Revolutionary Rants

On Saturday evening Chicken, Alex and I went to view ‘Batman Begins’ at Barnstaple’s small cinema. I, personally, thought that it was really rather good!

After the truly awful films featuring Val Kilmer and George Clooney as Bruce Wayne/Batters I was slightly worried when I heard about the plans for a new prequel. These were mostly laid to rest when I heard Batman would be played by the very lovely Christian Bale (who regular readers will know is a favourite of mine), but I was still quite worried that we would have wasted our ticket money…

Although the supporting cast seemed a little off par at times (bring back the wonderful Micheal Gough I say!!! So what if he is now 87!), and even if Katie Holmes could act she hardly had any character with which to do it (luckily she was saved from having to as she can’t act anyway ). However, Mr Bale was good despite the usual not – exactly – Woody – Allen – but – still – trying – to – be – witty type script, and seeing how Batman, well, began was pretty interesting for a long-time fan!!!

‘Batman Begins’ did really drag – at over two and a half hours – especially at the start when there is a rather unnecessarily long stay with a ninja gang before the return to Gotham: which was what we were all waiting for anyway! We all already knew about his parent’s death and his fall in to the bat infested cave as a child, so all of that could have been speeded up, but once the action was returned to the city, things seemed a lot faster.

Overall the film still kept some of the Gothic menace of Tim Burton’s amazing first two films, whilst ditching the nippled bat suit and ‘movie magic’ of the dreadful third and forth films; what it really needed was a villain! Although Cillian Murphy was quite spooky as ‘Scarecrow’ (who was nothing like the comic/cartoon versions, so you won’t be disappointed if you loved the original!), Tom Wilkinson as Carmine Falcone (a mob boss) is not nearly as scary as somethings we’ve seen in Batman films. What we really needed here was a Joker or Penguin, or even a Riddler or a Two Face, to be honest; when we go to see a Batman film we want dark psychological undertones! The best thing about Batman is that he is always as mentally ill as the crooks he is fighting, it isn’t just ‘good’ verses ‘evil’, all the lines are blurred. But, anyway, although the film could’ve done with more of that it was still very good – I hope for more films now!

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