Director: Matt Reeves
Starring: Robert Pattinson, Zoe Kravitz, Colin Farrell, Jeffrey Wright, Paul Dano, Barry Keoghan, Peter Sarsgaard, John Turturro, Andy Serkis, Rupert Penry Jones, Jayme Lawson
Distributor: Warner Brothers
Runtime: 175 mins. Reviewed in Mar 2022
Reviewer: Fr Peter Malone msc

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Rating notes: Sustained Threat, Violence and Coarse Language

Once again, Bruce Wayne is available to avenge injustice in Gotham city. This time a very dark and sombre interpretation of Batman and his crusade against crime and corruption.

Quite an achievement. Quite a significant cinematic achievement.

Bob Kane’s original comic strip, Batman, has had a long life on television and in the movies – from the fun and excitement of the 1960s, to Tim Burton’s vision with Michael Keaton, to lighter touches with Val Kilmer and George Clooney, Ben Affleck and the Justice League. Now we have British actor, Robert Pattinson, the most serious Batman of them all. (In fact, this version might appeal strongly to Christopher Nolan and his Christian Bale series but not so much to Zack Snyder with Ben Affleck seeming like a benevolent uncle compared with Robert Pattinson.)

This is a dark version, not only in characters and themes, lawlessness in Gotham city, political corruption, Gotham’s equivalent of the mob, money, graft and assassinations, but, in its two-hour 55-minute running time, practically every sequence is at night, in the dark. There is a daylight sequence at a funeral commemoration, a relief to see some daylight, but it is soon overwhelmed in disaster, chaos, and a huge chase throughout the city (with compliments to the skills of the editor to make the chase so adrenaline-exciting, putting together brief shots with accumulated dramatic effect such as the chases in the Mad Max films). There is also a brief dawn sequence at the top of a high building where Batman encounters the mysterious character, Selina (Kravitz). Otherwise, ever-dark.

The visuals of this Gotham more than ever resemble those of New York City. But, there is a focus on churches, Gothic architecture, even within Bruce Wayne’s hermitage home. And, the film opens with a version of Schubert’s ‘Ave Maria’, recurring throughout the film as a kind of motif to alert the audience to potential tragedy, even sung at the end by the mysteriously villainous, The Riddler (generally seen masked but a virtuoso performance by Dano).

The film opens with the assassination of the Mayor, the opening of a new campaign and a young African-American female contender. There are further killings, the introduction to a mob boss in his nightclub, The Penguin (this reviewer’s jaw dropped at the final credits to discover he is played by Colin Farrell – disguised to look rather like Al Pacino’s character in Dick Tracy). Then there is the mob boss, smooth-talking and arrogant, dominating the city’s present and its past, an effective John Turturro.

And, what of The Batman himself? When the sign goes up in the sky, it is his chance to rendezvous with police Commissioner Gordon (Wright efficient in the role). The Batman is big, brawny, full of vigour and, when he goes into action, initially against a group of louts mugging an Asian American, he is a vigorous and violent fighter. And we see this throughout the film – reluctant to kill, ready to maim, a masked vigilante. And denounced by many as such. We do see him at home, with Andy Serkis this time as Alfred.

The development of the plot, as so often with Batman films, takes us back to Bruce Wayne’s parents, their role in Gotham, politics, finance, philanthropy – but this time with some sinister twists. And they reinforce the basic stands of Bruce Wayne and his disguise, initial fears, violence and vindictiveness, relentlessness. We might say that Pattinson’s version of Bruce Wayne (and that of director and co-writer, Reeves) is one-dimensional as described. However, with his interactions and the encounters with Selina, there is a further reticent emotional response – perhaps he is a half dimension character.

The film is strikingly photographed, with many strong close-ups dominating the action, yet quite an amount of action and effects.

The long running time passes quite effectively, the action intriguing, as is the mystery of who was behind the corruption and the identity of The Riddler. The sinister atmosphere making the film something of a parable about contemporary cities, government, corruption and the victimisation of ordinary people.