Downey, no doubt. He’s playing Tony STark – admittedly, Tony Stark and Robert Downey are pretty similar dudes.
Bale isn’t playing Bruce Wayne. The Nolan Batman movies are good, but they’re not about Batman; they’re about some different character with the same name and a similar costume. Batman is a character who is built completely on a shellshocked eight year old’s view of what it is possible for him to become; the great part of the Batman character is that his will is so strong and his mind is so engaged that he managed to transcend the limits of the possible to actually become what his naive eight year old self thought he could be.
Bale is playing a different character – he spends most of the second movie wishing he could stop being Batman and trying to find a way out. That’s not the way the comic book Batman sees things, even if he does have the occasional crisis of faith.
Plus, ISTM that Bale gets Bruce Wayne all wrong – I only see Patrick Bateman. That is, it should be clear to anyone that that persona is an act. Wayne isn’t smarmy; he’s a flibberdigibbet. That doesn’t come through on Bale performance at all. I agree that Conroy’s is the classic performance of the character – he gets that Wayne is a very charming guy who simply seems unreliable, not unpleasant.
Pleasant is the best definition of the classic Bruce Wayne. My favorite appearance by him is in the two-part Animated episode, “The Cat and the Claw.” Bruce remains clearly different from Batman. He’s pleasant. And he’s caring. And empathetic to Selena. Enough that the tough woman she is, is seduced by him. He’s the feelings Batman can’t express. And yet, there’s enough for a whole person there. Admittedly, he can only be that caring and empathetic because he’s so rich he can go ‘why not do it this way?’ and presto, it can be done. But heck, Batman’s the same way.
I think Bale had too much baggage to compete with. He’s not only competing with other actors, he’s also competing with himself. In the two other Bale movies I’ve seen (the Dragon one and the one about burning books I always misspell the title to) he’s got just about the same character: tortured, lost family, etc.
Downey, on the other hand, had a completely clean slate. Comic book Tony had no defining personality characteristics so he was free to create whatever he wanted. I’m very glad he didn’t try to make fans happy but instead tried to make Tony his own creation.
… what? Tony Stark had no defining personality characteristics? I mean, besides his ego, his penchant for randomly being the world’s biggest playboy, his insane sense of competitivity? His tendency to, repeatedly, decide he’s the only one who knows how to go save the world, then go and implement it by cutting everyone off at the knees? (He’s done it like three times now.)
Bale lost me with that Batman “growl” that they also used for Rorshach. Dozens of actors, from Pitt and Cruise on down, could do an equally credible turn as Batman. NO ONE could do Tony Stark as well as Downey did.
I loved both Iron Man and The Dark Knight in completely different way and for wholly different reasons.
But in my opinion,*** Iron Man ***worked primarily because of Robert Downey Jr., whereas The Dark Knight worked primarily because of Christopher Nolan. Several good actors could have stepped in and accomplished what Bale did, but Downey would have been MUCH harder to replace.
I should point out a true fact: Iron Man 1 was largely improvised.
This explains some of the incoherence in minor bits. But it also means that Downey owned the role in ways that almost no actor could, because he was the writer as well.
It certainly helps Downey’s case that the Tony Stark in the Ultimate comic line IS basically Robertt Downey Jr. The character is written specifically for him, and the movies crib from that directly.
True story: I mentioned to my wife, who has never read a superhero comic in her life, that I thought the Tony Stark/Iron Man lead casting was perfect back when it was first announced. She asked me who they cast. Instead of telling her, I thoroughly described the character, then asked who she thought would be the perfect actor for that part. She thought for a minute, then said, “James Spader.” I said that was not a bad thought, but he was probably too old. So she thought for another minute, then said, “Robert Downey Jr.”
I imagine that the hardest job in this regard for the casting director of Iron Man was in convincing Downey to take the role.
(Now that I look, Spader is only five years older than Downey. I wonder how he’d have done playing Stark?)
I dunno how often it works out for everybody (actor, source material, or fans) that just by chance, the actor has similar issues as the character in real life. That RDJ’s life seems to parallel Stark’s in some ways doesn’t make him the ideal choice. His life also resembled Sherlock Holmes, and he pretty much screwed up that role.
Based on the comics, unlike all the other heroes I’ve always felt that Bruce Wayne was Batman’s alter ego. When he goes to sleep, Bruce Wayne is the dream, and Batman the reality. I’ve never seen any of the actors of Batman nail this. They always take the Batman is the mask attitude to the character. I think he’s sad and more tragic than that. None of the actors see it the same as I do and so while I say hat Michael Keaton and Christian Bale were the best Batmen, neither of them were as good as the Downey/Stark combo. Stark’s a drunk. He’s never been my favorite hero. Iron Man, until recently, was his body guard and the two were distinct and seperate identities. I always had this feeling that Tony resented Iron Man for the pressure he put on him and he would have walked away if he could. Stark in the movie is a lot more playfula nd fun however. He’s not the angry drunk he was in comics.
Of course I haven’t read a Batman or Iron Man comic in a good 10-15 years, so things might have changed since I last read one.
I viewed the Sherlock Holmes movie as being a Batman movie. In that regard, it was excellent. Batman actually did something akin to investigation, rather than just being an action hero.
Heh, good point: if you try to imagine Sherlock Holmes as anything other than a movie about Sherlock Holmes, it’s probably better for everyone involved.
