matt Reeves's take on The Batman leans heavily on the thematic brutality of the Nolan trilogy. The coloring is the first clue. Sepia orange tones and gothic green lighting emit on grisly faces and a grim atmosphere.
The three-hour film opens on Halloween with Robert Pattinson narrating typical Batman ‘he is vengeance’ lore. Batman is two years into his vigilante career and already has petty criminals running frightened from the sight of their own shadow. The criminals that do challenge Batman get swiftly punched in the face.
Pattinson’s Bruce Wayne is a stark contrast to most renditions of Wayne where he is well-adjusted to his double life. Pattinson’s Wayne is deeply burdened by the loss of his parents to the point that it’s become his sole identity. Wayne is a social recluse and comes off as socially awkward whether the mask is on or off. Batman doesn’t need a ton of social skills.
Batman is rarely the most compelling character in his own story. The villains take center stage because they are in charge of setting up the moral dilemmas Batman must navigate. Batman’s nemesis here is The Riddler who hasn’t been utilized much in the recent franchise films.
Reeves has a non-traditional take on The Riddler. This Riddler bears no green suit and isn’t a cocky television show personality. Instead, The Riddler is framed as an anarchist cult leader unraveling the corruption within Gotham’s police department and political offices.
The Batman considers our current political climate where government mistrust is feverishly high and mass shooters are apt to live broadcast their plans on a Twitch stream. Paul Dano captures The Riddler’s mania frighteningly well despite being behind a ski mask for most of the film.
The Batman has all the technical aspects of a well-crafted film. The coloring and lighting match the mood. The soundtrack ominously drones along adding to the noir as Batman and Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) follow the Riddler’s trail.
We’re also graced with appearances from Zoe Kravitz as Selina Kyle/Catwoman and Colin Farrell as Penguin. Selina gets a significant amount of screen time but is confusingly written. Penguin may as well have been any old generic mob boss.
There’s intention in the gritty realism of Reeves’ Batman. The Batman is a political commentary on the surface. Remove the cape and costume from Pattinson and this film could play out as a Scorcese film minus the captivating character drama. Oh, the irony.
But that’s the rub of this rendition of Batman that Reeves and fellow writer Peter Craig never grasp. The substance and the theme never connect. The movie begins assuming we know the who’s, the what’s, the where’s, the when’s, the why, and we’re just here for the how. Throw in some expository dialogue here and there and call it a day.
Gordon and Batman already have a complex relationship. Why does Gordon trust the caped crusader? Unsure. The Gotham PD is a right mess and they find Batman to be more of a threat than an asset but continue to allow him to investigate every crime scene like he’s one of their own. This same PD is also heavily tied to the criminal underworld and the linchpin is Carmine Falcone (John Turturro, who must’ve thought this was a Scorcese movie). Of course, there’s an Alfred (Andy Serkis) but he’s more expository device than movie character.
Somehow in a movie of this incredible length, the world-building of Gotham and its internal unrest is undercooked. Despite this, the film manages to be engaging for its runtime. The Batman is a movie that is confident in what it wants to be and say, but it is never fully realized. Possibly it is too beholden to its source material.
The Batman may be ambitious in prying a superhero away from a non-traditional superhero plot, but I don’t find it taking enough literary chances to veer far enough from the bar Nolan set. In the end, The Batman falls halfway between Nolan’s Batman and a Scorcese mob movie but is never able to reach the peaks that those two directors deliver.
