The Batman has been a long-awaited film for many superhero and DC fans, as it’s, the first solo Batman movie since Nolan’s ‘The Dark Knight Rising’ 10 years ago. Many fans were sceptical of Robert Pattinson playing The Batman as his role in the infamous Twilight movies wasn’t giving fans any hope of fully portraying Batman the way they thought he would.
Robert Pattinson and director Matt Reeves created the perfect adaptation of The Batman and showcased how broken Bruce Wayne is due to his childhood past i.e. his parents were shot but he still remained rich. But, unlike all the other Batman movies, ‘The Batman’ embodies everything that Batman is supposed to embody from his dark gritty childhood to becoming Gotham's greatest detective. He’s everyone’s Batman, even though he’s still Bruce Wayne and gets to cosy up in his massive mansion at the end of the day.
Why is Robert Pattinson the Perfect Batman?
I personally still have a questionable take on this adaptation, mainly as The Batman starts approximately 2 years into the chaos, and there are many unanswered questions. Such as how the Joker already ended up in Arkham Asylum. I don’t hate the film nor do I fully like it, but Robert Pattinson is a better Batman than Ben Affleck, and here's why.
Robert Pattinson’s The Batman or ‘Vengenace’ as Gotham city call him, is so perfect in every aspect such that his version of Batman is broken in every aspect, he can’t even be the billionaire playboy people in Gotham want him or expect him to be.
His Bruce Wayne is so far from reality that each time he does make an appearance in public he finds himself reliving pieces of his childhood and still trying to solve the murder of his parents, Thomas and Martha. We don’t get a scene on how they died and through that, we see the impact it had on Bruce now as an adult. So much care was put into The Batman as ‘Bruce Wayne’ is a crippled child in a man's body who can’t be loved and trying to understand the world (Gotham) and why it is evil and self-destructive as it is.
The Batman’s Bruce Wayne is so subtle and simple that we feel the character's emotions through his eyes- he doesn’t have to say anything for us to know what’s happening or what he’s feeling. We as viewers could just feel it, every intensity in every moment.
The slight voice change when he's afraid of losing Alfred. Terrified of being alone.
It's the ease when Selina Kyle is around. He wants himself to allow her to love him but he can’t when he’s Bruce Wayne because he’s too broken. He must unmask everyone else before he can unmask his dark past.
When he’s just himself… Bruce Wayne and not The Batman, it’s like we see this vulnerable layer to Bruce Wayne and this separates his whole Character from being Batman, unlike the Nolan films. Robert Pattinson portrays his role as Bruce and Batman as two different persons which is rather breathtaking. When he isn’t Batman, we get a sense of confusion from Bruce, lack of purpose as he is merely seen as a billionaire amongst the people of Gotham and his wealth is the only integrity he carries as a person.
The Villians
Before seeing the movie, like many people I was very wary of how the villains would be as the Riddlers costume wasn’t very ‘evil’ as we didn’t expect him to terrorise Batman and Gotham the way he did and it was beautiful. It was great to see how well Batman's detective skills actually were in the final scene when Gotham flooded and had a delayed response solving that final piece of the puzzle until the Riddler had taunted Bruce instead of calling him Batman.
In that scene, we could see how Bruce Wayne tries so hard to separate Batman from his true self as the anger and pain he has as Bruce Wayne is not portrayed when he is dressed as The Batman as he mainly seeks vengeance for the weaker people of Gotham.
The other villain in this adaptation is the Penguin, who is a mobster running an underground club within a club. That's how Batman met Selina and discovered she was Catwoman. Although we don’t get to see the full evil of the Penguin, we get a great or rather AMAZING car chase scene from Batman and the Penguin as he has intel on who the snitch in the police department is, that caused all the chaos the Riddler was bringing upon Gotham. It was beautifully shot and Matt Reeves did a great job directing the whole film.
Overall, The Batman is a solid 8.5/10.
