The Batman

The Batman

Introduction

The Batman is Matt Reeves’ imagining of the world of Batman, and he undoubtedly knocks it out of the park. From the very first scene, I knew that I was in the hands of a director who knew exactly what he was doing with the character of Batman and the city of Gotham. His direction is so strong throughout the film, and his vision is well-realised for the entirety of the runtime, something that is pretty rare to find in a superhero film. Although I say superhero film, this is really so much more than that. While it is a superhero film at its core, Reeves crafts an excellent noir crime thriller out of this film. 

Batman and Catwoman in Matt Reeves' The Batman

More than a superhero film

Matt Reeves manages to make The Batman work on two levels, and to great effect, at that. Fundamentally, The Batman is a superhero film, with all the elements of a Batman film. Alfred, Gordon, Catwoman, The Penguin, and The Riddler were all great characters and allowed me to gain more insight into the world of Batman, with this being my first Batman film after all. The film offered all the great action that should come out of a superhero film. But what Reeves does with the film is morph it into a multi-genre feature, injecting his strong direction into the film to turn it into a noir crime thriller. From my limited knowledge, Batman is a detective, and a great one at that. The film really stays faithful to this concept and features plenty of police work done by the Batman-Gordon duo, who have fantastic chemistry. Remnants of past crime thrillers, such as Zodiac and Se7en, echo through the film, with delightful cyphers being sent by The Riddler, and entertainingly cryptic riddles as well. Reeves’ version of The Riddler is incredibly down to earth and grounded, which is what makes him such an effective and terrifying villain. He fights for change, and he is certainly not afraid to resort to violence. Reeves has mentioned that he drew heavy inspiration from the Zodiac killer for his version of The Riddler, and he succeeds wildly in bringing a realistically terrifying serial killer to life in Gotham City. 

The bone-chilling villain of the film, The Riddler

Cinematography and Set Design

Reeves chooses to present Gotham at its absolute darkest, literally. The atmosphere of Gotham is constantly gloomy and depressing, with the seemingly never-ending rain and the deep darkness that fills up every frame. With the dark as a constant background, Reeves and cinematographer Greg Fraser masterfully injects bright colours and light to create stark contrasts between light and dark, and it works every single time. I especially loved scenes where the colour red would be contrasted with the dark, such as the flare scene and the first club fight, which were in the trailer. With Reeves’ close attention to detail, the greatness of the cinematography is only amplified. Along with the cinematography, the set design contributes greatly to the mood of the film. The city streets are grimy, dirty and appropriately menacing. Shadows fill the frame, casting a feeling of impending doom over the audience, just like it does to Gotham’s criminals, who imagine Batman standing there, lurking in the shadows and waiting to strike. As Batman notes, “I am the shadows.” This conveys to the audience that Batman really is trying to help the city, but ultimately cannot stretch himself over the whole city. He can only do so much. That brings me to my next discussion point, the character of Batman.

The beautiful "Flare" scene

The Batman and Bruce Wayne

Batman is brought entirely down to earth in Reeves’ film. At times, he even seems less of a superhero than he is a detective. As such, there are times when he is presented to be human and fallible, an imperfect hero. I really appreciated this aspect of his character as it completely disregards the stereotype of a “perfect” hero, and makes the character much more fleshed out. It also allows for the audience to further root for our hero. He also has pretty fancy technology that was very interesting to watch him use. Outside of being Batman, Bruce Wayne is a totally different character. Again, to my very limited knowledge, Bruce Wayne has been presented to have a “playboy millionaire” personality. That side of Bruce is nowhere to be found in this film. In this film, the trauma that Bruce faced after the murder of his parents does not reside deep within him. It exists freshly in his mind, and it shows. Robert Pattinson does an amazing job at conveying Bruce’s troubled state of mind to the audience. He feels down all the time, and feels somewhat uncomfortable living life as Bruce Wayne. Sometimes, he does not even change out of his Batman suit. When he does go out in public as Bruce Wayne, he is reserved and mostly keeps to himself, almost as if he is trying to vanish into the shadows, just like how Batman can. He seeks comfort and solace in the Batman suit. He could possibly only feel like himself and be himself in the suit, which was excellently pointed out by The Riddler in the film. The character of Batman feels like he has a split personality in this film, divided by his trauma, and I personally love that take on the character. 

Bruce Wayne, who realistically has eyeliner on

Performances and the Score

Lastly, I would like to touch on some aspects of the film that I don’t see getting enough recognition; the side performances and the score. Every single side character was amazing, in my opinion. Zoë Kravitz, Colin Farrell and Andy Serkis were all great in their roles. The stand-outs to me, though, are Jeffrey Wright and Paul Dano. Jeffrey Wright had an insanely high chemistry with Robert Pattinson, and their two characters are able to go back and forth so well, but are also able to convey a believable conflict when necessary. Paul Dano, though, silently stole the show. I was a huge fan of his performance in Prisoners, and he does it again here. He is phenomenal. His face is covered for a large portion of the runtime, and he hence has to rely on only his voice to effectively play The Riddler. And boy does he do it well. He is so creepy and menacing, and invoked a feeling of true fear from me. As a small side note, I am excited beyond belief to see how Barry Kheoghan plays The Joker in the future. Moving on, Michael Giacchino’s score. The man is insane. The strings, the beats, the ringing of a church bell from time to time. The Batman theme is incredible. The rest of the score follows in the footsteps of the theme, and truly succeeds at making the tension and excitement rise through the roof throughout the film. 

Robert Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz as the bat and the cat

Conclusion

I really enjoyed this film. Before it started, I was very wary of its runtime, but it worked out great in the end. If anything, I have one tiny issue with the film, and that is I wish the final step in The Riddler’s plan was explained better and less rushed. Besides that tiny concern, I believe that The Batman is a phenomenal film and a great take on the character and his universe. Matt Reeves truly did well.