Friday, July 15, 2005
The "Realism" of Batman Begins
There's been a lot of talk about the "realism" of Batman Begins, as opposed to the more fantastical version by Tim Burton. People have hypothesized that Nolan will not include more exotic and far-fetched characters like Mr. Freeze, The Riddler, Bane, the Mad Hatter, Clayface and so on, in future Batman outings. "It just doesn't hold with Nolan's realistic Batman."
To that, I offer this thought: There are none of the costume-and-mask characters Batman Begins because Batman is the cause this phenomenon. The phenomenon is a direct reaction to the arrival of the Batman.
It's a Yin/Yang thing. The criminal element overtaking Gotham when Bruce is young has thrown the city out of balance. The restoration of balance occurs when Bruce's parents are killed. He becomes the Batman, and begins to restore balance.
The problem is, he is too effective. The pendulum swings the other way and the side of good overwhelms the city's criminal element. As a response, these maniacal super-villains emerge. Their costumes and M.O.s are the distorted reflection of Batman's.
The ultimate example of this is the Joker. The Joker is the antithesis of Batman, representing everything Batman does not. Batman stands for truth, justice, reason. He's always stoic and deadly serious. The Joker, on the other hand, is pure, homicidal insanity, destruction and chaos wrapped up in a purple suit.
Of course, the balance in Gotham is best represented by Two-Face. This is a classic theme, one that can be found in classics like "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" (which creators Bob Kane and Bill Finger used as inspiration for Two-Face). It's a battle between our destructive, animal nature and the logical higher-reason aspects of our minds.
So, I think that as Batman continues, the world of Gotham will continue to get more bizarre and less "real." As Batman descends further into his own psychosis (and let's face it, he is crazy in his own right), Gotham will descend into madness with him. I think Nolan will take us there.
Writer: Frank Miller
Artist: Jim Lee
Miller is back with a vengeance. After the clusterfook that was 'The Dark Knight Returns 2" I thought Miller had spent most of his writing mojo in the 80's and early 90's. This book made me shut my mouth.
This is a continuation of Year One and a masterful one at that.
Burton's Gotham city and charachters were a tip of the hat to the silver age of comic books. Everthing was larger than life. The dialogue was one camp line after another. Let's be honest, we all loved the first Batman, but show me one line that wasn't a set up for the "par um pum" punch line.
Nolan as we have said time and time again borrowed diurectly from Frank Miller's 80's rendetion of the Dark Knight. He put a man under the cowl. Not just a stereotype.
I think Nolan's interpretation of the more colorful Bat charachters are going to be a huge departure from the Burton rogues gallery.
I guess only time will tell. But there is one piece of cheese here that left the theater with some hard nipples for what is in store.
Many of the villains in Batman are very similar. The Joker, Two-Face, Mr. Freeze and Clayface were all normal men transformed by a tragic accident. Most of the villains are simple regular people rendered criminally insane. Again, the Joker, Two-Face, Mad Hatter, the Ventriloquist, Scarecrow and so on. The rest are just criminals with a signature (Penguin, Catwoman, etc.) The point is, by and large these are all normal human beings, when you get down to it.
Granted, it does tread into the realm of sci-fi in some cases (think Mr. Freeze), but there's no reason it can't be approached seriously. Mr. Freeze is a tragic character. Watch his first appearance on the Animated Series and you'll know what I mean.
Anyway, where they differ the most is in style. Burton has always been willing to sacrifice story for style. He has always been more interested in the way a movie looks rather than the story. (Think Planet of the Apes or Sleepy Hollow). So, we got a Gotham that was highly stylized, something out of a German expressionist film.
Nolan took another approach. Whereas Burton was more the stylized feel of "The Dark Knight Returns," Nolan went for the more down-to-earth feel of "Batman: Year One." Gotham was no longer a city of imagaination. It felt like a real place, like Nolan took the worst parts of New York and Chicago and slapped 'em together. Instead of deviating from the source material to suit his film, he changed his film to suit the source.
<< Home
