Batman Begins plot discussion [OPEN SPOILERS!]

[CandidGamera]

Just saw the film, at last.

Wow. They got it right.

Regarding the Microwave Generator - maybe it only works on water in metal pipes?

Not sure.

Didn’t care for the Scarecrow’s mask, and I thought Alfred and Gordon were badly cast with regard to physical tape, but of course brilliantly played by their respective actors. Didn’t care for Alfred’s accent, I usually expect a more prim and proper upper-class Alfred.

I got a major chuckle when the Scarecrow set Batman on fire, as this went through my head :

“How 'bout a little fire, Scarecrow?”
“Sure!”

[Wolfian]

@CandidGamera

Didn’t care for the Scarecrow’s mask, and I thought Alfred and Gordon were badly cast with regard to physical tape, but of course brilliantly played by their respective actors. Didn’t care for Alfred’s accent, I usually expect a more prim and proper upper-class Alfred.

After listening to Efrem Zimbalist Jr. (aka the animated Alfred) for the past ten years Caine’s Alfred was a little odd at first, but he really nailed that part.

[Reyemile]

I definitely loved the movie, and was perfectly willing to overlook the stupidity of the microwave generator et. al in deference to the excellent mood and character studies. But there is one minor gripe I want to add to the list of complains about the movie. To me, it appears that in the Batman Begins universe, the only thing more common than hydrogen is poetic irony.

Let’s start with the basics. Batman is afraid of bats and briminals, so he poetically reverses it by making criminals afraid of bats.

Then Scarecrow gets his fear gas turned on him.

Ra’s al Ghul get’s to get HIS ironic turnabout by leaving Bruce for dead in a burning house, only to die by ironic turnabout as Batman spins the “attention to surroundings” bit back at him.

Katie holmes gets her “It’s not who you are inside, it’s what you do” line turned back on her by Bruce as he shows off how cool he is and that he’s not a manslut.

And finally, Rutger Hauer gets a double wammy, with both his “Didn’t you get the memo” line and his “it’s complicated” snub slammed back in his face in the final boardroom scene.

Things get turned back on their originators, you reap what you sow, we get the frickin’ idea, already! Sheesh.

But yeah, aside from that, loved it

[Marley23]

@Reyemile

But there is one minor gripe I want to add to the list of complains about the movie. To me, it appears that in the Batman Begins universe, the only thing more common than hydrogen is poetic irony.

Dammit! My one major gripe, and I read the whole thread and find someone’s noted it in the last post. Every movie these days uses this device a little, but they poured it on in this one. About six times more than was necessary, if you ask me. I liked Liam Neeson’s line about ‘you burned down my house and left me for dead,’ but I couldn’t get over two things: the idea of burning down Stately Wayne Manor really bugged me, and the whole thing burned pretty fast considering it was made out of stone.

Bale definitely overdid the testosterone growl as Batman. If you wanted to put a positive spin on it, we DID have one angry Batman in this movie. “SWEAR TO ME!” Yipes! And I agree about the identity thing. Alfred has to know, but now Rachael knows, Fox tacitly knows, and it should be obvious to a lot of other people, like anybody who does Wayne Corp. accounting and noticed they’ve sold a lot of their never-used experimental prototypes lately. Sort of a problem, I think.

Cillian Murphy was really, really good. And that was Gary Oldman? Shit.

[Silentgoldfish]

@Marley23

anybody who does Wayne Corp. accounting and noticed they’ve sold a lot of their never-used experimental prototypes lately. Sort of a problem, I think.

Eh? You actually think he bought them? They joke around about it a little but I thought it was pretty clear that he just took them with no one knowing they’d gone out of storage but Fox. I mean sure, if someone else wanted to have a look at that stuff, but they’d always have to go through Fox so that’s not a problem, movie or plot wise I don’t think.

[Marley23]

@Silentgoldfish

Eh? You actually think he bought them? They joke around about it a little but I thought it was pretty clear that he just took them with no one knowing they’d gone out of storage but Fox. I mean sure, if someone else wanted to have a look at that stuff, but they’d always have to go through Fox so that’s not a problem, movie or plot wise I don’t think.

