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Batman Begins *** (out of ****):
The performances were all spot on, and we have the first convincing Batman in history. Gotham City looked right, the villain didn't control the piece, the story was interesting and plausible, and seamlessly integrated elements of Year One, The Long Halloween, and Blind Justice, and did it well. It's by far the best live action Batman ever.
However, it still falls short of the animated series, and is far from perfect. The big twist at the 2/3 mark is telegraphed ten minutes into the movie, and Christopher Nolan, skilled though he is at all of the other elements of directing, cannot direct a fight to save his life. Dang it man, you've got Christian Bale, who knows how to stage a fight scene, use him and get rid of the badly cut fights in which it's impossible to tell who's doing what. Here's a hint: Rent several of Jet Li's movies, and watch those. Notice how the fight scenes show the whole body, and show exactly who is hitting or kicking whom, and where, and how one move flows into the next? The MTV style of close-up shots cut every half second make for a terrible, confusing, difficult to understand fight scene. I could have been the one in the suit in those scenes and nobody would have noticed any difference.
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