When I went to watch this film, I looked across the cinema and my face fell. It was Surbiton Rebel Wilson Fan Club’s writer, with their massive box of popcorn. I was polite and said “Hello” They replied with a G’day and said they were looking forward to this film. Upon me asking why, they said they were looking forward to seeing Rebel in it. My heart sank, was I in the wrong film? Short answer is no. They were confused because when they heard it had Cat Woman in it, they thought it meant the woman from Tom Hooper’s 2019 disaster Cats. It doesn’t have Rebel and when they realised, they promptly left.

Sometimes a great film seems impossible to make, whether down to the subject matter, or previous history. Even thinking about the “Last Train to New York” remake of Korean zombie masterpiece Train to Busan leave one feeling physically queasy. Following the origin story Joker’s failure to live up to The Dark Knight, I went into The Batman with very low expectations. This film wouldn’t be able to live up to the Bale/Ledger benchmark, surely? And does it hit those heights? No it doesn’t. However, it certainly gets close.

Here’s the important thing to remember before watching batman. He’s not really a super hero. Much like in The Dark Knight his agenda isn’t going around beating up bad guys. Instead, it relies more on being a detective. If you expect a marvel, you won’t get it. Instead you find yourself watching a gothic noir mystery film. When a mayoral candidate is murdered by the self-titled “Riddler”, Batman and officer Gordon are given a string of clues by him about the next victim they have to work out in time. The whole movie works in a similar way to those early Cumberbatch Sherlock episodes with Moriarty, where Sherlock attempts to solve these puzzles and work out the endgame.

Much like Moriarty, The Riddler works from within the shadows, rather appropriately like Batman. This provides an interesting look at the film. The Riddler is against corruption and wants justice, but from a hidden place. It’s almost a form of vigilantism which parallels Batman, creating this unnerving foe who is on evil footing. While The Joker is big and performative and unpredictably mad, it’s almost what you don’t see which allows the Riddler to provide the tension.

Interestingly, and some may say limiting this film, we never really get to know Batman. He is always behind a mask (whether physically or metaphorically) and doesn’t really show any form of emotion. In some ways this is frustrating, but in other ways, it allows us to reflect. He fundamentally isn’t our window into the film. We don’t see things from his perspective, as much as the warmer Officer Gordon, Alfred the Butler or Cat Woman. It’s through each of these upstanding characters in a corrupt Gotham that we learn to trust Bruce Wayne, as well as our prior knowledge of the hero. It shifts our interests more to the mystery than the human characters, much like The Third Man.

Alongside Robert Pattinson’s well acted emo bat, we also meet Cat Woman, this time portrayed by Zoe Kravitz. She and Pattinson have a brilliant chemistry. Both want justice, but for Batman’s cold headedness, Cat Woman provides a shorter temper and a willingness to do whatever it takes to perform a more righteous form of justice, leaving the hero in the shadows feeling exposed and with another thing to worry about.

As well as the plot, the film is of arthouse brilliance. The use of light throughout is such a key element. Batman is regularly in the dark, but when placed in sunsets, the light around him contrasting his back suit in an almost silhouette manner just works wonders. Matt Reeves, the director, knows exactly what he’s doing and how he’s framing everything and it makes the film so visually pleasing with some truly epic moments, the best of which is Bat Man walking with flames behind him and the camera being at a strange angle.

As well as the look the soundtrack is equally delightful. A large part of it seems to be somewhat derivative from the classical piece Ave Maria. However, away from that you have this creeping growing somewhat intimidating orchestral score which both suits the film and sounds absolutely fantastic. This is the sort of theme which in years to come should be seen as up there with Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings.

As much as the film gets right, its not without its flaws. There is a bit too much narrative exposition for my liking, as especially at the beginning the film feels the need to tell you a lot. The big flaw however is the last 30 minutes. It feels like they felt the need for an epic conclusion. For the sake of spoilers, I won’t go too much into it. It just felt there was an unnatural twist which hadn’t been lead up to. If the film had ended 20 minutes earlier, it would’ve been much more satisfying, instead it went down the whole “Gotham is bad” route and that’s frustrating as we’ve already seen that in films such as Joker.

Despite this, there is still a good two and a half hours of constant creeping tension which only the best films manage to sustain, even with the deliberate more plodding pace than the constantly frantic Dark Knight. The film gives you time to breathe and is all the better for it.

Summary

The Batman achieves the almost impossible by creating a film worthy of almost standing shoulder to shoulder with The Dark Knight. While you don’t have the manical Heath Ledger, The Batman provides a much more deliberate gothic almost noir detective drama which remains tense and engaging throughout, while also looking and sounding incredible. [Grade: A-]

See. I can like popular films as well. Who’s the snob now