The one-of-a-kind items, sure. But there’s a scene where Bruce and Alfred talk about buying the items in bulk so nobody gets suspicious. They get 10,000 cowls, learn the graphite is defective, and then have to buy 10,000 more.

[Wolfian]

@Marley23

The one-of-a-kind items, sure. But there’s a scene where Bruce and Alfred talk about buying the items in bulk so nobody gets suspicious. They get 10,000 cowls, learn the graphite is defective, and then have to buy 10,000 more.

I thought they bought them via a dummy company from China.

[Lok]

@Wolfian

I thought they bought them via a dummy company from China.

And they weren’t buying them from Wayne corporation.

Lok

[Scott_Plaid]

@cbawlmer

Victor Zasz appears briefly.

No, they put some sort of extra on for a few minutes, and called him by that name. :mad: Where are the scars? The crewcut? The camera lingering on the look of madness in his eyes?

@BayleDomon

The idea was actually for a renewal of the city. In the “League of Shadows” opinion, when a city as a whole grows too big and seedy and corrupt for their likings, it’s their job to raze it and force people to start anew. Essentially like formatting your computer and restoring a clean backup periodically to get rid of spy ware and viruses.

After an hour of browsing around, your city will come down with all kinds of harmful ideologies, if you have not installed a firewall. Also, fires will spread faster.

[cbawlmer]

@Scott Plaid

No, they put some sort of extra on for a few minutes, and called him by that name. :mad: Where are the scars? The crewcut? The camera lingering on the look of madness in his eyes?

The scars, etc. are visible later, when he’s in Arkham.

[Acsenray]

Who is Victor Zasz? A google search didn’t turn up anything.

[Scott_Plaid]

@cbawlmer

The scars, etc. are visible later, when he’s in Arkham.

Huh. Didn’t notice. He is a psycho killer. For each victiom, he carves a lscar on his skin. Also, he usually goes around shirtless.

[cbawlmer]

@Scott Plaid

Huh. Didn’t notice. He is a psycho killer. For each victiom, he carves a lscar on his skin. Also, he usually goes around shirtless.

Presumably his lawyer advised against that during his court appearance.

[CandidGamera]

Try Zsasz. Victor Zsasz. His last name is palindromic.

And very similar to Charles Victor Szasz, AKA the Question.

[Hey_It_s_That_Guy]

@CandidGamera

Try Zsasz. Victor Zsasz. His last name is palindromic.

And very similar to Charles Victor Szasz, AKA the Question.

When someone mentioned “Victor Zsasz” was in the movie, I freaked out, because I thought one of my favorite characters, the Question, had a cameo appearance! I’m still waiting for a Question movie to be made, though. He is one of the more cinematic and filmable comic book heroes.

[Wolfian]

@Big Bad Voodoo Lou

When someone mentioned “Victor Zsasz” was in the movie, I freaked out, because I thought one of my favorite characters, the Question, had a cameo appearance! I’m still waiting for a Question movie to be made, though. He is one of the more cinematic and filmable comic book heroes.

Considering the amount of air-time he’s getting on the animated Justice League and the critical acclaim for Sin City and Batman Begins (dark, gritty, and “realistic” comic book movies) that could happen. I wouldn’t hold my breath, but it could.

[Larry_Borgia]

Just saw this movie and loved it. Best Batman Ever!

I realize I am in the minority, but I thought Katie Holmes was fine. I actually thought her youth worked in making her an idealist who had not yet been compromised by the system, as even Gordon was at first. (Compromised, not corrupted. “I’m no rat, and who is there to rat too, anyway.”)

As for the microwave generator, the reason humans weren’t vaporized was because of the mitochloridians in human blood.

I do agree that the fight scenes could have been less confusing. This seems to be a trend in a lot of movies now, and one that’s getting kinda played. See The Bourne Supremacy for example.

I liked the closing lines too:

Gordon: I never thanked you.
Batman: You’ll never have to.

A bit Ayn Randish, but that’s fine in small doses.

I did like that millionaire Bruce Wayne was shown as having some business savvy, and that they threw in some scenes of him putting on a playboy facade.

