The following review of The Batman is spoiler-free.
It’s become popular in recent years for people—people who aren’t dissecting trailers, reading fan theories, and creating fan casts for every single superhero movie, that is—to suggest that Batman has reached a cultural saturation point. To say that after three continuities in the last three decades (the one that started with Michael Keaton in 1989 and continued with Val Kilmer and George Clooney; the one with Christian Bale; the one with Ben Affleck) and even a standalone movie focused on his arch-enemy (Joker), that movies centered on the caped crusader have done all they can do, and have said all they can say. Do we really need to see Bruce Wayne’s parents get murdered again?
And while that thinking is perfectly logical and fair, director Matt Reeves (Cloverfield) smashes it into a thousand pieces with The Batman, his visually gorgeous and stunningly acted take on the character. At 2 hours and 55 minutes, Reeves’ film is exceptionally long, but it never feels like a slog. The movie takes the Batman lore we’ve seen before, and structures it less like the tentpole Marvel or DC superhero film we’ve seen throughout the last decade, and more like a contemporary take on the detective epics of years past, such as L.A. Confidential or The Big Sleep.
Where past takes on the Bruce Wayne character have painted him as a wealthy and charismatic playboy, Reeves’ version of Bruce Wayne (now played by Robert Pattinson) is a recluse, not seen in public enough to have any reputation at all. The movie finds Wayne early in his career as Batman (it’s mentioned a few times that he and Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) have been working together for just two years), but rather than the straight action that past Batman installments have gone for, we see him piecing a larger conspiracy puzzle together.
Warner Bros.
And since we’re talking noir here, it makes sense that The Batman has a femme fatale of its own. Enter Selina Kyle/Catwoman (played this time around by the wonderful Zoë Kravitz, just off another great turn in Steven Soderbergh’s Kimi), who perfectly toes the line between hero and villain. Kravitz has seen her star rise considerably in recent years, but this take on Catwoman may be her best work yet; she’s intriguing, threatening, and compelling all at the same time. And her chemistry with Pattinson is off the charts.
The Batman isn’t just a noir, though. It also has elements clearly inspired by the crime thrillers of, say, David Fincher, and that calls for an appropriate villain. Paul Dano’s Zodiac Killer-inspired take on the Riddler is a stark contrast from anything we’ve ever seen before from that character . But from Little Miss Sunshine and There Will Be Blood to Prisoners, Dano has long been a performer with the ability to take well-written characters and transcend them even further on the screen. He’s working with a solid script from Reeves and Peter Craig, and does his thing, coming off committed and scary, and also oddly funny at times too. Dano brings a combination of madness and pathos, and you simply cannot look away when he’s on screen.
The cast, across the board, is exceptional. As crime boss Carmine Falcone, John Turturro gets his finest role since HBO’s The Night Of, and while he’s not super essential to the overarching plot, it’s a blast to see Colin Farrell as Falcone’s right-hand man “Oz,” AKA The Penguin (Farrell will return in an HBO Max series). Add in Andy Serkis as the latest in a line of witty Alfreds (Michael Caine and Jeremy Irons played the Wayne family butler previously) and a short Peter Sarsgaard turn, and it’s clear this movie knows just how to use its character actors to great effect.
Warner Bros.
It helps that Pattinson does a great job melding both the Batman and the Bruce Wayne parts of the role into someone we don’t mind spending time with. He’s quiet, but much of this performance can be non-verbal; Pattinson is one of the most expressive performers in the game and that’s on display here. This take on the character has said to be “inspired by Kurt Cobain,” and playing “Something in the Way” multiple times certainly beats that over your head. But it’s clear this is a Bruce Wayne who’s not come to terms with Gotham City; he’s not Batman because he’s bored—he’s got a legitimate gripe with the world around him.
Ultimately, the movie works as well as it does because this director got to make exactly the movie he set out to make, and the move looks stunning. For that, we also need to credit director of photography Greig Fraser, who also worked with Denis Villeneuve on last year’s Dune. Like Dune, The Batman just looks incredible—the bigger the screen you see it on, the better.
It might be tempting to let The Batman go, and it’s hard to blame you. You’ve seen characters named Batman, Catwoman, The Riddler, Alfred, and Gordon before. H0w different could it be? But the good news is the answer to that is…quite different. And it’s worth the 2 hours and 55 minutes of your time to find out how.
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