The Batman - Triumphant Baptism of Fire for New Dark Knight
The Batman is another example of why trailers lie. Matt Reeves' film turned out to be simply better than anything the trailers ever suggested. It excels as entertainment for lovers of noir crime fiction, but it is also much more than that.
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Batman reborn
When it comes to execution, The Batman is close to perfection. Not only because it's great to watch – and believe me, you will be delighted with the visuals and the sound. It's a series of great shots, play of light, choreography of fights, chases, special effects, scenes full of suspense, investigations and intimate conversations, vistas of the Gothic-industrial city during the day and at night. The movie sounds amazing, believable, digs into our brain and stays there. Music based on leitmotifs perfectly builds a heavy, disturbing atmosphere. But it's not just the refinement of these elements that makes them great – it's about what they consist in.
In The Batman, each of these elements serves a purpose, they contribute to the presentation of action in such a way that it strengthens the message. Reeves's movie is a film about the difference between vengeance and justice, about how much we need humanity, understanding and forgiveness, especially in the worst, darkest moments of humanity – to face the evil, find allies. The arch of Pattinson's Batman is designed for the main character to understand exactly this – and along with him, the audience.
It starts out as a nervous, furious shell of a human being driven by revenge. He's as terrifying as the evil he fights and truth be told, is not much different from him. The first half of the film is a marriage of crime fiction, thriller and horror. Not only is the murderer terrifying, but so is Batman. He emerges like a scarecrow from the shadows to commit acts of violence (of course, directed against those who hurt or wronged someone), he acts as an agent of a Biblical God's Wrath.
He is revenge, as he says himself – and it's much more than just words. Even the Batmobile (looking like an armored crossover of between a classic muscle car and a flashy supercar) steps into the action in a sequence that shows the vehicle like it was a horror monster – a furious, roaring beast that makes Christine from John Carpenter's movie look like an innocent, wayward go-kart. The chase with the Batmobile on the one hand brings to mind the great Ronin with Jean Reno and Robert De Niro (through cinematography and editing), and on the other, embodies the punishment being delivered on the city; fire, destruction and all that jazz. And gosh! What a beautiful scene it is! Action cinema at its best, beautiful and bitterly summarized.
Christian symbolism ties the entire film together, from the first song we hear (in a scene of disturbing stalking that wold make Hitchcock go "Whoa"), through the use of water and fire, to sequences emphasizing the underlying message of Reeves' film. The water-related scene of Batman's "rebirth" is a kind of baptism, a moment of transition and understanding of the mistakes and shortcomings that plagued him. It's expressive and subtle at the same time.
All this playing with meaning and symbolics does not overwhelm the viewer. It's an element of the message, but also of fun, a jigsaw puzzle that we complete. It emphasizes the gloomy mood, adjusts to the pace and the thrilling intrigue. It's an element of the landscape in a sin-ridden neo-noir city.
But be warned: this Batman is political. (Aren't they all? In the trilogy, Nolan sometimes applauded some of the ideas of the George W. Bush' administration). There's beautiful, poetic irony, but on the level of social messages, Reeves' Batman's corresponds to Todd Phillips' Joker (even though the movies do not belong to the same universe). Although he does it in a different way, as if just by coincidence when unveiling subsequent segments of the story. To show that all evil has a source and does not come from nowhere. Evil comes from neglect, abandonment of the weak and lost souls. From abuse. And the greatest monsters may once have been harmless victims. We create them. Just like the Joker. And all this is also intertwined with the plot of the film, with Batman's investigation and conclusions. And it all clicks, harmonizes perfectly with the image of a degenerated city and its people – with the exception of a few, cheap sermon-like lines of dialogue, which were probably written to please the least subtle of the audiences.
Despite such minor shortcomings, all the elements make up the new face of the Dark Knight, fresh for viewers (because comic book readers may associate individual puzzles of personality and history). Concrete, expressive – and necessary. Necessary, because it's so powerful that it doesn't let you treat The Batman as another commercial reboot of the series. With so many screen iterations, any other hero would probably have already been exhausted, but the director found something interesting and different here, something that had been neglected in these movies so far. And he allowed Batman to be reborn, so that again, like in 2008, after the premiere of The Dark Knight by Nolan, he had a chance to captivate our imagination.
Baptism of fire – check
Matt Reeves has proven more than once that he can combine a more ambitious message with an entertaining show. The trilogy about the planet of the apes certainly showed what the director can do with a large budget. Yet The Batman was an unknown entity before the premiere. We couldn't be sure whether we will get a movie that's correct at best, or maybe something more – a picture that can boldly challenge Nolan's movies when it comes to the best film about the Batman. I was waiting for this movie to be a test for Matt Reeves, Robert Pattinson and their idea of Batman. The entire trio, and everyone else involved, passed this baptism of fire like the Batmobile in their signature scene – with a bang. Despite the age rating, it's a strong cinema, disturbing and intriguing. It's like just another movie about chasing a psycho, and yet it leaves a mark. And it pulls you in.
I loved both the Dark Knight and Batman Returns, but I love them as a single cinematic entity. I really liked the brutal, stout interpretation by Ben Affleck (which Zack Snyder obviously wanted to show in a standalone film... And it would probably be his best work). The Batman jumps to the forefront of Bat movies – and new superhero films in general. Pattinson's interpretation, at times sensitive, at times terrifying, and visibly torn inside could be the most personal Batman ever made, because it remains very human all the time, just like the film itself. And that's the biggest feat.