Overall, really cool. I hope Nolan stays on for at least one sequel, and that he takes some lessons in filming fight scenes.

[Steve_MB]

@ArchiveGuy

Adding of Holmes, "She won’t be in the sequel… the next romantic interest will be a much stronger actress.

Oh, that really narrows it down…

[Pedro]

Damn I hated this movie! What a waste of time and money. I swear I went in with an open mind.

First of all the action scenes sucked and it ruined the movie. The quick sequence of close ups was a blur and made me physically unconfortable.

Let’s see, what’s left, the plot. Laughable. Full of holes, clichéd, predictable, bland and ridiculously far-fetched. The beginning was alright, but only because I was trying really hard to enjoy the movie. Although The League of Shadows needs a primer in explosives safety. Did they fill the walls with gunpowder or what? And gunpowder doesn’t produce those flames but whatever. I won’t even mention stuff like the fact that Wayne Manor crumbled down like a sand castle because the curtains were on fire. And why did the exit of the Opera house lead to a run down back alley? They didn’t even explain convincingly why placing the mob guy on the scene was indicative of anything but kidnapping (something about fingerprints). And for a guy with a bullet proof vest batman was strangely vulnerable to a good kneeing on the ribs. Wayne was bleeding seriously after the fire but conveniently that is completely ignored afterwards. I’m sure I’m forgetting many other things that pissed me off. It seems like every single scene had a hole or was completely contrived.

The acting was not bad. Bale was OK but that female DA was unbearable, both the acting and the character. Morgan Freeman deserves much better.

The movie has one or two memorable lines but when the zombies teamed up (powerful psychotropic hallucinogenic drugs work in mysterious ways apparently) with the scarecrow riding a horse shooting flames from its mouth to get the little boy I was ready to leave, but summoned some superpowers because of my friend.

[Shodan]

@Sam Lowry

I agree with you on this. The crime boss earlier in the movie was screaming his head off, and all she was doing was sitting there looking a little freaked out.

True dat.

I am not sure I can articulate why some plot holes are endearingly forgivable, and some drop off the screen with a clank and break the flow. The Magic Water Vaporizer of Death is funny and forgivable - Katie Holmes (and the street kid who Batman gives the periscope) reacting differently from everybody else to Scarecrow’s panic gas - clank.

Overall - B at best, and not a B+ either.

Action scenes were filmed interestingly. If they didn’t want to escalate the wire-work standards of many recent films, the confused blur of combat came across well. Katie Holmes is a completely forgettable piece of eye candy, and should have been treated that way - i.e. drop the whole lost/reunited/relost lovers from childhood subplot. Liam Niessan holding his own with Batman in a sword fight? Come on.

The Scarecrow was great. Especially that effeminate looking actor playing him. And it set up the “here come a batch of super villians next time” well.

Bale is fine as Batman. Michael Caine as Alfred - not so much. That cockney accent is completely out of place - Alfred is supposed to be dignified, not a smart-ass. Where the heck did Bruce Wayne learn to be a super-martial arts guy? He could do that in the Chinese prison, long before he went to the top of the mountain. And by the way, if he had to struggle his way up a mountainside, how did Ras make it there before him without messing up his nice suit?

The whole Legion of Shadows thing was fine but overdone. Batman is about the gadgets - the Batmobile (which should not be a tank, but sleekly futuristic), the utility belt, the batarang - “wonderful toys”. What the heck is he doing sword-fighting?

Biggest problem - they’re messing with the canon, especially the canon of the films. That is not how the Joker comes to Batman’s attention, darnit. And if you start doing that, there is no sense of continuity to the character and the whole series gets broken up.

Maybe that’s why I stopped reading comic books - the tendency for a new author to come along and say, “No, that never happened.” That violates the “willing suspension of disbelief” that makes the whole movie possible. If they do that, then there is no tension to sustain the series from movie to movie.

If this is the start of a new canon, I guess I can wait and see how it develops. If they are going to start from scratch every time, forget it. They are bringing a well known character to life, not rewriting him from scratch.

Regards,
Shodan