Batman Begins (2005): Christopher Nolan resurrects the Dark Knight with a bold new vision of the superhero film

Christian’s Grade: A

When people talk about Christopher Nolan’s Batman films, they’re usually talking about The Dark Knight. And, of course, it was an amazing movie with a stellar cast. But I’ve always found it strange that the first film in his Batman trilogy, Batman Begins, often goes unmentioned. As great as The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises were (and they were great), they had flaws that I’ve had a hard time overlooking. However, Batman Begins in 2005 is as close to a perfect batman movie as I’ve ever seen, both in pacing and story construction. 

Nolan asks the question, what would it take for someone like Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) to become Batman? With that question as the foundation of the story, he proceeds to lay it all out for us. After the murder of his parents, Bruce is lost for many years with no direction for his life. He wants revenge against the criminal element of Gotham city but doesn’t know how to get it. He finally realizes he needs to understand criminality in order to defeat it and sets off on a journey of discovery. In his travels, Bruce is approached by Ra’s Al Ghul (Liam Neeson), a man with similar passion, who offers to train him and give his life meaning. Bruce joins the League of Shadows, and when his training is complete, he realizes his morals don’t align with the leagues and has to fight his way to freedom.

Upon returning to Gotham, Bruce is focused and ready with a new plan to clean up the city as a masked vigilante. Assisted by his butler Alfred (Michael Caine), he goes about building his base of operations, gathering his tools, and refamiliarizing himself with the criminal landscape within the city. At this point, we’re introduced to the Scarecrow (Cillian Murphy), who has been contaminating the illegal drug supply and the city’s water with a fear toxin, preparing the way for the league of shadows to enter Gotham and destroy it from within. We find out Scarecrow is working as a middleman between Ra’s Al Ghul and the Gotham mob, covering supply and distribution of the toxin. Batman has some early exposure to the fear toxin, which allows him time to use Wayne Enterprises resources, and his connection with Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) in Research & Development to create a vaccine. Batman has a final confrontation with Scarecrow, and another with Ra’s Al Ghul and, with the assistance of James Gordon (Gary Oldman), stops the league of shadows and their plans for the destruction of Gotham. 

We get everything in this story. Bruce Wayne’s inspiration from bats, his training abroad, the murder of his parents, how he builds his arsenal, some missteps as a new vigilante, and learning who to trust along the way. It is a true and complete origin story focusing on the evolution from Bruce Wayne to Batman. And let’s not forget, this was the first time we were given a Jim Gordon that was both tough and respectable. That’s not a small thing and a real gift from Nolan to long-time fans of the Batman comics.

There’s also the romantic connection to Assistant DA Rachel Dawes (Katie Holmes) to consider. She’s the anchor that keeps Bruce from going too far, both as Batman and Bruce Wayne’s millionaire playboy. Katie Holmes catches a lot of flack from fans for her performance, but I don’t understand why. I found her performance to be solid and well utilized as Bruce Wayne’s moral center. It seems to me that most of the trolling tends to stem from people’s judgment of her personal life and not her professional one.

I have a lot of admiration for storytellers that approach superhero movies with a clear vision and the talent to make it real. Respect has to be given to David S. Goyer for mapping out this Batman reboot. It was not just an act of respect for the source material but an act of love for the character. In retrospect, it’s clear the Batman franchise needed Christopher Nolan because, after Joel Schumacher’s Batman and Robin in 1997, the franchise was essentially dead. All bat-fans had during those dark years was Bruce Timm and his exquisite animated Batman stories. It took a director of Christopher Nolan’s caliber to resurrect Batman on film and give us all a taste of what bat-mania was like in 1989.

THE WAYNE FACTOR

Hollywood was aware of Christian Bale before Batman Begins. He was little Jim in Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun (1987) and Jack Kelly in Newsies (1992). And we can’t forget Patrick Bateman in American Psycho (2000). He was kind of an indie king working steadily in TV and film but not pulling a ton of attention to himself until American Psycho. And it was exactly because of that role that many moviegoers had a hard time seeing him as Batman before the release of Batman Begins. 

Looking back over the franchise as a whole, that seems to be the one constant. Directors tend to look for actors to fill this role, that could be considered risky. Either because they haven’t performed in a role like Batman before, so the public questions their chops, or because, at first glance, they just don’t seem to fit the stereotype. But oddly enough, it’s the risky choices that also tend to pay off in the end. Michael Keaton, Christian Bale, and Robert Pattinson were risks. On paper, there was nothing risky about movies starring Val Kilmer and George Clooney. (No offense to either actor. Both are in some of my favorite movies) Of course, the blame for a poorly received movie usually hangs off the shoulders of the director and/or the studio execs that won’t step out of the way, not the actors. 

Now, after three turns as Batman, Christian Bale is a household name, an A-list actor, highly respected in the industry, and his movies get a lot more attention. If you’re looking for a “Wayne Factor,” there it is.

THOSE WONDERFUL TOYS

One aspect that helps define a Batman movie is the Batmobile. The design and functionality sets the tone for what kind of Batman we’re dealing with. The Tumbler is… in a word, unique. When you see it for the first time, you don’t quite know what to make of it. Is it a car? Is it a tank? It embodies the term urban assault. But one thing it doesn’t do is scream batmobile! 

And I love it.

So what does this say about Christopher Nolan’s Batman? Tactical, functional, tough, stealthy, and it’s something unlike anything we’ve seen before. It takes a beating, and it doesn’t stop, and it packs a lot of surprises.

The design isn’t beautiful. It’s intimidating. You see it coming at you, and you just don’t know what it can do, what it will do, and what you can do about it. That’s Batman.

GOTHAM CENTRAL

Grounding this version of Batman and the city of Gotham was foremost on Nolan’s mind. So how do you depart from the fantasy world sets of Tim Burton and Joel Schumacher? You film in Chicago. And it worked beautifully. That’s really all I can say about it. It set the stage for a more grounded and relatable Batman because this Gotham city and the people in it looked like the kind of city we see every day.