Batman Begins

[As always, spoilers within]

Loved: The turning point in Bruce Wayne’s (Christian Bale) training in the Tibetan fastness of R’as Al Ghul (Ken Watanabe). This is a beautiful, simple, visual expression of the transformation of the man into Batman. Wayne remakes himself into one of the black-clad fighters dancing and drilling in the ring with Ducard (Liam Neeson). He bests Liam Neeson, signaling he has mastered his fears, and his destiny lies in harnessing the darkness, both literal and figurative. Three cheers to director Christopher Nolan for not resorting to CGI.

Loved: Nolan’s Batman suffers a driven restlessness, which never loses the threat that cruelty or vengefulness may break out. It makes him more like the kind of hero for those of us who are not independently wealthy. In Tim Burton’s Batman (1989), Bruce Wayne is a much more reflective, and sometimes dithering, verso to his threatening Batman. Bale plays him as relentless and workaholic. His potential is broader and more surprising.

Hated: Yack, yack, yack about spiritual life and embracing one’s fears. The fighting said it all. Or should have.

Lack of focus: The movie struggled to show the redemption that Batman seeks. The movie set two inward obstacles for Wayne to overcome. The first was his fear of bats, an image tied to the abandonment he experienced when he fell into the well. The second, his guilt that he caused his parents death. Wayne overcomes his fear of bats, and of his own darkness, during his initiation by Assghoul.

Back in Gotham, I lost him. Or he lost me. The fight against injustice builds to climax against the forces of decadence and destruction. Batman fights. The more he fights, the more he wins. What does he want? Justice. Good. Can I identify with him? Perhaps, in some brainy, ought-to way. From the time Wayne and Morgan Freeman finish equipping Batman, he seems invincible. Both the man and his heart seemed impervious. Because Batman never lost, even in temporary failure, and was not vulnerable even in love, his offer to give up his life to defeat Ducard/R’as Al Ghul and save Gotham came cheap. I wanted to care. I really, really wanted to care.

A suggestion: Change the scene of the boy listening to his father’s heart in the first act. Instead, the father holds the stethoscope and the boy listens to his own heart. The father a medium, showing him his humanity. In a third act scene, when Wayne recovers the burned stethoscope, it would recall not simply the absent father, but the moral import of the man, and invoke his silent admonition to live up to his humanity.