Year: 2005
- Director: Christopher Nolan
- Series Rank: #2
- Year Rank: #7
- Oscar Nominations: Cinematography
- Nighthawk Nominations: Editing, Original Score, Sound, Art Direction, Sound Editing
- Batman Villains: Liam Neeson (Ducard), Cillian Murphy (Scarecrow), Tom Wilkinson (Carmine Falcone), Ken Watanabe (Ra’s Al Ghul)
- Love Interest: Katie Holmes (Rachel Dawes)
- Batman Allies: Michael Caine (Alfred), Gary Oldman (Jim Gordon), Morgan Freeman (Lucius Fox)
Non comic book fans always complain that the first movie in a comic book movie series must deal with the dreaded origin story (comic book fans, on the other hand, don’t mind seeing Peter get bitten, Kal-El rocketing away from Krypton or Bruce deciding what will drive fear into the hearts of that cowardly lot). This film has a double burden because not only is it the origin story, but it’s one we’ve already seen before. Like The Exorcist, Jaws and Halloween, this film must live with starting an unfortunate trend, but like those three films it does it so well, we try not to lay the blame on this film. It’s the first reboot of a super-hero film franchise. While the stretch from 1989 to 1997 had three different Batmans, it had one continuous series. But now, we’ve dropped all that, gone back to the basics and found out where it all started. We’ve moved away from the camp that Schumacher and Goldsman had brought to the character and returned to its roots, to the darkness in that alley when his parents are gunned down, to the corruption in Gotham that causes the city to fester and stink, to the dark soul of a man who feels the need to dress up as a bat and bring fear to the people who deserve it. He is a man, that, like is said about him in this film, clearly has issues and we will find out what those issues are. (more…)